Non-player character

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Non-player character" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (August 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

A non-player character (NPC), also called a non-playable character, is a character in a game that is not controlled by a player.^[1] The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster or referee rather than by another player. In video games, this usually means a character controlled by the computer (instead of a player) that has a predetermined set of behaviors that potentially will impact gameplay, but will not necessarily be the product of true artificial intelligence.