Open Access

ARTICLE

Evaluating Domain Randomization Techniques in DRL Agents: A Comparative Study of Normal, Randomized, and Non-Randomized Resets

Abubakar Elsafi^*

Department of Software Engineering, College of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Jeddah, Jeddah, 21959, Saudi Arabia

* Corresponding Author: Abubakar Elsafi. Email:

Computer Modeling in Engineering & Sciences 2025, 144(2), 1749-1766. https://doi.org/10.32604/cmes.2025.066449

Received 09 April 2025; Accepted 11 July 2025; Issue published 31 August 2025

Abstract

Domain randomization is a widely adopted technique in deep reinforcement learning (DRL) to improve agent generalization by exposing policies to diverse environmental conditions. This paper investigates the impact of different reset strategies, normal, non-randomized, and randomized, on agent performance using the Deep Deterministic Policy Gradient (DDPG) and Twin Delayed DDPG (TD3) algorithms within the CarRacing-v2 environment. Two experimental setups were conducted: an extended training regime with DDPG for 1000 steps per episode across 1000 episodes, and a fast execution setup comparing DDPG and TD3 for 30 episodes with 50 steps per episode under constrained computational resources. A step-based reward scaling mechanism was applied under the randomized reset condition to promote broader state exploration. Experimental results show that randomized resets significantly enhance learning efficiency and generalization, with DDPG demonstrating superior performance across all reset strategies. In particular, DDPG combined with randomized resets achieves the highest smoothed rewards (reaching approximately 15), best stability, and fastest convergence. These differences are statistically significant, as confirmed by t-tests: DDPG outperforms TD3 under randomized (t = −101.91, p < 0.0001), normal (t = −21.59, p < 0.0001), and non-randomized (t = −62.46, p < 0.0001)) reset conditions. The findings underscore the critical role of reset strategy and reward shaping in enhancing the robustness and adaptability of DRL agents in continuous control tasks, particularly in environments where computational efficiency and training stability are crucial.

---

Keywords

---