Are you ready to play the good game? This robot is an air hockey expert!
The robotic system tracks the puck and opponent’s paddle, and position data from camera images are then processed by the external PC, which determines the robot’s next move. The robot tracks the game at a very fast rate of 500 frames per second. The researchers designed the robot to observe the speed and position of the player’s paddle in relation to the puck, and it uses this data to estimate whether its opponent is playing aggressively or defensively. In experiments, the robot detected playing behaviors, and forced players to change their strategy; players said this made the game more exciting. So that the game is entertaining for human players, the researchers programmed the robot with a three-layer control system. The first layer controls basic hardware motion, the second decides the device’s short-term strategy, and the third ascertains a long-term strategy.
Kudos to Japanese researchers at Chiba University’s Namiki Lab!
IEEE Spectrum.
