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Kiro, the Foosball Robot
JasonFleischer writes "Although the official line from the RoboCup competition is that robots should be ready to challenge humans on the soccer
field by the year 2050, we don't have to wait that long to see man-machine
competition in the bar.
Researchers in Germany have developed a table football (foosball, table soccer, whatever) robot. The human challenger(s) take the red team, while the machine works the blue side, using an overhead video camera to see what's happening on the table. The conference paper shows that while the machine generally wins against the normal bar-amatuer it has no chance against a human grandmaster. But these kinds of things are always improving, after all look how big a deal the man-machine chess competition turned out to be. So perhaps the current table football world champions should be watching their backs."
This will be fun for about ten minutes, until the machine is either impossible, or laughably easy (more likely) to beat.
People in bars want games they can play socially, with other people. The people who would really be in to something like this would stay home tweaking their Debian installation and picking at their hemorrhoids.
...someone else to kick my ass at that game.
Until this thing starts talking smack while racking up the goals, I'm not impressed...
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What is the world coming to when...
"foosball" and "grandmaster" is used in the same paragraph.
Of course, I didn't realize that "table football world champions" actually existed either. Isn't that decided by the last drunken game... "And thhhiss is for the cchampionship ooffff thheee wwwwwooorrllldddd."
Davak
but does the computer have full control over all the umm (forgive my foosball knowledge) "handles" at all time. I mean part of the game is having to let go and grab the next one. Kind of an unfair advantage if the computer does not have to do so.
I'll be impressed when they have a robot/AI that can play ping-pong. If you look at the plane the ball travels in, foosball is pretty two-dimensional...not entirely, I'll grant you, but I'm making a generalization. If you can create a robot that can deal with three dimensions, and can build strategies to play a good game of ping-pong, then I'll be impressed.
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The fact that there is a human grandmaster of foosball somehow makes my life seem less meaningless. :)
Bringing computers into pubs? No, No i tells ya. I work with computers all week. Theres a few things i like doing at the friday happy hour with my work mates. Thats, getting cheap or free beers and playing pool.
:/
This thing doesnt bellong in a pub. It belongs in a pinball palar... Or whatever you call those things...
Computers in pubs? pfffffffft... why dont i just start bringing beer to work?
Actualy, i make a good point, why dont i?
My point is the pub is my one place to ungeekatise myself... bringing a computer to a pub might have the oposite effect.
Giving IE users a taste of their own medicine since 2005 - http://pods.-is-a-geek.net/
I hope the robot isn't smart enough to jam the handle at maximum speed toward an opponent, when the opponent is positioned...uhm...a little too close.
Ah, the college days of Extreme Foosball. And misinterpreting what exactly 'foos'-ing a ball is.
...
You just gave me a really horrible image of some drunken guy in bed waking up next to a... foosball playing machine. Shame on you. :/
(Maybe we could put a GPS device in the ball!)
As much as it might be true that it'll have a better win/lose ratio with sensors, GPS is not the way to go. I mean... A foosball table isn't all that big, and what will the computer do when he thinks the ball is actually 5 metres outside of the "arena"? GPS is a no-go.
I think everyone so far has missed as to why exactly this is such a big deal.
It is not important what game the robot mastered. What is important is the fact that the robot is capable of on the fly visual/apendage (arm) coordination.
That means we have technology that will allow for application of this in other areas (think retrieval robots for disaster zones, etc.)
That is what makes this story so exciting.
hmmm... if I were wanting to create the ultimate computer foosball player, I'd just have the machine rotate all the handles at about 12000 rpm, sliding them back and forth at a 100 cycles per second.
The first time the human opponent catches the ball off the forehead at 1200 fps... FORFIET! The machine wins again.
but that's just me...
No man is an island, but Gary is a city in Indiana.
Foosball is of the DEVIL!
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
I was OK with robots taking away factory work
I am OK with robots taking away bar games
But when they start drinking beer on my behalf I draw the line!
You will have to pry my proprietary software $$$ from my cold dead hands!
I don't think this is the way it's supposed to go. I haven't seen Terminator 3 yet, but I'm pretty sure Skynet doesn't begin with a withering attack on humanity's carefully-crafted illusion that foosball is anything other than spinning the handles as quickly as you can and screaming, "BOOOYAH! IN YOUR FACE!"
Having played foosball my entire life, I doubt they can make something to beat anyone of real skill anytime soon. When you get really good at the game, it's not about seeing the shot to block it, because you rarely see it (if you're good enough) because it's so fast. No, you're going on anticipation, of what the player may do. It becomes a sort of guessing game at that point.
This is where the stragegy in foosball really comes in. They key is to have a bunch of various shots you can use but that all "look" the same on set up, so the player has no idea where you're going to go with the shot. If they guess wrong, you score. Of course, this takes a lot of skill to do well (and just as much skill on defense to defend).
Because the robot is using a camera, and because the action is so fast, I can't imagine it stopping a good push shot, or even a good pop or bank shot for that matter. Similarly, I can't see it setting up good shots that a human couldn't pick out everytime. Though I think it would be easier to teach a robot offense, than defense.
I've played this thing last February at the Hannover industry fair. I'm by no means a tournament-level player, but I'm not crap either, so I think I can judge this thing's playing power. It's not very good at planning shots (in fact, it's crap at that ;-)), but it's amazingly fast. Better reactions than I have ever seen in a human. And keep in mind, this was a year ago. They use motion prediction to increase the frame rate, so that isn't the limit.
I do think that they can make a tournament-level player out of this thing. Which isn't the motivation, of course, but give them two or three years.
No really, I'm serious. This robot's playing style is more akin to what we call "whackball." Better foosball players remain in contact with the ball a lot longer, "palming" the ball with the face of the man to do quick changes in direction, fakes, and more. There's some video available here on the right side of the page.
Of course, there have been robots interacting with dynamic environments in similar ways for a long time, such as juggling and running. It's a big jump to go to the next level, which requires chaining together sequences of difficult actions, such as palming the ball, passing, and shooting. But I think foosball is a great place to explore such dynamical interaction and action composition, and I'm jealous that they beat me to building a table.
As an avid foosball player, I first want to refute the "lack of strategy" argument for foosball. I play frequently with Tom Spear and Robbie Mares, two of the greatest foosball players in the world. (I don't know about elsewhere in the world, but in America they are known as "Pro Masters," not "grandmasters.") Either one of those guys will tell you that foosball is like a game of chess on speed. The amount of skill you posess for the game will only take you so far. At a certain point, the game becomes almost entirely mental.
Players reach a skill level where they can, physically, do whatever they want to do with the ball. For a pass or a shot, they choose their hole before they even start to move the ball. Trying to defend the pass or the shot is a matter of being able to predict your opponent's maneuver; if you try to play a straightforward defense and watch to see where they're going, then race them to the opening...you'll lose every time.
That said, I think that a machine could be a very worthy competitor. With a fine-tuned history-based decision-making algorithm for baiting and blocking shots, I'm sure it could play great defense if it's fast enough. As far as offense, I'm sure the machine could hit all sorts of angles and speed shots with deadly precision. It will just take time to teach it how to play.
If you're at all interested in more foosball stuff, check out the Valley International Foosball Association and the United States Table Soccer Association. If you like to play, you should check out some local tournaments. For Colorado, we've got our own site and you might have one for your area, too. Speaking on behalf of tournament players everywhere, we'd love for you to come play our tournaments.