Programming a MOBA bot: any open-source genre entries or games with an open A.I. API?

Question

So some background: I play League of Legends (LoL) religiously and have a strong background in A.I. programming. In an attempt to put 2 and 2 together I've been trying to implement a bot for playing LoL, but have stymied by having to extract game-state information without access to the source code.

With that in mind, does anyone know of a MOBA that could sate my bot developing urges via being open-source? Alternatively, do you know if any AAA game companies (e.g. RIOT, Blizzard, Valve) would release some of their code (or even just an API) for research purposes (I'm in academia, so I could probably pass off my fascination as work related)?

Answer 1

I came across an article a couple weeks ago about a Stanford project to make a Starcraft 2 bot. It uses a DirectX interceptor to capture and decode the graphics. I won't have time to play with it until after the semester ends.

In a different project (also waiting for the end of the semester), the creators of Arx Fatalis released the source code. Since the source lacks the graphics and resource files, you'll need to spend $5 on Steam to get a copy of the game (if you don't have one already).

Answer 2

So League of Legends and any other AAA company most likely will not release any API to directly control bots in their MOBA game but that doesn't have to stop you!

You should try creating an AI bot in the original Defense of the Ancients for Warcraft 3 using their JASS/JASS2 scripting language that the World Editor provides.

• http://dota-map-ai.blogspot.com/

Dota-Map-AI for example created DOTA AI bots

Answer 3

I had your same idea time ago and have some eperience in LUA, Java, C++ and C# languages also i worked for a while in AI developing for gaming bots, and i play LoL too. As far as i know from an old WoW bot project i collaborated a little in the past, you need access to the API of the game, as in WoW certain API functions (and in our case none) are not published by the developer and must be unveiled through reverse engeneering on the program. Unless you find the code other ways...

Answer 4

We are a group of students planning on making an open source MOBA game during spring. The game gonna be build on Ogre c++ but the server will run on python. We're not gonna make AI but if you are interested we'd be glad to receive some help :)