Tommy Reddad


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About
I am a third year undergraduate student in Honours Mathematics and Computer Science at McGill University. My particular fields of interest include modern computer games and computational geometry.

On this site, you will find a description of my interests, some small projects that I work on for fun, and eventually a homework assignment archive, as well as possibly some typed course notes if I feel so inclined. You will also find quotes which I think are interesting, memorable, or funny. They are for my entertainment value and are otherwise meaningless.

You can find my CV here.
Research
I did some research in modern computer games over the course of the summer of 2012, under the supervision of Professor Clark Verbrugge, in the context of an NSERC-USRA (Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada - Undergraduate Student Research Award). My project was entitled Geometric Analysis of Maps in Real-Time Strategy Games: Measuring Map Quality in a Competitive Setting. The paper is published as a technical report on the GR@M (Games Research At McGill) website. The abstract reads:

Professional competitive gaming has grown increasingly lucrative over the past 2 years since the release of Blizzard Entertainment's real-time strategy game, StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty (SC2). Since there is no widely used SC2 map generator, most maps are hand-crafted by level designers who may not be in touch with the game's intricate and shifting strategy, resulting in inconsistent game quality. Here we develop a tool that algorithmically identifies a map's key geometric elements and analyzes them to judge if a map is of good quality. Our quantitative approach simplifies the question of whether the map is worthy of being used in a competitive setting, and reduces reliance on human judgments of quality.

You can get the full paper on the GR@M site here.
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