History Main / TheAllSeeingAI

* The ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquer: VideoGame/RedAlert'' series feature Gap Generators, structures which create a permanent shroud above itself, effectively hiding anything that is covered by its radius of effect. It is somewhat effective in multiplayer for long games, because it can hide units and structures, forcing your opponents to guess what sort of attack to send your way. However, it's completely useless against AI opponents, which are omniscient and can target any specific unit or structure, even ones that it isn't supposed to see. To be fair, the AI still won't be able to send any standard aircraft to attack units/structures within the Gap Generator's field of effect. Special Weapons utilising aircraft (Paratroopers, Spy Plane, Parabombs), however, can and will be used by the AI when possible.

* Go ahead and use Reptile's invisibility on any difficulty setting for ''VideoGame/MortalKombat2'', and see if the AI is at all inhibited by it.
* In ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros Melee'' and ''Brawl'', no InterfaceScrew in the world is going to deter the AI. Examples include:

** And in addition to general immunity to InterfaceScrew, the higher-level AI has superhuman reaction speed thanks to knowing your inputs. Melee level 9 [=CPUs=] were notorious for throwing out perfectly-timed jabs to interrupt most of your approaches and attacks, in addition to being able to consistently powershield, which is extremely difficult.
** ''Super Smash Bros for 3DS/Wii U'' had the amiibo figures that you can use. When Nintendo means that the amiibo learns from you, they mean that the amiibo can eventually know what your strategy is and counter them. This can even result in a CurbStompBattle.

A part of how TheComputerIsACheatingBastard, although it isn't ''strictly'' cheating, as the AI doesn't bend the game mechanics as such. Not to be confused with {{AI is a Crapshoot}} or {{The Computer is Your Friend}}, which tend to involve a more literal all-seeing, malicious AI that monitors your every move.

* In ''VideoGame/MountAndBlade'' AI does not have it's vision hurt by foggy/night battlefield. As the player is the only one that can use archers properly without Warband's AI upgrades (that is, put them on top of a hill and wait for the enemy), this tends to be in your favor.

* ''VideoGame/MarioParty1'': For Ground Pound, the AI [[ArtificialStupidity always gets one wrong for every one that it gets right]]. However, at the beginning of the game, you can see and memorize which posts are right and wrong before the butterflies land on them.

* ''[[VideoGame/PuyoPuyo Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary]]'' features the Searchlight mode, where, outside of Fever mode, the field is entirely obscured outside of a section that is visible through a rotating flashlight. The AI is completely unaffected by this. The same thing happens in ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyoTetris'', where Searchlight is one of the possible powerups that can be used on opponents in Party mode.

* ''[[VideoGame/PuyoPuyo Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary]]'' features the Searchlight mode, where, outside of Fever mode, the field is entirely obscured outside of a section that is visible through a rotating flashlight. The AI is completely unaffected by this. The same thing happens in ''Puyo Puyo Tetris'', where Searchlight is one of the possible powerups that can be used on opponents in Party mode.

* The ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquer: Red Alert'' series feature Gap Generators, structures which create a permanent shroud above itself, effectively hiding anything that is covered by its radius of effect. It is somewhat effective in multiplayer for long games, because it can hide units and structures, forcing your opponents to guess what sort of attack to send your way. However, it's completely useless against AI opponents, which are omniscient and can target any specific unit or structure, even ones that it isn't supposed to see. To be fair, the AI still won't be able to send any standard aircraft to attack units/structures within the Gap Generator's field of effect. Special Weapons utilising aircraft (Paratroopers, Spy Plane, Parabombs), however, can and will be used by the AI when possible.

** ''Tiberian Sun'' also cheats in skirmish mode. No matter the difficulty, the AI knows exactly where your Construction Yard is, even if you moved it halfway across the map prior to deploying it, so long as they have seen ''any'' of your ''units''. Even a lowly Scout Bike.

