Spectrum watched the 2018 FRC teaser tonight in our lab and we have some initial reactions.
Elevation Changes
- Power UP - makes it pretty obvious that robots will have to climb something,
- that may be stairs like the student walks down in the beginning of the clip or it could be ramps that robots have to drive up.
- There are stairs/ramps in the poster and on top of the arcade machine
- Multi-Tiered playing field, multiple ramps
- More obscure level changes
- Ladders?
- Moving Platforms
- Up / down
- Tilting
Coins
- Collecting them as a game piece
- Discs/Frisbees/Disc Golf Discs
- If you turn in coins your human players can put out different game pieces based on the amount of coins.
- Possibly scoring in coin slots
- Tiny coins (like 1in or less)
- Large coins (2 ft or bigger diameter)
- Coin dispensers on the field, so you have to pull something, push a block, hit something, to release more coins (hoppers?)
- 500 = Coin Amount on the field?
(Searches for “500” in google did not return any relevant results)
Power Ups = changes or bonuses mid match
- Bonus points
- Get certain items or score in a certain order and then there are multipliers. Similar to ubertubes in 2011
- Unlock certain parts of the game or objectives after scoring or completing objectives
- Possibly get to choose which power ups to use each match
- Audience selection of power ups?
FIRST Logo on poles (similar to logo motion)- Possibly hanging logos like 2011
- Maybe have to get logo pieces off the poles instead of putting them on
- 4 out of 5 games on the machine were pick and place games
- 2005, 2007, 2011, 2017 (not 2016)
Misc- Human players score the game pieces on the side of the field similar to pilots placing gears this year.
- Size changes?
- The power ups may allow your robots to expand to a taller or larger size.
- Inflatable robots (unlikely but cool)
- Video Game Mechanics
- A lot of things are possible with video mechanics.
- Mystery boxes
- Co-op elements
- Intra alliance co-op elements were it takes multiple robots on an alliance to do something
- Inter alliance co-op similar to 2012/2015 (hopefully not)
- Barrel Jumping/Ladder Climbing
Just for Fun
- Human players dressed as Donkey Kong
- CHUCK TOWN
- Charleston, South Carolina
- Fire Alarm = Lava Game
- Spectrum
