Why don the Robot Gladiators® stand on two legs?
Our priority was in developing high speed reactive systems for a robot that could independently control its movements in a combat situation. The cost to create a functional combat robot that can walk and balance on two legs was, frankly, far beyond our budget and capability. Development of Honda’s Asimo robot began in 1986 and has consumed hundreds of millions of dollars so far. Still, we confess that we did get a lot of inspiration from the P1 model they used from 1993-97. With his aggressive good machine looks “he coulda been a contender.” While Honda engineers created a machine that “was capable of turning a switch on and off, gripping the door knob, and even carrying something” we were concentrating on building an intelligent machine that would beat the snot out of anyone foolish enough to get in the same ring with it. Our mobile chassis eliminates the need for balance so power and logic capacity can be focused on more spectacular abilities.
