If you grew up in the 80’s, odds are you probably remember the Rock Em’ Sock Em’ Robots – little red and blue plastic robots with manual handles and buttons.
The goal of the brawl? Hit the opposing robot the chin and make its plastic head pop up.
A modern system dubbed “Cloudrobot” has been making the rounds, and I couldn’t help but be reminded of the 80’s toy.
Of course, the new robots are 16-inches tall with 21 motors controlled by an AVR chip. That chip allows the robots to offer a wide range of motion and impressive precision. The motion is passed to the robot using a computer system, allowing players to throw punches, blocks, and move around using a standard game pad connected to the bot via Bluetooth.
This sounds exactly like a miniaturized version of Real Steel to me. The 16-inch tall robots wear their own Everlast branded boxing gloves to help prevent significant damage to the robotic pugilists. During the fight, players don’t score points for actually punching the other robot, the points are scored virtually. One of the reasons for this is that the robots have electromagnets in the feet to keep them from toppling over while moving around.
Cloudrobot is reportedly seeking a partner in the US to bring these robots to market. The company hopes to be able to produce the robots at a cost of $300 per unit. While that price isn’t exactly cheap, for a highly mobile robot it seems too good to be true. Check out the video above to see the fighting robots in action.