*** Oddly sometimes units will follow stealth units around..and then stand next to them, not attacking but frustrating your efforts to use those units.
** Support powers from later games are a particularly egregious case. The Soviet [[SelectiveMagnetism Magnetic Satellite]] from ''Red Alert 3'', for example, causes a warning flare to appear in an area, after which a beam sucking enemy units into space will fire down. Good luck seeing the flare when you're currently looking at the other end of the map. If you're unlucky, the only clue you'll have that the AI used the attack is that your fleet of Shogun Battleships has suddenly disappeared. The skirmish AI, however, will ''always'' notice, and move its units away. End result: an attack that's nigh-useless against the AI, but devastating against an unlucky human. For bonus points: you cannot use support powers in areas shrouded in FogOfWar (While for the AI, there is no such thing as Fog of War), and the AI is more than happy to use such powers against hidden units.

* In ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}: VideoGame/DawnOfWar'', the Imperial Guard [=AIs=] not only have the uncanny ability to know ''exactly'' where your stealthed units are, but also the ability to place long range auspex (radar) scans ''right on top of them''. To make matters worse, this ability has an unfairly short cooldown (for its effects, at least), and the Imperial Guard can have ''five'' HQ buildings and thus five scans, each on a separate cooldown from the others. This can be exploited by having some dummy stealthers around to attract auspex scans whilst the ''real'' stealth units do their work, but that's a waste for the most part. (It's a little less wasteful with the Tau or Space Marines, who have access to cheap stealth units.)

*** More annoying than this is the ability for the AI to send subterranean APCs full of engineers or other troops right into the middle of your base, '''even if the AI has never seen your base''' . When you have control over the same APCs, you can't send them anywhere that you haven't already been. A common tactic for Nod AI players in skirmish games is to rush the subterranean APCs and send one straight into your base immediately, capture your construction yard, and sell it. If you didn't manage to build a war factory before this happened, then you'll have no way of getting a new construction yard, essentially giving the AI the win.

* In VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft, Mobs can actually see you from behind. While yes, you could say they simply heard you walking, but they'll do it from about twenty feet away. But even worse than this? Mobs can see you ''through walls''. As long as you step into their aggro range, a mob will come screaming at you, whether it makes any sense or not. This was particularly bad underwater, like in a shipwreck, adding to the infuriating nature of underwater quests.

* VideoGame/WorldOfWarships gives the bot ships an unlimited sight range so they always know where player ships are (although in order to fire, they need to actually see the target), and unlimited torpedo detection so that bots have at least some chances to dodge them. Unlike most games, this is actually done not only to make human vs A.I. fights less of a CurbStompBattle every time, but to make the fights less frustrating: before the introduction of all-seeing bots, too many a Coop game would end in players gathered in one corner, with one or two bots blindly wandering on the opposite side of the map instead of coming towards the players for actual battle.

* Inverted in ''VideoGame/MarioKart Wii'', with the view-obscuring Blooper Ink interface screw. For regular players, it makes it hard to see what's up ahead of you, but certainly not hard to see where the track is. For computer-controlled players, however, expect to see extreme amounts of off-course racing when it happens!
** Likewise in ''VideoGame/MarioKart DS''. You could just switch to the bottom screen for the short time that the Ink is affecting you.
** Also in ''Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing'' (with Banjo-Kazooie), the Pocket Rainbow, which works like the Banana Peel of Mario Kart, but instead, acts like a Gooper Blooper. This is also inverted by the Shooting Star, which makes the player's screen turn upside-down.

* ''VideoGame/FarCry''

** Another silly example courtesy of ''Far Cry 3'' - at one point on the second island, you're disguised as a mercenary and tasked with assassinating 3 merc captains inside a base. If you kill a guard and someone discovers the body, everyone instantly knows you did it and comes gunning for you, even if you killed him silently with no witnesses and are on the other side of the camp when the body is found.

