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Learning Java Through Violence

Posted by michael on from the is-there-any-other-way dept.

Joe writes: "Someone introduced me to a new game called Robocode and now I'm hooked as well as my 17 year old son. We are both learning Java while playing the game or I should say while building our Java robots. The game is setup to teach you how to handle events, how to create inner classes, and other Java techniques to build more sophisticated Java bots. I have a c++ background so I've been helping my son with his bots, but he's catching on very fast. It's turning out to be a cool and easy way to get the kid clued into programming and best of all its free." I'll bet if the little Logo turtles shot at each other, I would have had more fun programming as a kid.

5 of 225 comments (clear)

  1. Yes, there are others by interiot · · Score: 5, Informative

    Yes, robocode is not the first, see DMOZ's entry. Corewars was perhaps the most famous. Okay, now we can move on to talking about Robocode's merits instead of talking about its family tree.

  2. interview with the developer by n3m6 · · Score: 5, Informative

    kuro5hin has a much more in depth look at robowars .

  3. Re:This is how i learned C, too by maxxon · · Score: 3, Informative

    Yes, this game was called Crobots. You can still find copies of it around with some well-placed Web searches.

    There's also a more recent type of this simulation called RealTimeBattle which uses a simple text-based protocol so that you can write a bot in literally any language.

    --
    max
  4. Disussion groups, theory and more sample bots by cvanaver · · Score: 4, Informative

    Can be found at: http://www.robocode.net/

  5. Such a thing exists. by khaladan · · Score: 3, Informative

    It's called TopCoder, located at www.topcoder.com (use my name khaladan as referrer if you sign up). You can participate in a contest usually once or twice a week with 7 other programmers trying to solve various problems of increasing difficulty.

    It's based on time. Whoever submits code the fastest, gets the most points. Of course, then there's a challenge round where you inspect other people's code for bugs, and if you find one, supply input that will produce bad output (or crasht the program).

    It's a greate contest. Currently you can choose either Java or C++ to program solutions in.

    Plus, if you get 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place in your room (of max 8 people), you get $150, $75, or $25 dollars, respecitively. I myself have not been playing very long but I got 2nd place once, and sure enough, a check came about two weeks later for $75.

    So, sign up and try it... use my name, khaladan, as the person who referred you.