Tought some of you would like to hear about this: http://pc.ign.com/articles/664/664063p1.html

By invitation only though. The competition is only open to students of specific schools. =(

-me

I happen to be a graduate student of one of the school, but I just dont have time to participate. I may keep the program to test my future AI engines, tough.

Restricted to North American entrants... yes...apparently the rest of the world isn't smart enough to be able to contribute meaningfully. Or perhaps they're just worried that we'll show them up! ;)

Quote: Original post by Timkin
Restricted to North American entrants... yes...apparently the rest of the world isn't smart enough to be able to contribute meaningfully. Or perhaps they're just worried that we'll show them up! ;)

Actaully, I think it is because they want to hire the people and don't want workers with a loose grasp on the english laugage. Or maybe this just isn't that big of a event. Or just inter-school competision.

Probably just legal problems stopping entrants.

I hope they release the game (minus the AI) for enthusiasts to try out.

this sounds a bit similar and was gr8 fun

http://www.mindrover.com/

Quote: Original post by ROBERTREAD1
Probably just legal problems stopping entrants.

I hope they release the game (minus the AI) for enthusiasts to try out.

this sounds a bit similar and was gr8 fun

http://www.mindrover.com/

They did, anyone is free to download the game with code source to play with it.

Quote: Actaully, I think it is because they want to hire the people

Thats the primary objective I think, of restricting the competition to North American students. They are looking for AI coders that they can recruit, and if someone from Asia or Australia were to display their flair for AI, and win, it would be impractical for the company to recruit them.

Has anybody else downloaded it yet? The test arena is garbage. I only installed it maybe 30 minutes ago, and already I've had to fix several serious bugs. Good thing it comes with source. Also, I don't know about platforms other than Windows, but on Windows the UI is barely usuable. For example, the only keys that work in the text boxes are alphanumeric and backspace, and the box is about 8 characters wide and requires full paths unless you setup a different working folder.

tj963

ROFL. EA hires internationally all the time. I'd say more than likely that if there are prizes being awarded, then the restrictions are for taxation purposes. It's apparently hard for US companies to award prizes to (or pay wages to) foreign nationals not living in the US (who obviously don't file a tax return there).

Anyway, my comment above was just a light hearted jibe. Don't take it so seriously! ;)

Good luck to anyone taking part in the competition... but make sure that if you get to the finals, you obtain agreements in writing that EA wont use your intellectual property without your permission.