The following is a list of notable contestants that have reached the semi-finals or grand final in Robot Wars.
A natural disaster is a major adverse event resulting from natural processes of the Earth; examples include firestorms, duststorms, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, tsunamis, storms, and other geologic processes. A natural disaster can cause loss of life or damage property, and typically leaves some economic damage in its wake, the severity of which depends on the affected population's resilience and on the infrastructure available.
A firestorm is a conflagration which attains such intensity that it creates and sustains its own wind system. It is most commonly a natural phenomenon, created during some of the largest bushfires and wildfires. Although the term has been used to describe certain large fires, the phenomenon's determining characteristic is a fire with its own storm-force winds from every point of the compass towards the storm's center, where the air is heated and then ascends. The Black Saturday bushfires and the Great Peshtigo Fire are possible examples of forest fires with some portion of combustion due to a firestorm, as is the Great Hinckley Fire. Firestorms have also occurred in cities, usually due to targeted explosives, such as in the aerial firebombings of Hamburg, Dresden, and Tokyo, and the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
Robot Wars is a robot combat competition that was broadcast on British television from 1998 to 2004 and from 2016 to 2018. Each series involves teams of amateur and professional roboteers operating their own constructed remote controlled robots to fight against each other in an arena formed of steel and bullet proof glass fitted with arena hazards and containing areas occupied by hostile and heavier "House Robots". Earlier series included assault and trial courses for competing robots.
Red Tornado is a fictional superhero appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics.
Firestorm is the name of several fictional superheroes appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Ronnie Raymond and Martin Stein fused together debuted as the first incarnation in Firestorm, the Nuclear Man #1 and were created by Gerry Conway and Al Milgrom. Jason Rusch debuted as a modern update of the character in Firestorm #1, and was created by Dan Jolley and ChrisCross.
Chaos 2 is a combat robot from the UK Television Series Robot Wars, designed and built by self-employed mechanic George Francis, from Ipswich, and operated by Team Chaos. Twice winner of the UK Robot Wars Championship and the only robot with that distinction, it was the first robot to use its flipper to throw its opponents out of the arena altogether. This machine was also the first to defeat Hypno-Disc in Series 3. Its flipper is commonly considered to be one of the most powerful in Robot Wars, although it is not as powerful as the catapult-style flipper of Wheely Big Cheese. However, its weapon is superior in terms of efficiency, but has a limited supply of CO2, which provides the power for the weapon. The robot has been reincarnated several times over the years, previously appearing as Robot The Bruce and Chaos. Its flipper was also used as a self-righting mechanism when the robot was inverted, flipping the entire robot over in a half-somersault so it could continue fighting.
Robot combat is a mode of robot competition in which custom-built machines fight using various methods to incapacitate each other. The machines have generally been remote-controlled vehicles rather than autonomous robots.
Hypno-Disc was a contestant entry in the Robot Wars TV series, and was one of the first robots permitted to use the kinetic flywheel weapon. Hypno-Disc's design, however, was somewhat basic, and its high ground clearance made it an easy target for robots armed with flipping weapons, such as Chaos 2. Hypno-Disc was the creation of the Rose family — twin brothers Derek and David, and their father Ken. It was the first competitor robot recreated in toy form when the Robot Wars pullback toys were released.
The Mad Thinker is a supervillain appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. He is portrayed to be an evil genius specializing in robotics. He is sometimes referred to just as "The Thinker".
Razer is a combat robot that competes on the British television series Robot Wars. It was constructed by Simon Scott and Ian Lewis from Bournemouth; the team later expanded to include webmaster Vincent Blood. Razer was designed and constructed in 1998 to participate in the second series of Robot Wars, but subsequent modifications and improvements enabled it to remain competitive until its retirement after the second series of Robot Wars Extreme. Despite gaining a reputation for being unreliable, it was champion of the fifth series of Robot Wars, runner-up in the sixth, and won the first two Robot Wars World Championships.
Panic Attack was a robot that competed in the British television show Robot Wars. In Series 2, it was just a box, with a set of electrically powered lifting forks, powered by a homemade system. It was emblazoned with the image of a spider. The spider was the result of a school competition to come up with a design of something that made you panic. A 12-year-old girl designed the spider. With his prize money from Series 2, Kim built a newer machine. This one had a srimech, a new body shape, and more effective forks, which were capable of completely overturning opposing machines. The top-mounted self-righting mechanism proved to be unreliable, and was eventually removed. Added in Series 4 were a set of side "skirts" to prevent all but the lowest of robots from getting underneath it, as well as sloping sides. The fourth model had improved skirts, and the srimech was updated to a top flipper, which was the favourite with the driver Kim Davies, who stated it was, in his opinion, the best version.
Tornado was a competitor on the UK TV series Robot Wars, noteworthy as the champion of the sixth series. It was built by Andrew Marchant, Bryan Moss and David Gamble, from Sawtry, near Huntingdon.
A-Next is a fictional team of superheroes appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. It is the Marvel Comics 2 universe version of the Avengers. The team made its first appearance in What If? #105, the first comic featuring Spider-Girl, and the team's origin story was told in A-Next #1.
Roadblock is a fictional character from the G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero toyline, comic books and animated series. He is the G.I. Joe Team's Heavy Machine Gunner and debuted in 1984. Roadblock is one of the most prominent African-Americans in the series. He is portrayed by Dwayne Johnson in the 2013 film G.I. Joe: Retaliation.
Robot Wars: Extreme Destruction is an action game developed by Climax Development and published by BBC Multimedia under their game development label Gamezlab in 2002 for the Game Boy Advance, Microsoft Windows and Xbox. It was given a release in the run-up to Christmas to build on the success of the three previous games, which had sold over 250,000 copies.
In robot combat, a self-righting mechanism or srimech is a device used to re-right a robot should it get flipped. Biohazard of BattleBots was the first robot to self-right.
Robot Wars: Advanced Destruction is the third video game based on the British game show Robot Wars. It was the third of four games based on the show, with the first three selling over 250,000 copies. It was developed by Crawfish Interactive and published by BBC Multimedia and was released exclusively for the Game Boy Advance in 2001. It was also released in the US by Vivendi Universal Games. The game is based on Series 4 of Robot Wars.