The goal of the competition is to build AI agents that can play the popular game Angry Birds better than the best human players. This is surprisingly difficult as the outcome of each action is unknown in advance and the number of possible actions is infinite. Physics-based simulation games such as Angry Birds use a simulator that has complete knowledge of the current game state and each action can be perfectly and realistically simulated. However, players only have visual information available and must select a good action based on estimating the outcomes. This is very similar to the way humans interact with the physical world and what successful AI systems should be capable of doing too. The Angry Birds AI competition offers the possibility to develop these capabilities in a  simplified and controlled environment.

Participants are provided with a sample agent that they can improve using methods developed in AI areas such as computer vision, machine learning, knowledge representation and reasoning, heuristic search, and reasoning under uncertainty.

In addition to the standard track, the 2015 competition features a new competitive track where two agents play the same game level using alternating shots. Agents make concealed offers for the right of the
first shot and the agent that solves a level gets all the points. This should offer an interesting testbed for multi-agent and game theory research.

AIBIRDS 2015 will be held over multiple days during the main conference. The first day is the qualification round accompanied by paper presentations. The second day is the finals day where the winner will
be determined. The last day features the Human vs Machine Challenge where everyone is invited to challenge the best AI agents and where we will answer whether humans are still better than AI at playing Angry Birds.

The competition is open to all registered teams who submit a working Angry Birds game playing agent to the organisers by July 12. This agent will be used for testing compatibility with the competition framework. Participants can still modify their agent after July 12, but no further compatibility tests will be made. Remote participation is possible, but attendance is encouraged. Each team must submit a one page description of the methods and strategies used by the agent. This information will not be disclosed to other competitors before the competition.
There will also be a limited opportunity to present original scientific work on all aspects of developing an Angry Birds AI agent. The deadline for submitting full or short papers is July 1.

All participating teams need to register for the competition, one registration per team. Registration will open on March 1, 2015. Early registration deadline is May 31. For more detailed information on the competition, including Call for Participation and Call for Papers, please refer to aibirds.org.

Organisers: Jochen Renz, XiaoYu (Gary) Ge, Peng Zhang, Stephen Gould
(Australian National University).
Contact: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.