DJI RoboMaster S1

[Sendotsh]

For those that aren't aware, this is designed for the RoboMaster robotics league in China, which is sponsored (owned?) by DJI in the first place.

Overview of the competition series itself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyYsCyMC-0w

Video of the 2018 Finals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRNQfaf_Cr0

Bloomberg video about the RoboMaster S1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPzq1DoPnXs

[hurrdurr2]

Making the offensive component a central design element is... interesting. They could have designed a robot for kids like what anki did but.. this is what they came up with.

[jamestimmins]

It's perhaps notable that Anki went out of business.

Given the popularity of games like Fortnite, the shooting dynamic seems somewhat inevitable. They may as well shoot at other toy robots and learn to program in the process.

[Lazare]

I can only conclude they've actually met a child, unlike the Anki designers then. :)

[usaphp]

From my experience companies try to design way too friendly and childish robots for kids. Kids at age 8-12 don’t like anki looking robots, they are not cool at all, maybe that’s the reason anki went out of business

[lnsru]

I can imagine, that some primitive gripper is many times more expensive than this offensive component. With a gripper robot must be also bigger and wider as well as more expensive.

As I can see in my home country (ex Soviet Union), parents have no problems when little kids play with guns, tanks or planes. Germans, for example, avoid this. I have mixed feelings, I love peace, but the guns also exist in this world.

[foxylad]

Really limiting their demographic though. A little thought and they could have have had all the Candy Crush kids too.

[adultSwim]

is... a reflection of where this technology came from

[throwaway66666]

The fact that DJI releases an educational robot for kids that has a working cannon feels super icky from my western perspective. In China do they think it's a great idea? Is the culture gap that big, or is there another reason?

Also, how long until someone recreates the famous square scene with a lego character and 3 of these?

EDIT: This video from the promo page where it is hunting down a child - https://www1.djicdn.com/assets/uploads/v/1b34c0e069531a08639...

This would have been great without the cannon, with the cannon it feels... off.

[mikl]

Damn, a younger version of me would have loved this thing. The remote-controlled cars we had in the 90's were downright primitive in comparison.

[cbg0]

Those primitive RC cars weren't $499 though.

[xchaotic]

My kids went through Sphero, Mindstorms and a couple of other robots where you can program them in Scratch and similar. To me such a toy would have been a godsend. They got bored pretty quickly.

Another issue is that gimbal adds to video quality but also to cost.

Finally with the hype, I was expecting a nice ready to fly FPV drone.

So I'm a bit meh about this toy.

[Mauronic1]

Why do you think they would not get bored? Also, what do you think about the price?

[sneak]

DJI is amazing. They sell their drone IMU+RF module separately to make your own drones, and their new 4K Osmo Pocket comes with me everywhere I go. Few companies are making such innovative hardware.

[ex3ndr]

So they are showing how this robots shoot each other and then they show where you can point to a child to follow (or shoot?)...

[yardie]

I like it. Wish it came with an arm instead of a turret. We have a Parrot Mambo in our home. The turret was used for a few days and then removed. It added a lot of bulk and halved the flight time.

[rosege]

This website has a major flaw. When I click the buy button it says not available in your country. I was thinking about getting this for my nephew who lives in the USA while I live in Australia. I know I'm obviously a small percentage that is outside USA that could buy and get it delivered to a local address but it still seems crazy not to even allow that.

I know I could vpn it but I don't think that should be necessary.

[rendx]

You can change the country at the top right corner. At least this worked for me to get a price tag and the option to order.

[sjcao]

It might be a legal issue instead of the small market. the robot shoot water ball so it might violate Australia law. just my 2 cents.

[deskamess]

To mimic your use case, I went through a trial run and it does let you enter a non US billing address (Australia was a drop down).

[acomjean]

Seems A lot like Robocode, but with hardware and less destruction.

(robocode seems to still be going, though I haven't looked at it in a while..)

http://robowiki.net/wiki/Robocode

https://robocode.sourceforge.io

[Tepix]

So, how about a DIY variant of this?

- Start with a DonkeyCar with Jetson Nano

- add mecanum wheels (why not three instead of four?)

- add a weapon or laser pointer or whatever

On the other hand, do we really want to push gamification of autonomous weapon systems?

[JustFinishedBSG]

DJI taking the time to write a page for the S1 in my language only to at the very end tell me "Not available in your region" is toying with my emotions and heartbreaking

[xiphias2]

You can always do dropshipping...it's sucks, but us non-US people are always second class citizens of the world.

[jeannekamikaze]

Interesting how an educational robot project/competition always needs to involve the careful exercising of ballistics against a target. Descartes clearly got it all wrong and should have instead formulated his proposition as "I fire ma lazerz, therefore I am". By that definition, the singularity is clearly near.

[danboarder]

Bloomberg Businessweek created an excellent video profile of how this kit fits in robotics education and STEAM programs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPzq1DoPnXs

[yeldarb]

Looks like a cooler version of the AWS DeepRacer mixed with an old LEGO MindStorm kit.

[jpdb]

I know this is a yet-to-be released product and it says Python is supported, but does anyone know if it is possible to install 3rd party libraries and interact with the filesystem?

Interested in installing a webserver like flask on here.

[Mauronic1]

It will be interesting to see how open it is but DJIs first educational offering (Tello) and other products don't go very far in that regard.

[darepublic]

This looks pretty damn cool and I'd like to try it. But weird that the western media hasn't picked up this story in light of all their coverage on China stealing IP...

[PanMan]

What does the "gun" shoot? It seems laser, but then how does the target in the movie (which seems to be paper) fall over?

[sjcao]

it's some kind of small ball, need to absorb water for 2+ hours before use.

[willart4food]

why this?

> To comply with local laws and regulations, the RoboMaster S1 will not be sold in Washington, D.C. or North Dakota.

[Mauronic1]

My American girlfriend's immediate response: seems militaristic and violent.

My daughter was turned off from robotics at a young age. She joined firstego league and there was a ton of domineering "boy energy" in her school. She enjoyed creating and personalizing the robots in unique ways, the boys wanted "to win".

This is what happens when you have a bunch of dudes designing educational robot toys.

[langitbiru]

You are posing an interesting assumption. Your premise is girls and boys are "biologically" different in this robotics context. Your words: "the boys wanted 'to win'", "She enjoyed creating and personalizing the robots".

If we accept your premise to be true, then we must cater to the girls so robotics can be more inclusive. Again your words: "creating and personalizing the robots in unique ways". Maybe DJI can provide robotics which is less violent, catered for girls. I don't know, maybe something like Baymax, or Wall-E.

The other side of coin is we reject your premise. Boys and girls have no differences. Boys want to win. Girls want to win also. If this alternative premise is true, then either we must push the girls to be more aggressive (want to win) or discourage the boys who are aggressive (want to win).

I am interested in other people's opinion about this. No, I don't have answer for this question.

[akerl_]

I’m more concerned by the idea that wanting “to win” is “boy energy”. Why should we persist the idea that wanting to win is a boy thing, and wanting to create/personalize is (as implied by your comment) a girl thing?

[dgzl]

I'm curious, since you know your daughter's personality (and those of little girls in general) better than I do, how would the game be designed such that they'd be more interested? Keep in mind this is coming from a company known for making high quality drones.

[bubblewrap]

Get your daughter a different toy, then, and let the boys enjoy their battles.