Digital agency AKQA has reportedly taught an AI to create a sport, and now we have Speedgate. According to reports, the newly invented sport is a combination of multiple field games like rugby, soccer, and even Quidditch – a fictional game in the famous Harry Potter movies.
Speedgate was invented due to AKQA’s goal of presenting something ambitious for Design Week Portland. Considering the agency’s recent work with Nike and its “love of sports or athleticism,” AKQA came up with the idea of inventing a new-generation game.
AKQA’s creative director Whitney Jenkins explained that they used an existing recurrent neural network architecture and deep convolutional generative adversarial network for their project. Together with tech company NVIDIA, Jenkins and her team fed the neural network with data from hundreds of existing sports.
Creating Speedgate
When it was run on clusters of Tesla GPUs, the AI network generated over a thousand different sports complete with logos and rules. However, the machine did not take the safety of players into consideration so most of the sports it generated either impractical or too dangerous to play.
For instance, one game involves doing parkour underwater while another uses exploding frisbees. If that’s not bizarre enough, the AI also created a game that requires players to play catch while walking on a tightrope attached between two hot air balloons. Jenkins and her team analyzed all the outputs of the AI and filtered them down to a list of ten possibilities that they tested on the field.
Playing Speedgate
Speedgate, which requires two teams composed of six players each, has won the field test. The game has three gates, one in the center and one at each end of the field. Three players from both teams can position themselves anywhere in the playing field.
The remaining three players can only cross into the opposing team’s side if their team gains control of the gate. Controlling the gate requires a team to kick a ball through the gate without stepping in the central gate area.
Also, the ball has to be passed between players as they can’t run while in possession of it. The ball has to be tossed or kicked to another player within three seconds. Otherwise, the opposing team will have the opportunity to snatch it away.
Scores are earned by kicking the ball through the opposing team’s gate. The team with the highest score at the end of the three seven-minute games will be declared the winner.
I don’t know about you, but I liked the sound of the hot air balloon tightrope more.
In any case, to learn more about Speedgate, you can find an in-depth guide here.
Intense game and a great workout!
A bit complicated but interesting.