LogFAQs > #962990672

SF_Okami posted...

No matter how popular Battlebots gets, it will never be as special to me as Robot Wars in the UK. I spent so many days of my youth watching that show. Tornado cheated

NightRender posted...

I feel like I had the exact opposite experience. To me Battlebots was the "real" robot combat show, and Robot Wars was the cheap knockoff. Y'all can play with your Megabloks all day, I'll be over here with my Lego.

The Robot Wars arena is (IMO) more balanced for all of the different weapon types. The better hazards leads to more tactical fights rather than just "crash weapons and pray theirs breaks sooner" like many fights in the BattleBox are, and the Pit gives control bots a fair and viable win condition instead of them needing to depend on judge's decisions where the criteria is heavily weighed against them. I think BattleBots would be way better if used the same layout as the Robot Wars arena. Just remove the house robots (they're just producer-controlled hazards) and add a timer so the Pit can't be opened until a full minute into the fight (to prevent a Storm2 situation where wedgebots are fishing for quick wins via the Pit) and I think it would be perfectly balanced for every kind of robot. Also, yes, Tornado definitely cheated.

But everything else involved, from the quality of the robots to the production values to even the commentators, I think BattleBots does better. Part of that is just due to the budget though. Robot Wars aired on the taxpayer-funded BBC Network in the UK, so there's no advertising money coming in for the show and no sponsorship money allowed for the teams to use. Everything feels cheaper because it is cheaper.