When We Were Kings !

[typhoon_driver]

Re: When We Were Kings !

Wow talk about a slap in the face to all the good work, time, effort and cash thrown in by everyone since robot wars finished.

Camera crew always wanting interviews? No that was a pain in the arse at the best of times. Trying to prepare the robot and prepare mentally for the next battle was always interupted. The best interview I ever gave where I took the camera man around the inside of typhoon 2 explaining the various systems and how they worked together, was it shown? Was it hell

Hotel rooms? Really? You are complaining because you aren't put up in a holiday inn? Funny thing was that I never usually got to see a hotel room as those were taken up by the BAE systems support crew. I slept on the floor on the local ATC unit. Far more fun as there was a dozen or so cadets in the same building and we had far more fun there.

Meals? Those are usually provided in some form and the organisers that don't I don't hold it against them one bit. Throwing up an arena and all the support mechanisms around it are far more important than making sure you have a free egg mayo sandwich (not that I don't appriciate when one is available!)

If you want to go feel like a star then apply for big brother or britains got talent. If your ambitions in life are really so vapid as to be popular for a while before being spat out and then touring student unions for years then good luck to you.

9 years on since the end of robot wars? I don't think so. We appeared for the first time in 2001 and if im not mistaken I had several more appearances after that.

One big event? We have those, they are called the heavyweight and featherweight champs. Most of the machines in the woodwork couldn't hope to compete for the titles these days as they are so far behind technologically.

This comment was the best though, There are alternatives to spending a barrow load of bucks on polycarbonate sheeting too.

Yes there are, they are called lawsuits and would usually result from a member of the audience being injured or damage to property etc etc

Is this post a bit cutting and to the point? Yeah probably. Do I care? Not at all.

I am exceptionally grateful to all those members of the FRA, event organisers and other roboteers that I have had the good fortune to meet and work with and to those that I haven't, I know that you have done a lot of work behind the scenes that never gets seen. If anyone would have loved robot wars to return it would have been me as I never got to defend the title I won in the same arena with the same machine. Typhoon 2 was measured up for a toy but that never materialised obviously and I enjoyed the times I had on the tv. But that is in the past. Time to move on.

[anukhet]

Re: When We Were Kings !

I have won around £1000 over the last 3 years - If it was still on TV I would have prob won 20 times that and the toy deal which would be nice but it's not coming back.

Just a small point on the toy deal - exactly £0 was made from that - plus the pride of seeing your creation reproduced in the shops. In that respect absolutely nothing has changed - except nowadays we make or commission our own merchandise and our shop windows are the event organisers. What money is made actually goes back into keeping the robot running instead of straight into the pockets of the toy makers and tv companies.

[edit] Well said Gary

[chimera1]

Re: When We Were Kings !

I must correct the date Robot Wars finished, it was 2003 and not 2001 but it still makes it seven years, I should have known that as I did take part doh .

Secondly I must correct John- if I was in it for money I would build a robot that wasn't purely made for the fun aspect of taking part and sadly that means a wedge with a powerfull flipper QED.

Many people have knocked Robot Wars but youve got to ask yourself a question:What first got you interested in the fighting robot game?

[cliveb]

Re: When We Were Kings !

Firstly and most importantly a big thank you to all of the event organisors.Without you people we have nowhere to go and play with our toys.One big event a year with a big cash win? Where is this big cash win coming from? and if it brings people out of the woodwork it must surely prove that they are only in it for the money and not the enjoyment and cameraderie that I believe exists in the current community. I agree with Grant in the aspect of getting a buzz in fighting in a full combat event, my featherweight is totally unsuitable to fight a machine like 360 or Hornet but I just love the adrenaline rush of lining up opposite them and hearing the words 3 2 1 activate(normally resulting in another repair bill) Until a large lottery win turns up to fund a heavyweight spinner arena we will have to accept the fact that the vast majority of machines will be flippers.
So in my opinion thanks to the EO's for your hard work in putting events on all year round for us, and keep up the hard work.You can count on my support.

[john]

Re: When We Were Kings !

What was the reason you stopped for then colin? Did you attend any events after it had stopped being filmed for TV?

