Organizer David Caulkins and Combat Robot Legend Ray Billings talk about the return of Robogames, which takes place at the Alameda County Fairgrounds in Pleasanton CA on April 6th through 9th, 2023.

Robogames is the world's largest robot competition with over 54 different events -- everything from tiny little Rubik's cube-sized Sumo robots that act autonomously to humanoids that play soccer. The big thing is always the 250-pound robots in our 40 foot by 40 foot, 130,000 pound arena.

When I asked David Caulkins towards the end of this interview, how he was able to bring back, Robogames after a four-year absence, he said that his arena was so badly damaged in 2018 that he couldn't continue but an anonymous contestant offered to put up $1M to bring back Robogames.

David is also joined by Ray Billings who has been competing in combat robot events for 22 years. His robot "Last Rites" was a previous winner at Robogames, and this year he'll be featuring "The Mortician," which is another variation of the offset horizontal spinner. Ray gives some great advice to those thinking about competing in combat robots: "start small", advice which no one seems to follow.

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