The development of realistic computer-generated synthetic environments, also calleddistributed virtual environments, relies heavily upon computer-generated actors (CGAs) to provide accurate behaviors at reasonable cost so that the synthetic environments are useful, affordable, complex, and high fidelity. Unfortunately, the pace of synthetic environment development and the level of desired CGA performance continue to rise at a much faster rate than CGA capability improvements. This insatiable demand for realism in CGAs for synthetic environments arises from the growing understanding of the significant role that modeling and simulation can play in a variety of uses. These uses include training, analysis, procurement decisions, mission rehearsal, doctrine development, force-level and task-level training, information assurance, cyberwarfare, force structure analysis, sustainability analysis, life cycle costs analysis, material management, infrastructure analysis, and many other uses. In these and other uses of military synthetic environments, CGAs play a central role because they have the potential to increase the realism of the environment while also reducing the cost of operating the environment. The progress made in addressing the technical challenges that must be overcome to realize effective and realistic CGAs for military simulation environments and the technical areas that should be the focus of future work are the subject of this paper, which surveys the technologies and progress made in the construction and use of CGAs. In this, the third installment in the series of papers discussing CGAs, we conclude our discussion of CGA technologies by concluding the discussion of human behavior modeling for CGAs, and we present some suggested future research directions for CGA technologies.

This content is only available as a PDF.
You do not currently have access to this content.