Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 4/28/26 has been entered.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 1-4, 7-10, 13, 14, 16-18, 20-25 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rico (US 20210158589) in view of Kim (US 20220193554)
In claims 1 13, and 17, Rico discloses
Executing a video game to enable gameplay using a player character controlled by a player, wherein the gameplay produces game state data (the invention is describes as having a player who controls a player character within game states, such as paragraph 52, “a player walking along a trail”)
During execution of the video game, detecting an occurrence of one or more gameplay events based on a subset of the game state data (paragraph 26 “examining a scene from a game context. The game context may include a plurality of characters and corresponding voice outputs for the plurality of characters.”)
Generating context aware logic based on the subset of the game state data related to the one or more gameplay events wherein generating the context aware logic comprises generating, by a first model, the context aware logic based on (i) a model output indicative of a predicted gameplay event for the game state data and generated using the subset of the game state data, wherein the first model is trained to generate context aware logic for controlling NPC behavior based on predicted gameplay events and wherein the predicted gameplay event comprises a predicted outcome of a current scene of gameplay (certain portions of the scene may cause reactions, for example paragraph 34 describes “a villain character lurking at a distance” which causes the NPC to react by saying “quiet, danger ahead” meaning that a prediction is made as to a dangerous gameplay event)
Applying the context aware logic to an NPC that is associated with a current scene of gameplay, the context aware logic transforms a behavior of the NPC to be contextually interactive with the player character during the gameplay to alter the predicted outcome of the current scene of gameplay. (paragraph 34, in response to the villain character lurking at a distance “the NPC may turn its body towards the character and while making eye contact with the player’s avatar and whisper ‘quiet, danger ahead’ “, this alters the predicted outcome, as the character lurking ahead becomes less dangerous due to the user being prepared and not being surprise attacked or otherwise caught off guard.)
Rico fails to discloses that the context aware logic is based on user profile data indicative of a player’s skill, and the first model is trained to generate context aware logic based on user profile data indicative of a player’s skill, however Kim discloses the context aware logic is based on user profile data indicative of a player’s skill, and the first model is trained to generate context aware logic based on user profile data indicative of a player’s skill (paragraphs 57-59, the user profile data indicative of the players skill is the “skill level value input by the user”, and the NPC is modified based on the skill level value input by the user.) It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to combine Rico with Kim in order to allow for NPCs to have a level of skill similar to game users.
In claim 2, Rico discloses the context aware logic is compiled and instrumented to execute with interactivity logic of the NPC and wherein the behavior of the NPC is transformed for a period of time during which the context aware logic is applied (paragraph 30 discloses a standard reaction profile, which is then modified when the context aware logic is applied)
In claim 3, Rico discloses applying the context aware logic to the NPC is based on, at least in part, a gameplay mode indicative of a difficulty of the video game (it is noted by examiner that “a gameplay mode” is extremely broad, and would simply mean that something is occurring in the gameplay. Paragraph 34 discloses “a villain character lurking at a distance” when the context aware logic is applied, which teaches the BRI of a mode (such as a villain mode, or an attack mode). With respect to “indicative of a difficulty of the video game”, a dangerous character increases the difficulty of a video game)
In claim 4, Rico discloses the behavior of the NPC is transformed to be contextually interactive with the player character by causing the NPC to engage in speech communication with the player character (paragraph 34) the behavior of the NPC is transformed to be contextually interactive with the player character by causing the NPC to perform an action in relation to the player character (paragraph 34 “making eye contact with the player’s avatar”) or the behavior of the NPC is transformed to be contextually interactive with the player character by causing the NPC to provide assistance to the player character (paragraph 34)
In claim 7, Rico discloses applying activity settings that define whether a lower degree of context aware logic or a higher degree of context aware logic is to be applied to the NPC, wherein applying a lower degree of context aware logic to the NPC reduces a degree to which the NPC is contextually interactive with the PC during gameplay by the player, and applying a higher degree of context aware logic to the NPC increases a degree to which the NPC is contextually interactive with the PC during gameplay by the player (paragraph 37, higher priority NPCs have a higher degree of context aware logic than lower priority NPCs)
In claim 8, Rico discloses executing a context interactivity model to analyze features of the one or more gameplay events based on the subset of the game state data, wherein the context interactivity model is a different model than the first model, and generating by the context interactivity model, the model output indicative of a predicted outcome of a gameplay scene in the subset of the game state data (paragraph 46 discloses classifying the feature data with a machine learning model, which is different than the NPC animation model of paragraph 49, or the model which predicts the BLS (body language signal) as per paragraph 50. paragraph 36 discloses determining what is within the context of the scene was the game is occurring)
In claim 9, Rico discloses the model output comprises an output indicative a descriptive interactivity context for the gameplay scene, wherein the descriptive interactivity context comprises a description of the predicted gameplay event for the current scene of gameplay (paragraph 46)
In claim 10, Rico in view of Kim discloses the claimed invention except the video game includes one or more spectators and the one or more spectators comprise at least one of one or more additional NPCs or one or more additional players, however official notice is taken that allowing for players or NPCs to spectate the game was notoriously well known in the art before the effective filing date of the invention and it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to combine Rico and Kim with this well known technique in order to allow for streaming of games to create entertainment for more users.
