I Introduction.- Introducing the Cast for Social Computing: Life-Like Characters.- II Languages and Tools for Life-Like Characters.- Representing and Parameterizing Agent Behaviors.- Toward a Unified Scripting Language: Lessons Learned from Developing CML and AML.- APML, a Markup Language for Believable Behavior Generation.- STEP: a Scripting Language for Embodied Agents.- gUI: Specifying Complete User Interaction.- A Behavior Language: Joint Action and Behavioral Idioms.- BEAT: the Behavior Expression Animation Toolkit.- Galatea: Open-Source Software for Developing Anthropomorphic Spoken Dialog Agents.- MPML and SCREAM: Scripting the Bodies and Minds of Life-Like Characters.- III Systems and Applications.- Great Expectations: Prediction in Entertainment Applications.- Shallow and Inner Forms of Emotional Intelligence in Advisory Dialog Simulation.- Web Information Integration Using Multiple Character Agents.- Expressive Behaviors for Virtual Worlds.- Playing with Agents ¿ Agents in Social and Dramatic Games.- A Review of the Development of Embodied Presentation Agents and Their Application Fields.- Interface Agents That Facilitate Knowledge Interactions Between Community Members.- Animated Agents Capable of Understanding Natural Language and Performing Actions.- IV Synopsis.- What Makes Characters Seem Life-Like?.- Some Issues in the Design of Character Scripting and Specification Languages ¿ a Personal View.- Online Material.

Life-like characters is one of the most exciting technologies for human-computer interface applications today. They convincingly take the roles of virtual presenters, synthetic actors and sales personas, teammates and tutors. A common characteristic underlying their life-likeness or believability as virtual conversational partners is computational models that provide them with affective functions such as synthetic emotions and personalities and implement human interactive behavior. The wide dissemination of life-like characters in multimedia systems, however, will greatly depend on the availability of control languages and tools that facilitate scripting of intelligent conversational behaviour. This book presents the first comprehensive collection of the latest developments in scripting and representation languages for life-like characters, rounded off with an in-depth comparison and synopsis of the major approaches. Introducing toolkits for authoring animated characters further supports the ease of use of this new interface technology.
Life-like characters being a vibrant research area, various applications have been designed and implemented. This book offers coverage of the most successful and promising applications, ranging from product presentation and student training to knowledge integration and interactive gaming. It also discusses the key challenges in the area and provides design guidelines for employing life-like characters.