The Ultimate Fight

Okay, everyone went to Robogames to see something like this:



This is the last Robogames post. I will be putting up a robot post of a different kind tomorrow. Stay tuned.

Humanoids

These were my favorites. These humanoids could do all kinds of things. They had these dances at the beginning to show off the range of movements these robots have and then, they had sumo fights and kung fu fights. Here are a some of my favorites.

The quick and little ones

They had this tournament right at the beginning and I didn't really understand what was going on. The gist is that there is a course marked on the floor and these robots have to find their ways from the beginning to the end. It was pretty fun to watch. This video may not look like much but if you've seen all the ones that failed, you'd know how impressive this guy was.

These hockey robots were also small and quick.

Pleo

Okay, this was maybe the cutest robot at the show and definately Kira's favorite. His name is Pleo and since we'll never buy Kira and Hayden a dog, he is officially on our wishlist.

Kira was so attached that she went back to it again and again eventhough Pleo was not really on display. One of the guys running the tournament happened to have one and brought it along. After being mopped by kids, the guy picked up Pleo and wanted to put him away. While he was hugging Pleo, Kira got around to the other side of the booth where he sat and since she couldn't reach Pleo, she just patted the guy. I had to remind her that he is a real person, not a robot.

Things that roll

Well, not strictly speaking. Here are a couple of videos of Robo-hockey and that weird round spherical robot.

Robo-hockey was more exciting than robot soccer. There were definately more action going on.


I don't really know what the purpose of this weird thing is, if there is one. But it was at Maker Faire as well and people seemed to be fascinated by it. I guess I am, too.

Soccer with the Bots

Robogames 2008 was fun. The main event was of course the battle bots. Unfortunately, neither of my kids wanted to sit still for 6 hours and watch the games. So, I walked around the convention center with them to find more interactive things to do. Fortunately, there were a few.
First up is "Hot Shot" here. I think he is Kira's second favorite thing. He is actually quite smart. Unlike most of the other robots, he is not controlled in real time by a person. His AI allows him to converse and he does so quite well. He learned Kira's name and when we returned later in the day, he remembered her. That made Kira quite happy.

I think he is programed to talk differently with different people. He commented on Kira's nice backpack and asked her if she likes the colour pink (she was wearing pink). When a bunch of boys showed up, he asked them if they saw the game and asked for a high five. Then, a few giggly girls came along and Hot Shot asked them to take a picture with him and he asked if he could put his arm around their shoulders.

After chatting with Hot Shot, we went to watch Robo-soccer. They are cute but nothing like the real sport. The robots kept falling over because the floor was so uneven. The guy who was there with the bots was very very nice though. He was all ready to pack up and leave when Kira wandered up to him asking to play with the robots. He took one back out of its case and let Kira push the remote and walked the robot back into it's box to go night night.

Here are the kids waiting for the games to start:

More Robots at Maker Faire

Here is another robot that we played with. It was super wonderful that the robots at Maker Faire were all interactive instead of "display only". This orange robot's job is to take and release these giant donuts/life savers. It was a simple task but the kids love it.


So R2D2 was cool and this orange robot is also kinda fun. There were a few others that I didn't get pictures of that roamed around the fair grounds. But my favorite is the robot battles!!!!! They are 3 minute battles between two robots. I don't know how to describe it any further so here is a video of 3 very exciting minutes. The video really doesn't do it justice. You have to be there. I am so into now that I think I am going to try making it to this.

R2D2 at Maker Faire

We went to Maker Faire on Sunday and it was AWESOME! According to the official Maker Faire website, "Maker Faire is a two-day, family-friendly event that celebrates the Do-It-Yourself (DIY) mindset. It’s for creative, resourceful people of all ages and backgrounds who like to tinker and love to make things." Now, try explaining that to a two year old. I figured Kira didn't need to know all the details so I told her we were going to see robots. Man, did she ever saw robots. She LOVED it! I will blog more about the other robots later in the week but let's start with the biggest celebrity of all robots: R2D2.

Here is an action shot of R2:

I saw R2 before Kira did. She was sleeping in the stroller with Brett while I walked around and first ran into R2. I really wanted to show it to Kira. So, when R2 came back, I got really excited and unstrapped Kira from her stroller and pushed her towards the robot. Of course, she got really scared and wanted to jump back into her stroller. So, I picked her up and we walked slowly towards R2 and she gently patted R2 on the head. Then, she was in love.

We saw this short video over and over this morning when Kira wanted to go see the robots again. Sorry Kira, we'll have to wait until next year.