This is one hobby that I want to get into, but then I don't have the time, money, and skills to make one that can duke it out with the best of them in robot wars. With this, I have to content myself watching videos of these robots, and it's fun to watch. Also at the same time, I marvel on how these types of games also help in the development of mechanized assistants that we will soon encounter in the future, however far in the future these may appear.

These robots fire airsoft BBs and we have posted a story about these mech warriors battling it out in Japan in the Robot Survival games. In the USA, they have the Mech Warfare which is their version of the Robot Survival Games and they've been doing for the past 3 years. With the success of their competitions, the games have outgrown their arenas and they want to build a bigger one. As the group describe themselves:

We are a group of hobbyists, robotics engineers, students, and various humans that build small remotely piloted walking robots armed with airsoft, nerf, and even more powerful weapons such as micro-rockets, custom co2 powered bb rifles, and flame throwers. We take these robots, place them in a small-scale model urban environment and duke it out. Mech Warfare is part engineering competition, part "real-world videogame" with a strong emphasis on sharing knowledge, advancing robotics technology, and having fun. In our 4th year, we now have teams from across the United States, Canada, Mexico, and even Japan flying into Robogames in San Fransisco to compete each year.

The last 3 years we've used a simple PVC pipe & canvas tent, which is inadequate for larger more powerful robots. Furthermore, we were fortunate enough to have a professional model making crew (Fonco Creative Services) do all of our scale buildings for the inside of the arena. While the internal environment looks very professional and well done, the canvas & PVC tent takes away from the immersion and overall aesthetic of the competition quite a bit, and we'd like to remedy this.

So off to Kickstarter they went, putting up their own page as they aim to raise US$6,000 which will end on the 5th of April. As of this writing, they have raised over US$2,000, so they need somewhere near US$4,000 more of pledges before they get to build a bigger arena.

It may not be as tactical as our airsoft skirmishes, but it's fun to watch to see these robots in action, firing airsoft guns as their makers try to win. Even if these guys may not develop something that can profitable in the airsoft market, they may have some concepts that can be taken for airsoft. Who knows? Someone may just make an airsoft sentry gun that is fully automated? Or an airsoft drone that will rain BBs on a hapless group of skirmishers?

If you dig these types of competitions, why not help them achieve their goal? Just go to the Mech Warfare Kickstarter page to pledge and ammount, even just US$1.00 will do. But if you're generous, you can pledge more than US$1,000 to get this thing going. Video of Mech Warfare 2010 below for your viewing pleasure: