Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]

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Errkal
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Errkal » Fri Mar 16, 2018 6:40 pm

I think a lot of people went go strawberry float yourself when it wasn't Craig Charles

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Jenuall
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Jenuall » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:01 pm

Bring back Lister or there'll be no applause,
Without Charles I ain't watching Robot Wars!

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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Errkal » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:07 pm

It's a shame it is gone though, scanlon was yummy.

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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Frank » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:12 pm

Jenuall wrote:Bring back Lister or there'll be no applause,
Without Charles I ain't watching Robot Wars!


:lol:

Man, Craig Charles was good.

It's sad that they cancelled it when it was finally starting to show potential. Add a bit of variation to the actual fights (the Gauntlet and the Sumo would have meant that teams couldn't just design "another smashy spinner" and kept the roster fresh) and it would have been much more interesting for families to watch. There's only so many spinner v spinner fights you can watch before the whole thing gets dull.

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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Errkal » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:22 pm

I wasn't a massive scan of bots fighting g a few times a show, it mean the final of the show was usually two beaten to gooseberry fool robots neither working right and the winner got more lucky than anything.

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Jenuall
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Jenuall » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:40 pm

Yeah I think they had the right idea to try and mix things up a bit, but getting the robots to fight over and over again could be somewhat anticlimactic.

I don't know whether they should have adjusted the rules somewhat to try and promote more varied robot designs because it did get a bit repetitive once people decided that spinners and flippers were basically the only way to go.

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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Dig Dug » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:52 pm

Jenuall wrote:I don't know whether they should have adjusted the rules somewhat to try and promote more varied robot designs because it did get a bit repetitive once people decided that spinners and flippers were basically the only way to go.

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Jenuall
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Jenuall » Fri Mar 16, 2018 8:05 pm

Dig Dug wrote:
Jenuall wrote:I don't know whether they should have adjusted the rules somewhat to try and promote more varied robot designs because it did get a bit repetitive once people decided that spinners and flippers were basically the only way to go.

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Yeah, to be fair Nuts was a pretty neat robot.

I always thought something more interesting could have been done with the cluster-bot approach as well.

Last edited by Jenuall on Fri Mar 16, 2018 11:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Wrathy » Fri Mar 16, 2018 11:03 pm

Dream: Reboot on Dave with Craig Charles, Season 2/3 hybrid format with the gauntlet and the pinball as "hey look its not just robots beating the gooseberry fool out of each other" sideshows, bring back Hypnodisc and Sgt bash (its what the people want)

Reality: Comedy Central make a reboot with Jonathan Ross and cut it down to 30 minutes per episode

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Blue Canary
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Blue Canary » Sat Mar 17, 2018 10:48 am

I'm not sure what's worse: Robot Wars dying, or the fact that the last Robot Wars episode ever was World Series: Episode 2.

If anyone is looking for something to fill the void that Robot Wars has left, then don't worry! There's plenty of shows coming along!

King of Bots just completed its first series in China and features lots of British builders including John Reid (Terrorhurtz) and Gabe (Sabertooth) competing with their new flipper Tanshe. Ellis Ware (Pulsar/Magnetar) competing with Great White, Gary Cairns (PP3D/Typhoon) with the insane Crossfire and The Coopers (They built the house robots) competing with Spectre which is now my favourite robot ever. It was a fantastic series and it's all available on Youtube for free. You can watch episode one here. Someone has even done English translations of each episode, although I followed along nicely just watching in Chinese. Team Rapid have said they are gearing up for KoB 2.

This Is Fighting (Sometimes referred to as King of Bots 1.5) is currently filming in China and features more very good robots. This should air later this year and if the pictures of the arena and the pits are anything to go by, it should be very good indeed. According to Robotic Death Company, it's a mix between a normal tournament and The Voice where 4 captains choose teams of robots.

Clash Bots is currently filming in China and from what i've heard from builders involved, it's a mess and the production crew are slave drivers. But it's still worth looking out for. They've released lots of teasers/trailers and all of them are so bad they're hilarious.

