RoboCup: robot world cup

RoboCup is an attempt to foster intelligent robotics research by providing a standard problem where a wide range of technologies can be integrated and examined. The First Robot World Cup Soccer Games and Conferences (RoboCup-97) was held during IJCAI-97, Nagoya, with over 40 teams participating from throughout the world. RoboCup soccer is a task for a team of fast-moving robots in a dynamic, noisy environment. In order for a robot team to actually perform a soccer game, various technologies must be incorporated including: design principles of autonomous agents, multi-agent collaboration, strategy acquisition, real-time reasoning, robotics, and sensor-fusion. This article describes technical challenges involved in RoboCup, its official rules, a report of RoboCup-97, and future perspectives.