* VideoGame/WorldOfWarships gives the bot ships an unlimited sight range so they always know where player ships are (although in order to fire, they need to actually see the target), and unlimited torpedo detection so that bots have at least some chances to dodge them. Unlike most games, this is actually done not only to make human vs A.I. fights less of a CurbStormBattle every time, but to make the fights less frustrating: before the introduction of all-seeing bots, too many a Coop game would end in players gathered in one corner, with one or two bots blindly wandering on the opposite side of the map instead of coming towards the players for actual battle.

* ''VideoGame/DwarfFortress'', goblin invaders automatically know the shortest way into your fortress. The game is a good illustration of how omniscient pathing can be CPU-expensive -- especially with reproducing creatures, which is known as "[[http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2012:Catsplosion catsplosion]]". And ''[[AIBreaker how it can be exploited]]'': Dorf Fortress players being what they are, they figured out that if you keep two ways into your fortress and [[TacticalDoorUse alternately open and shut the doors hostiles approach]], it's possible to get the gobbos marching back and forth through your hallways full of [[DeathTrap giant swinging axe blades and walls of rotating saws]] until the entire siege [[LudicrousGibs is reduced to a fine paste]]. And that with one PressurePlate per exit you can [[http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/Trap_design#Goblin_Grinder automate it]] and they will never catch on.

* In ''Franchise/FireEmblem'' games, (6 to 10), on fog of war maps the enemies will know where you are. Always. What makes this even more frustrating is the fact that if the player runs into an enemy (in a space they cannot see) the character that was moving cannot perform any other actions for that turn. Enemies can charge right into your characters and attack anyway, crossing this into MyRulesAreNotYourRules.

* In just about every shooter, there will often be a lot of dust and smoke and explosions and whatnot cluttering up your vision, but the enemy AI will almost always be able to clearly see and shoot you through it unless it's specifically caused by a smoke grenade or a flashbang.
** And in ''SoldierOfFortune II'' and the later ''VideoGame/CallOfDuty'' games, they can see you through smokescreens too!
** In most shooters, darkness doesn't inhibit the AI's vision either.

** If you blow your cover in the first three games, the enemies in the level will all know your position and will shoot you if you're in their line of sight, light and shadow be damned. One glaring example is in the second mission of the first game, in a scripted event with three alert enemy soldiers: even if Sam is perfectly hidden and undetectable, when a soldier with his rifle raised walks around the office, he'll point his gun ''unerringly'' at where Sam is hidden.

* The hostiles in VideoGame/{{Minecraft}} are like this, but only after they've already spotted you the normal way. Then they can track your movement through any kind of wall and even [[ActionBomb explode]] from behind a thin wall. Results in ArtificialStupidity in that transparent blocks like glass count as walls, so mobs cannot see you through glass unless you've already been spotted through just air.

Despite what publishers would like to tell you, there really is no such thing as true ArtificialIntelligence in video games. Most VideoGameAI systems are, ultimately, nothing more than complex flowcharts. Because of this, it's very tricky to make computer opponents behave the way a human player would. While it's possible to design an AI that receives data similar to what a player receives, then analyzes it to make a decision, this is ''immensely'' difficult. Since the AI is an integral part of the game engine, a far easier (and thus much more common) technique is to simply pluck the information directly from the engine, and base all AI decisions on that.

** Yu-Gi-OH! Forbidden Memories'' has Pegasus again. He can't be bluffed and will always change his monsters' positions if he can't attack. The same can be said for every opponent in the endgame as well as Heishin in the early HopelessBossFight; they all know what card you've set and attack based on that.

** ''[[VideoGame/SplinterCellConviction Conviction]]'' refined this; enemies now fire and search Sam's last known position, allowing him to sneak around and flank them. Sam himself gains "Sonic Goggles" that let ''him'' see enemies through walls. [[spoiler:In the very level he gets them, he faces foes armed with similar devices.]]