Artificial intelligence has a high impact on society. It plays a key role in some of the technological applications that have become indispensible to us. These applications include data mining (e.g. detection of fraudulent credit card transactions), automated trading software in real markets, interactive computer games, intelligent network routing on the internet, robotic space exploration, sensor networks for medical applications and many more. This master’s programme teaches you to become an artificial intelligence expert who is capable of dealing with both current and future challenges in this highly challenging field.

Since the recent victories of Machine against Man in Poker and Go, Starcraft has become the next target for (game) AI. Tech companies such as Google Deepmind will be using the game as an AI research environment.

StarCraft is a real-time strategy videogame where the players harvest resources and spend them on three aspects: buildings, units, and research. A player is eliminated when their buildings are destroyed. Everyone starts the game with one building and a limited number of harvesting and constructing units. The game is about creating an economic or strategic advantage over your opponent so that your units can overpower your opponent's units, giving you the opportunity to beat your opponent.

Brood War takes place in the StarCraft universe, set around the early 26th century. Terran exiles from Earth have colonized a distant area of the Milky Way galaxy called the Koprulu Sector, having established several governments. Eventually, a civil war breaks out and ends with the formation of the Terran Dominion. However, humanity soon becomes caught in a war between the Protoss and the Zerg, which culminates at the end of StarCraft with the death of the Zerg leader, the Overmind, on the Protoss homeworld of Aiur. Without the Overmind to command, the Zerg rampage mindlessly across Aiur, while the cerebrates—the secondary commanders of the Swarm—attempt to regain control. After the discovery of alien life in the Koprulu Sector, the United Earth Directorate (UED)—the international body governing Earth—decides to send an expeditionary force to secure the sector and prevent the aliens from finding Earth. Brood War begins two days after the conclusion of StarCraft.