In claims 14 and 18, Rico discloses the behavior of the NPC being contextually interactive with the player character is represented by having the NPC generate comments to the player character regarding actions occurring during execution of the video game (It is noted by examiner that this claims a Markush group, as such only 1 of the limitations needs to be found. paragraph 34)
In claims 16 and 20, Rico discloses the applying of the context aware logic to the NPC occurs for a period of time when the player character is within a halo space of the NPC in a scene of the video game, and wherein the behavior of the NPC is transformed to be contextually interactive with the player character for the period of time during which the context aware logic is applied (paragraph 35, zone of influence)
In claim 21, Rico discloses parsing the game state data to identify one or more gameplay activities, applying one or more rules to classify the one or more gameplay activities as a gameplay event and in response to classifying the one or more gameplay activities as the gameplay event, filtering the game state data to the subset of game state data corresponding to the one or more gameplay activities (paragraph 74-75, higher priority NPCs (and their associated gameplay event) are identified, and then game state data corresponding to the higher priority NPCs are filtered)
In claim 22, Rico discloses analyzing elements of a game scene indicated in the game state data to determine whether an element from the elements is relevant to identifying a location for navigation the NPC int eh game scene according to the context aware logic, determining one or more elements that are not relevant to identifying the location for navigation the NPC and excluding the one or more elements from the game state data to form the subset of the game state data (paragraphs 74-75, irrelevant NPCs are excluded from the subset of the game state data)
In claim 23, Rico discloses the context aware logic causes the NPC to engage with the player character using speech communication (paragraph 34), Rico in view of Kim fail to disclose the first model is configured to communicate with an LLM to generate the context aware logic and wherein, however Official notice is taken that LLMs was notoriously well known in the art before the effective filing date of the invention and it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to combine Rico in view of Kim with this well known technique in order to allow for the LLM to increase the breadth and efficiency of communication that can occur from the NPC.
In claim 24, Rico discloses the first model is a generative AI model trained to generate the context aware logic, and wherein the context aware logic causes the NPC to be contextually interactive with the player character by providing instructions for one or more user selectable inputs of an input device of the video game (paragraph 28)
In claim 25, Rico discloses the context aware logic causes the NPC to provide assistance to the player character to alter the predicted outcome of the current scene of the gameplay (warning a player of danger ahead is assistance that alters the predicted outcome as it reduces the danger such as from an ambush or surprise attack.)
Claim(s) 11 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rico in view of Kim in view of Omote (US 20220134225)
In claim 11, Rico in view of Kim fails to disclose the subset of game state data includes comments from one or more spectators and the behavior of the NPC is transformed by having the NPC communicate a sentiment of the one or more spectators to the player character, and applying mode settings that moderate an amount and a type of the sentiment of the one or more spectators that the NPC communicates to the PC however Omote discloses modifying a game to include comments from a spectator (figure 1, paragraph 37) and applying mode settings that moderate an amount and a type of the sentiment of the one or more spectators that the NPC communicates to the PC (paragraphs 82-83 disclose changing the size and color based on the emotion and volume). This would teach the invention as taught by Rico but including data from the spectators as taught by Omote. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to combine Rico in view of Kim with Omote in order to allow for spectators to feel more involved in the game.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. Applicant argues the amendments overcome the prior art of record however examiner disagrees as set forth in the rejection above.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to THOMAS HAYNES HENRY whose telephone number is (571)270-3905. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 10-6.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Peter Vasat can be reached at 571-270-7625. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/THOMAS H HENRY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3715
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