If the target’s are so big why won’t they fight me?
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The thing is that this becomes incredibly hard to set up as AI can’t make holistic assessments, it can only work on rules. The more complex the rules the higher the chances of abberant behavior and the greater the demand on the system so the less NPCs you can have.
For example fighting back at all when you have a small army on hand to do it for you, but how do you balance that? At what exact distance is a guard to far away to defer combat to? What if that guard is on the other side of a window, what difference should weapons and affiliations make?
It can all get infinitely complicated real quick which is why games rely on simple rule sets.
Again, infinitely complicated decision matrixes are fun in theory and fiction but not workable IRL.
They need to be consistent across fuzzy scenarios and that is where you run into problems:
47 is suspicious with an assault rifle in his hands, why would a commander pull a pistol?
There’s a gun lying on a bench nearby, leave cover to get it or not? AI can’t determine if it’ll be a comical decision to give 47 a clean shot that hides their body as well, thus making all silenced weapons OP against the supposed commanders.
No battle plan ever survives first contact with players.
Believe me, I would love a version where Pavarti ducks into the shed, returns with an assault rifle and orders minions to reload her when she’s spent the clip - but that’s not a realistic development goal.
Fundamental principles of AI haven’t changed because fundamental principles of programming haven’t. It’s all ones and zeroes.
They can have more rules, but they are still limited by rules but those rules are still limited by accessible data and decision trees. Hence why the experts spend so much time worrying about accidentally creating a global catastrophe (eg gray goo)
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That’s the fundamental problem with AI systems. It’s easy for games where the only behavior an NPC needs to have is “attack”. Give them a given sphere that they are allowed to travel within and make them aggressive. If the AI needs to do anything other than attack within a radius, it gets more and more complicated.
The sandbox that is Hitman is very complicated with defined routes and behaviors that fit nicely into a couple architypes. A soldier is generally aggressive, will fire at 47, will actively respond to suspicious behavior, grab guns and take them to safe storage, etc. Civilians will not pick up weapons, will go for help when they see something suspicious, alert guards when threatened, cower, etc. These two sets of behaviors are very different and simply combining parts of them into some hybrid isn’t as simple as just replacing the “pick up gun” rule with “don’t pick up gun”.
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47 is hitting power centers and their gatekeepers. All of them are suitably guarded (the higher up you are, the more you have) and continue their daily activities. I don’t think it’s realistic for them to be armed when guards are their “arms”. Most of the missions are just a normal day of operations with no hint that they have a hit on them. I think it’s canon that 47 takes all of them out without notice, the few that do notice accept their fate.
If anything, maybe the “Target Lockdown” A.I., where the target and guards are aware, perhaps. But again, the target has numbers in guards. The heightened state of alert is the job for the guards. Not one target thinks their own guards would fail, especially some who have “elite” guards.
This seemed relevant - games developers talking about how doors are a major headache to implement due to AI and gameplay considerations:
https://twitter.com/talecrafter/status/1369153361270935554
https://twitter.com/talecrafter/status/1369153361270935554/retweets/with_comments
Basically everything in game development is more complicated than you think, especially if it involved the computer trying to simulate human decisions - so it’s really miracle that they managed to program in such a believable form of cowardice.
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This is a great idea
Story-wise the targets’ behaviour makes sense, not because the targets are cowards per se, but because 47 is a genuinely scary dude.
Because we are controlling him we don’t think he’s scary, but just inverse the roles for a moment. You are trying to protect yourself from someone who wants to kill you, and given his penchant for disguising himself he could look like anyone. He could be standing right next to you. And the moment you start feeling safe, surrounded by your security, he suddenly does stand right next to you, I can easily imagine it gets too much at that moment.
47 also gets less scary to us because of his calculated nature. But if you re-imagine the mission as 47 being in love/obsessed with his targets, getting into the clothes of other people, intent on killing his targets in a very specific way and basically being a psycho, the game gets a horror twist very easily. For the targets, this horror twist is already present no matter how calculated he is.
Sean Rose, Parvati, Nolan Cassidy and Brother Akram could/should have been an exception (without taking into account the complicated programming this would entail) because they’re still active and in the field, but the others either got too complacent/rusty or were never fighters to begin with and had their dirty work done for them.
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Maybe this is true for the ICA agents in Berlin, and to an extent the Lady in Dartmoor, but in my headcanon, 47 kills in a way that it looks like an unfortunate accident, not a contract. So people aren’t supposed to cave in for a stalker killer is coming. In fact, most targets walk freely through crowds, and enjoy their business relatively unbothered.
They are not scared because they do not see what is coming.
Now that is scary and could turn people paranoid a f . Is it the postman, or a killer in disguise? Has your neighbour always been this tall? Why does your coworker make witty remarks all the time? 
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It’s a good point, but when talking about the “cowardly” behavior as described in this topic, the targets do realize what’s coming (hence their panic, they just saw 47). I think that at that point the realisations I described earlier engulf them in one big wave of panic, no matter how at ease they were just moments before.
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I think by that logic, none of the targets should ever “see” 47 at all. 47’s primary MO is to be the silent assassin. Whether that’s done by purely accident kills where 47 is miles away or by complete stealth is immaterial. The end result is that most of 47’s targets never actually see 47 so they have nothing to be afraid of, except for “everything”. If I was afraid of everything, and had no way of seeing death coming, I’d probably be pretty afraid too. The second that anything happened I’d probably be in the panic room.
Flashback Intensify
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It would just be a cool mechanic if some of the targets behaved differently than just all running away in fear. Probably makes sense for most targets but some should could be different. Maybe one target carries a gun and tries to play it cool when he sees 47 and talk his way out of it while trying to pull a gun if 47 turns his back for a second. Maybe another target could just try and talk their way out of it while trying to stay calm but you can tell by their speech they are nervous. Another target could be super aggressive and come at 47 with a knife if he spots him. Another target could be super paranoid and have a walkie talkie ready to call a swarm of guards at the slightest sight of 47.
In the final level of Hitman 3 for example, Edward is very calm and is trying to talk 47 into not killing him. This was an interesting change of pace for a target to behave this way.
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47 is scary because he’s like a slightly socially adept Terminator. He can get anywhere and he can’t be placated or bribed. A stalker can be manipulated to some extent because of his obsession. Someone whose motives you can’t discern? Even more disorienting.
Also, as a woman, I’m so over the psycho stalker trope. I’m glad 47 only has eyes for Diana lol
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The franchise wouldn’t be nearly as good if 47 was a psycho stalker type. His emotional emptiness is, for me, one of the things that really made the games stand out and helped the storyline of each of them (even if there was an overly convoluted explanation for how he got that way).
You’re over the stalker trope but glad 47 only has eyes for Diana? Doesn’t this kind of make him Diana’s stalker in a sense? 
There’s a difference between loyalty and erotomania.
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True. I guess the line between the two can be pretty thin though? 
Not really. If the other Person knows you and what you’re doing, it’s not stalking. (If the Person is fine with it of course)
I think it has more to do with whether or not the person is fine with it or not rather than knowing its happening. Knowing someone is stalking you doesn’t make them not a stalker. I guess my original point was that 47’s feelings towards Diana are possibly no better than a stalkers feeling towards another person because he clearly doesn’t have “typical” emotions. I guess it’s “acceptable” though since Diana is ok with it.
He could have stalker tendencies that come from the fact he literally regularly stalks targets to murder them as a profession. That tendency could effect his personal attachments to someone like Diana. Even though he is most likely of above average intelligence, I wouldn’t exactly consider emotionally intelligent category.
There’s no canonical evidence for this and it’s dragging the thread off topic. Let’s move on.