Review - IBM's Robocode: A Platform for Learning AI

Nick Loadholtes' contest article has just been published.

This platform is not only a fun tool for learning how to program in Java, but is also a powerful environment for testing out AI concepts. This article is an introduction to the platform and how it
can be used for AI programming.

http://ai-depot.com/Essay/Robocode.html

I've been looking for years for something similar to what I consider to be one of the best computer games ever, OMEGA (by Origin). I still have the original for the C64. Once in awhile I crack open the book for a good read. Anyone else ever play that game? It's more or less the same concept as Robocode except they created a custom programming language for the tanks. Each function had a "cycle cost" so you had to watch what you were doing. It had a few bugs but you could do some fairly advanced things. Anyways, great info about Robocode, thanks for the essay! Looking forward to getting into it.

This looks like a great little game which might actually motivate me to learn some more AI techniques!

Thanks for introducing it so well.

Thanks, I'm glad everyone liked the article. The robocode stuff is just so much fun (and so useful) I just had to write up a little something about it. :)

-Nick