Japan and US Attempting to Make Anime a Reality

No, that doesn’t mean humans with worryingly deformed skulls and eyes so large that they terrify your dog. This is much, much cooler.

Some of you will already be familiar with shows like Battlebots, where little custom built machines do combat with each other in enclosed arenas while humans look on and cheer on the carnage. If you’re not familiar with Battlebots, well, I just explained all you need to know about it.

Not content to sit back and be outdone by these small metal creations, impressive as they are, an American company called Megabots, which specializes in much larger variants of these attack robots, has issued a challenge to Japan’s Suidobashi Heavy Industries to pit the best of the US against the best of Japan.

After a year of preparation and building, the day of reckoning is almost upon us. But unfortantely a date for the face off between Team USA and Team Japan is still yet to be announced. The Megabot creation from the US stands 15 feet high and weighs over 12,000 pounds, a far cry from his smaller domestic brethren, while the Japanese Kuratas weighs in at 9900 pounds, and stands 13 feet tall. While the US creation has more height and mass, the Japanese Kuratas has the edge in decades of mecha culture.

So, which will end up victorious? Hopefully we will find out some time in the future. One of Megabots biggest investors Michael Kwatinetz stated that, “There is a giant opportunity for live events that stimulate people’s interest. That much is obvious from examples like the WWE or Nascar.” Just please, people working on these machines, put a limit on their artificial intelligence, they’re already terrifying enough.