Getting Started With War Of the Robots

Object of the game

In War Of the Robots, you program a simulated robot to fight other robots, programmed by other people. The goal is to have fun, and try to design the best possible robot. You control where the robot goes, how it dodges bullets and various other weapons, how it maneuvers into position and shoots the other robot down. You can see how this looks on the screenshots page.

Importand background information

WOR is completely free and will remain so. Everyone is invited to join and have fun! The game is aimed at programmers, but the non-programmers will enjoy using the remote-controlled robot to try to beat the computer-controlled ones. All programmers are invited to try to write their own robots: the language used is Java, but even the beginner will find it very easy to program his robot, thanks to the many helper functions which are provided and also the examples which show you the way.

We are willing and ready to help everyone who has technical difficulties while trying to write a robot. So if you have any problem write to wor@earthling.net and we'll be glad to help!

Quick start

You can start right away by opening ../common/wor-en.html on your browser or appletviewer, if it supports java 1.1. Otherwise, you have to download WOR and a Java runtime in order to be able to play War Of the Robots. Running WOR will allow you to see the game in action, and get a feel of what your robot will have to acomplish.

Programming your robot

To program your own robot, what you have to do is write a Java class that implements the RobotBrain interface. This interface contains a single method,

public Instructions nextMove(Feedback senses)

This method is called every time your robot wants to know what to do, i.e. at each time step. The Feedback contains your robot's sensory inputs: it can know its position in the map, the position of walls on the map, even the position of the other robots and all the bullets present in the simulation. The Instructions will contain the orders from your brain to the robot: should it go forward, turn, fire?

Your orders will then be checked against some rules to make sure that you are not asking your robot to turn 180 degrees in one time step or fire at a too great rate. The rules are the following:

rotation must be between -5.0 and 5.0
speed must be between -0.06 and 0.1 (yes, you can go backwards)
an interval of at least 10 time steps must be respected between shots.

Read the functions list to know what functions are available to your robot.

To complete the explanation and provide you with inspiration, six example robots are provided with source code

WallFollower.java: Very simple, just follows the walls
WallBouncer.java: Bumps off the walls
WallBouncerShooter.java: Bumps off the walls and shoots
Sprinkler.java: Goes to the center and shoots
Wimp.java: Stops when out of range
Seeker.java: Tracks down the other robot and shoots it down

Can you do better?

How to claim fame

Once you have designed robot you like, you can send the class file(s) to wor@earthling.net in order to have your robot added to the list so that everyone can try against other robots online. The web page also allows you to download robots designed by other people to try your robot against them.

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Please send feedback to wor@earthling.net.

Last updated 6/19/99