Robot Battle Team Event Electronic Arts CTO Conference

Robot Battle Team Event Champions Electronic Arts CTO Conference

We had a thrilling Robot Battle Team Event with Electronics Arts at the Seaport Conference Center in Redwood City CA. The group was made up of the CTO and key members of her team. Technology was not new to this group! In fact one participant had previous experience in large scale robot combat. He later showed off his skill by literally gripping and flipping another team’s robot and pinning it to the ground like a defeated wrestler. Very exciting moment in an event filled with loud cheers and roars.

The building competition component of the robot battle team event was competitive with teams finishing within a few minutes of each other. The build quality was excellent with the exception of a few wheels falling off in combat … to be expected. EA used teams of 3 and 4 people each which made obtaining the world record build time difficult, as most groups who have set records have 5-6 people. A few extra hands makes a big difference when you are competing against the elite technology groups from around the world.

The battles were memorable, exciting and very close. The final competition came down to the last balloon popped for team 3 to squeak out a last minute victory over team 1. Team 1 had taken the first competition. Team 2 actually made a thrilling run at the 2nd competition by having two “double pop” scenarios where they got both points twice!

We used a three team combat format which keeps thing interesting as it is difficult to be aggressive without risking your defense. Teams tried multiple strategies to take advantage of being the unoccupied robot and having a free shot at the other two robots. Of course every team was thinking like this so it lead to many Plan B’s being enacted on the fly. The battles were intense and without interruption, except for replacing popped balloons, or righting an upside down bot.

We recently upgraded our electronics and have been remarkably pleased with the consistency of the robot performance under intense battle pressure.

We are looking forward to more groups from EA competing for a championship and a world record!