Small Crowd Pays to Watch a Boxing Match Between 80-Pound Chinese Robots (restofworld.org)
- Reference: 0180793696
- News link: https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/26/02/14/2330259/small-crowd-pays-to-watch-a-boxing-match-between-80-pound-chinese-robots
- Source link: https://restofworld.org/2026/chinese-robot-boxing-unitree-rek/
> The match was organized by Rek, a San Francisco-based company, and drew hundreds of spectators who had paid about $60-$80 for a ticket to watch modified G1 robots go at each other. Made by Unitree, the dominant Chinese robot maker, they weighed in at around 80 pounds and stood 4.5 feet tall, with human-like hands and dozens of joint motors for flexibility. The match had all the bells and whistles of a regular boxing bout: pulsing music, cameras capturing all the angles, hyped-up introductions, a human referee, and even two commentators. The evening featured two bouts made up of five rounds, each lasting 60 seconds. The robots pranced around the cage, throwing jabs and punches, drawing ohs and ahs from the crowd. They fell sometimes, and needed human intervention to get them back on their feet.
The robots were controlled by humans using VR interfaces, which led to some odd moments with robots hitting into the air, throwing multiple punches that failed to even connect with their opponents. One robot controller was a former UFC fighter, the article points out, but "The crowd cheered as a 13-year-old VR pilot named Dash beat his older competitor...."
The company behind this event plans more boxing matches with their VR-controlled robots, and even wants to develop "a league of robot boxers, including full-height robots that weigh about 200 pounds and are nearly 6 feet tall."
[1] https://restofworld.org/2026/chinese-robot-boxing-unitree-rek/
[2] https://x.com/REK/status/2020351555950850243
No pathos (Score:3)
Its no fun to watch robots fight unless they have personalities, backstories. I want to see a tough, honest robot with a family, who just wants to make enough money fighting to start his italian sandwhich shop in New Jersey fight a plucky girl robot whose just coming out of her shell for the first time after a rough highschool experiance because her other girl robot friends support her so much. Or whatever.
Obligatory Futurama (Score:2)
[1]https://youtu.be/-o4mdhKlPLI?s... [youtu.be]
[1] https://youtu.be/-o4mdhKlPLI?si=ff1Y2RyOuR1ARU1U
Re: (Score:2)
THAT'S the stuff!
Will the stupid ever end? (Score:2)
It seems like every day I see something stupider
The tech has great potential to do great things, yet people seem to have unlimited ability to think up stupid ways to misuse it
Re: (Score:2)
A bounded random variable has a maximum, a minimum, and an expectation. If you insist on expecting the maximum every time you come across one, you will be disappointed most of your life. You should expect the mean instead.
The thing is that salespeople who are trying to sell you one will lead you to believe that the maximum is what your expectation should be. If you actually believe them, you will be regularly disappointed.
The potential of tech is one such random variable.
Re: (Score:2)
What do you mean never end? I don't even know why this is news. We've been fighting Robots against each other in an arena since 1964 Maybe your UID makes you too young to have played this game [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] as a kid.
But even if you are too young for that, surely you're all enough to have watched [2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] 25 years ago?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_'Em_Sock_'Em_Robots
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BattleBots
Are they robots? (Score:4, Insightful)
I guess I'll be that guy: If they're controlled by humans are they really robots? Sounds more like remote control humanoids to me.
Re: Are they robots? (Score:2)
Yeah. My thought was that's interesting until I got down to that sentence.
Two humans fighting by proxy isn't new. Truman and Stalin were doing it in Korea 75 years ago.
Re: (Score:2)
Remote controlled machine fights was basically the premise behind the BattleBots series. I'm kind of surprised this is getting such a negative reception here, it's finally something that fits the "news for nerds" mantra, and so far most of the comments are that it's dystopian/lame/a waste of technology.
Sure has become a jaded crowd here. If we've collectively grown weary of technology stories, perhaps it's time to start posting about Amish barn raisings instead. /s
Re: (Score:2)
I'm sure people said the same about BattleBots. I like the idea and would definitely go see a fight if it was nearby, but I'd rather see autonomous robots duke it out.
Re: (Score:2)
Probably because the title had "Chinese robots" in it and triggered a lot of people's subconscious negative emotions.
Whether the robots are Chinese or not makes no difference to the story, so I don't know why it's even included.
Could be better with AI (Score:2)
This is mildly interesting, but if they removed the VR teleoperation and instead required the robots to include an AI that they have trained to box (and ideally, also trash talk its opponent) it would be a lot more interesting.
Re: (Score:1)
It would be a lot more interesting technically, and a lot more boring to watch, robots aren't up to it yet.
Small Crowd (Score:2)
That's a pretty racist way to call Chinese people. ðY
You don't need robots for this (Score:2)
People have held underground boxing matches between fifth graders. Same specs. Well at least American fifth graders.
Boxing Match Between 80-Pound Chi... (Score:2)
That's how the headline clipped on my feed.
Was unsure whether it would complete as "Children", since Chihuahuas don't get that big.
I guess Chinese Robots would be entertaining too. Do their heads fly off if their opponent lands a punch?
I saw this movie (Score:1)
Real Steel, 2011
This is (Score:1)
Dystopia
Dystopian? (Score:3)
> Humans beating each other up for sport seems more dystopian honestly.
Only if the robots are paying $60-$80 for tickets to watch.