OpenAI Five, the artificial intelligence created by research company OpenAI, will play against a human Dota 2 team live on Twitch for the first time ever later this month.
The showmatch is scheduled to take place on July 28, according to a report published by Gamasutra. Although this won’t be the first time that OpenAI will compete against a full team of five human players, the match in question will be the first livestreamed for public viewing.
Just last week, the brains behind OpenAI announced that the bot had already become good enough to beat a full five-man human squad composed of players with at least 5,000 MMR. Under normal circumstances, this is a feat that the default Dota 2 bots, created by Valve for training and practice purposes, cannot achieve without cheating.
The bot apparently plays against itself in order to learn advanced mechanics, strategy, and game sense, with OpenAI claiming that it has so far played 180 years worth of Dota 2 games. Since then, the bot has shown that it is learning at a frightening pace, even going so far as to develop its own, gank-heavy playstyle.
Its basic mechanics, however, still leave plenty to be desired. OpenAI has yet to develop a good last-hitting rhythm, which is extremely important when going up against professional teams who make sure to suck up every last piece of gold available on the map.
As a follow-up to the progress report of sorts, the company revealed that OpenAI will be present at The International 8 this August, where the bot will play against a professional team in front of the crowd in Vancouver.
The list of players that OpenAI will be taking on in the showmatch on Twitch has not yet been announced. Given the bot’s newfound capability to beat highly skilled non-professional players, though, it would hardly be a stretch to assume that the scientists will want to pit the AI against players with 6,000 or more MMR.
Either way, we’re sure it’ll be a very interesting game to watch. You can catch the battle between man and machine over on the official OpenAI Twitch channel.
