They fall at the drop of a hat and are experts at fake falls. The first robot football tournament was full of fun: What's the significance?

Those who are involved in the second - dimensional circle or have watched the children's channel in their childhood will more or less remember that once - popular animation.

Yes, it's the "Hyper Soccer".

The content of this animation is actually quite simple. It's about a group of AI robots with self - awareness and unique "skills" competing in teams on the football field. Who among the protagonists of the "Red Team", like Qianlong, Liuxing, and Zhanfu, wasn't an object that kids vied to imitate with their friends on the playground back then?

Even today, I still love the combination of future technology and passionate sports.

Looking back, that period was basically the peak of such robot sports - themed works. From "Hyper Soccer" to "Real Steel", it's not hard to see that in the first decade of the 21st century, humans had infinite imagination about AI and robots breaking through human limits. And all of this seems to be getting closer to us today, more than a decade later.

(Image source: Doubao AI)

Recently, guided by the Management Committee of Beijing Economic - Technological Development Area, jointly hosted by Shangyicheng (Beijing) Technology and Culture Group Co., Ltd. and Beijing Acceleration Evolution Technology Co., Ltd., the finals of the 2025 RoBoLeague Robot Football League (abbreviated as "Robot Super League") were held at the Beijing Smart E - sports Event Center in Yizhuang, Beijing.

While the "Scottish Premier League" next door is in full swing, will the first truly pure - autonomous, non - remotely - controlled "Robot Super League" become the next big thing in China?

You know what? There are actually quite a few interesting things.

Kick - off, shooting, and chaos

What kind of scene do you imagine when robots play football?

Individual AI entities with high - level intelligence and autonomous learning abilities control sophisticated humanoid robots, making precise passes, powerful shots, and impeccable defenses on the football field with millisecond - level reaction speeds. They can even achieve seamless multi - agent cooperation through complex algorithms, and execute tactics with extreme precision, presenting an unprecedented, extremely smooth and futuristic competitive form?

Well, the reality might be quite different from what everyone imagines.

In this game, you can see the following scenes:

Some players collapse into a heap on the sidelines before the game even starts; some suddenly fall into a baby - like sleep while running. Although they all look human - like, once on the field, they just lie around everywhere. As long as one player falls, it's very common to see a chaotic scene of players falling over one after another.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

Even because the algorithms of players in the same team are basically the same, you can see such an abstract scene like "stick together if you're brothers".

(Image source: CCTV.com)

Putting aside these funny scenes, there are also many players focusing on the game.

For example, Xiaolv No. 4 of the Shanhai Team from the agricultural university tried to take a one - on - one shot after the opponent's forward made a mistake in their own half. Although the ball rolled a bit too far with his kick, with the "real human - machine operation" cooperation of the opposing goalkeeper, he still successfully helped his team score an equalizer.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

The opposing Huoshen Team wasn't willing to be outdone either. Xiaozǐ No. 3 suddenly made an incredibly imaginative back - heel pass, dodging two Xiaolv players who were marking him. Unfortunately, Xiaozǐ No. 4 of his team didn't keep up with the rhythm. Immediately, the players from both sides got into a scuffle, chasing and competing with each other, and the situation became even more intense.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

In the following time, unexpected situations kept popping up.

For example, Xiaozǐ, the goalkeeper, got impatient watching his teammates, sat down in front of the goal out of nowhere, and then slowly got up from the ground. At that time, his teammates were still entangled with the opponents, and the ball just stayed still on the ground.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

Another example is when the ball was kicked to a position on the verge of going out of bounds. Due to algorithm problems caused by vision blockage, the four players on the field were like headless chickens, constantly hesitating, and no player dared to touch the ball on the edge of going out of bounds. They wasted nearly a minute before the ball started moving again.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

You know, each half of this game is only ten minutes. Wasting one minute should be considered time - wasting.

In the second half, as the game became extremely intense, the players got into a series of close - combat scuffles. There were constant pursuits and blockades, which in real - life football would mostly result in yellow or red cards.

Finally, these fallen robots had to be carried out of the field one by one by human protectors.