BATTLEBOTS IS BACK! Discovery Science picked it up after ABC left it on their doorstep when it was just a baby. They have commissioned a 20 episode series with a more intense format where every robot fights 3/4 times before the top robots move to a 16 bot bracket. Filming starts in a few weeks time and again, lots of British builders are going along too, including one of my friends. Support Team Vanquish if you watch it.

And finally, there are plenty of live shows happening in Britain that you can attend. Robots Live and Extreme Robots are running shows all over the country with some robots from Robot Wars and some that only do the live tour. One of the arenas has been upgraded to house spinners so fights should be just as destructive as the ones on the telly. I would say if you're looking for robot combat then definitely think about going along.

Jenuall wrote:Yeah I think they had the right idea to try and mix things up a bit, but getting the robots to fight over and over again could be somewhat anticlimactic.

I don't know whether they should have adjusted the rules somewhat to try and promote more varied robot designs because it did get a bit repetitive once people decided that spinners and flippers were basically the only way to go.


In the last series, they did try and change the rules up a bit with the allowance of limited entanglement devices to try and counter the spinners. They didn't really work that well, however. A meta always emerges in any competition, and in Robot Wars it happens to be armoured flippers and high KE spinners.

People build these robots with their own money. The appearance fee from Robot Wars is generally pittance compared to the cost of the actual robot (~£500). Why would I spend thousands of pounds of my own money on a design that will get wrecked by Aftershock in the first round, when I could make a high KE spinner for cheaper that would do better? The new Chinese shows (KOB, Clash Bots, This is Fighting) and Battlebots throw decent money at the competitors and it shows in the variety of designs that you get.

The biggest problem the reboot had, for me, was the BBC's stupid commitment to 6 episode series, which meant that they couldn't get as many robots in and the format had to change to really work.

I'll post here what I said on Facebook:

I feel people overestimate how many people watched the reboot of Robot Wars. It's not like they just shot Have I Got News For You in the back of the head or anything. At most, it was getting 1.3 million in the final series and barely making a dent in iPlayer.

While I didn't like the BBC's lack of marketing, I can understand why they would focus more on marketing other shows. Very few shows have quite the community that Robot Wars does and, for lack of a better term, it could market itself. They knew that a million people would tune in regardless when it was on. I would argue that Robot Wars did better against Blue Planet than most other shows they would consider putting against it.

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Frank
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Frank » Sat Mar 17, 2018 10:54 am

Some of the live shows have been great. I've seen the Extreme Robots guys the past two years in a row. The shows are a bit skewed towards the younger audience (the last one I was at had appearances from like, a Dalek, Wall-E, and then two guys in Transformers suits :dread: ), but the actual robot fighting is good. Wonder if this means they can go back to using the Robot Wars name (and Matilda)...

Hope Rapid get obliterated in King of Bots as well. The guy manages to come across like a proper villain without actually really doing anything.

EDIT: Are the English translations of King of Bots the guy doing the Twitch commentary or is there another proper translation out there?

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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Blue Canary » Sat Mar 17, 2018 10:59 am

Frank wrote:Hope Rapid get obliterated in King of Bots as well. The guy manages to come across like a proper villain without actually really doing anything.


I sort of liked how he took the "I'm rich" persona on and rolled with it, personally. Every show needs a heel.

It also helped he had a great robot.

EDIT:


EDIT: Are the English translations of King of Bots the guy doing the Twitch commentary or is there another proper translation out there?


Just the Twitch ones, I'm afraid. Although I'm pretty sure full localisation is coming soon.

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Frank
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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Frank » Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:05 am

Yeah, it feels like he's literally just there to pay for the robot. He doesn't drive it, or do anything in the actual fights, but he's the mouthpiece :slol:

Ah, mayne. Hope someone gets some proper subtitles out soon!

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PostRe: Robot Wars [Series 10] [Sundays, 8pm] [BBC2]
by Blue Canary » Sat Mar 17, 2018 11:09 am

Frank wrote:Yeah, it feels like he's literally just there to pay for the robot. He doesn't drive it, or do anything in the actual fights, but he's the mouthpiece :slol:

Ah, mayne. Hope someone gets some proper subtitles out soon!


When I watched KOB I didn't feel like I missed much not knowing what they were saying, there were two points where people started their sob stories, but that was it. The fights still hold up very well on their own.


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