[craig_colliass]

Re: When We Were Kings !

anukhet wrote,

Just a small point on the toy deal - exactly £0 was made from that - plus the pride of seeing your creation reproduced in the shops. In that respect absolutely nothing has changed - except nowadays we make or commission our own merchandise and our shop windows are the event organisers. What money is made actually goes back into keeping the robot running instead of straight into the pockets of the toy makers and tv companies.


This is why I won't be jumping for joy if the series comes back you the roboteers that were in the Robot Wars TV series were fleeced for everything, you came in and you were told to sign contracts that boiled down to them getting everything and you nothing, the injustice of this is too much.
If the robot fighting dose come back on TV I would like to see partnership not dictatorship. The series did get me interested in the robot scene but that's the only thing positive it did for me.

[ady]

Re: When We Were Kings !

if it came back on tv the eo's would be laughing, with new popularity and reaching the new younger generation, you would be quids in

[Bodge Job]

Re: When We Were Kings !

I still think the tv show is what made fighting robots become great, If it had never been on tv I would hever had know about robots as im still only a little boy robot wars canged my life , lol.

[psycho_fling]

Re: When We Were Kings !

eo s would only be quids in if the tv deal involved all of them otherwiise its another competitor

[elobire]

Re: When We Were Kings !

I still think the tv show is what made fighting robots become great, If it had never been on tv I would hever had know about robots as im still only a little boy robot wars canged my life , lol.

same with me. spent most of my childhood wanting to build a robot because of robot wars, glad i came across this forum.
people have to realise that robotwars is gone, and probably will never be coming back in the near future.

[widow_twanky]

Re: When We Were Kings !

I still think the tv show is what made fighting robots become great.

Yes, you are absolutely correct but that brings its own problems.

Effectively you start on the top of your game as a 'fad' for most people without any infrastructure behind it.

It's a reason I like the idea of kilobots and Jonno's Battleratz. They start to build the grass roots level of the sport and start to create some sort of relatively easy access to the spobby (we must remember our esteemed president has decreed this a spobby).

It will take a long time to build this type of infrastructure but it's getting there.

Andy

[gravity]

Re: When We Were Kings !

Me personally, I like robots flying and bouncing around the arena, getting back on their wheels and fight on ! Instead of 1 hit bam death, as it was pretty often on tv...
3 full minutes of roaming robots is awesome

[RogueTwoRobots]

Re: When We Were Kings !

Instead of 1 hit bam death, as it was pretty often on tv...

I agree, I never liked the fights where a robot took out its opponent with one attack in about 6 seconds

[botmad]

Re: When We Were Kings !

That is one of the reasons johnno has changed the Roaming Robots arena to encorporate the cages .....

Takes away the 321 activate One Flip fight over senario ....

Tests the skill more as the fights go on longer ...

[team_orr]

Re: When We Were Kings !

this thread throws up a lot of interesting questions,

robot wars for me was the gateway to getting interested in fighting robots, and i think its the same for a lot of the younger generation robot wars put robot combat on the map, and helped it towards what it is today. hands up everybody who heard about robot combat through robot wars?

that being said however, i think its time we exept that robot wars is gone from the television, and that we need to stop hanging on to its reputation, the inflow to fighting robots nowdays is a lot smaller then it was back then, the viewers back from 7-8 years ago have grown up and moved on, it time to show the world what we have evolved into and get a whole new wave of people interestd in the current format, which, i think, is the best its ever been.

E.O's like RR, RL, and RC have kept us going, really well actualy, having competed at many events i can tell you that they do a great job, many of the luxureys from the golden era can still be found at live events, we sign autographs, get lunch, and most importantly entertain the crowd and have fun, after all, isnt what this spobby is...a bit of fun? unlike robot wars (where there were many hours between fights, and taking ages to do pre/post match interviews) nowdays we get non-stop robot action!!!

yes, there are many wedge flippers nowdays, the problem is that it is a very effective design, somthing that the iron awe's have shown very well, but tbf there is also a lot of variety, for example, the saint, terrorhurtz, and puck, the thing is, there are only so many basic robot platforms (axe, rammer, flipper etc) and if you stray to far away from them you might end up with a slightly pants robot that may implode on its first outing...which is bad seeing as heavyweights are very expensive.

the point is, im proud of what we have turned into, the current format of live events is top notch, and although there are certain things we dont get now we're off the tv...im perfectly happy with what we're getting atm