Of course, some were self - reliant. When there were no other robots or obstacles around, most robot players could stand up on their own after falling and continue playing as if nothing had happened.

The exciting moments in the second half mostly happened on the Shanhai Team's side. First, a powerful shot from the center - circle kick - off sent the ball straight into the Huoshen Team's goal. Although the goalkeeper of the Huoshen Team made the only standard save in the whole game, unfortunately, his legs were too short, and he could only watch the ball go into the net.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

In real - life three - a - side or five - a - side football, a long - range shot from the kick - off is also a very common strategy.

Another exciting moment came after the scuffle between the two teams. The goalkeeper of the Shanhai Team suddenly launched an attack, quickly broke through two forward players of the Huoshen Team and entered the opponent's penalty area. Taking advantage of the Huoshen Team's misjudgment, he poked the ball into the opponent's goal, narrowing the score gap to one goal.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

It's a pity that the goalkeeper of the Shanhai Team had a poor algorithm and didn't even attempt a proper interception in the whole game.

Finally, the Huoshen Team from Tsinghua University defeated the Shanhai Team from China Agricultural University with a score of 5:3 and won the championship.

Fair, but lacking in diversity

Different from previous robot competitions, this competition achieved two major breakthroughs:

First is completely autonomous AI decision - making.

All the humanoid robots on the field rely entirely on their built - in AI strategies to play the game. Without human control intervention, they autonomously complete a series of complex actions, including walking, running, kicking, defending, passing, shooting, and getting up on their own after falling, fully testing the robots' bipedal dynamic balance and multi - robot collaborative decision - making abilities.

You may not have a clear concept of these statements, but actually, you just need to know one thing -

Currently, most robot variety shows on the market still adopt the form of human back - end control of robots, and even the science - fiction movie "Real Steel" is the same.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

What does this mean?

It means that throughout the whole game, except for the referees and logistics staff, the game basically depends entirely on robots and algorithms. How to use depth cameras for visual recognition and positioning, how to make robots distinguish their own team from opponents, and what actions to take when the ball is nearby have all become difficult problems for several teams to debug.

The reality is quite harsh. Under the condition of autonomous AI decision - making, robots often have difficulty getting up after being knocked down, and there are frequent mistakes such as own goals and glancing blows. It's even very difficult for goalkeepers to make a save throughout the game.

Then is optimized rule mechanism.

(Image source: CCTV.com)

This competition didn't copy the rules of real - life three - a - side football but adopted new penalty rules, aiming to significantly reduce the frequency of game interruptions, thereby improving the smoothness and intensity of the game.

Considering the frequency of mistakes and confrontations of these robots on the field, if the rules of real - life three - a - side football were copied, the rhythm would definitely be affected by frequent fouls and set - pieces, which also doesn't meet the purpose of this competition to achieve "technical verification".

It's worth mentioning that this competition uniformly adopted the Acceleration Evolution Booster T1 humanoid robot as the standard platform, mainly testing the ability of university teams to conduct secondary development on the same hardware. For example, the Huoshen Team increased the robot's speed by 30% through algorithm optimization, while the Shanhai Team strengthened the anti - impact structural design.

This approach does ensure the fairness of the competition to a certain extent, but it also weakens the diversity that such competitions should have.

It is hoped that more different robots will appear in the upcoming World Humanoid Robot Games.

Robot competitions are not just for fun

Since 2025, domestic robot competitions seem to have entered a period of rapid development.

In April this year, a half - marathon for humanoid robots was held in Beijing; in May, Unitree held the world's first humanoid robot fighting competition. Then there was the just - concluded RoBoLeague Robot Football League, and the scheduled 2025 World Humanoid Robot Games and the world's first full - size humanoid robot free - fighting competition in the second half of the year...

Not to mention the industrial or household value of humanoid robots, the entertainment industry seems to have set its eyes on them.

Judging from the comment section of Bilibili, most netizens are quite interested in robot football. Many netizens joked that "there's hope for the Chinese national football team". Maybe before witnessing the Chinese national football team enter the World Cup, we can actually see domestic robots play in the World Cup first.

(Image source: Bilibili)