An official RoboCupJunior simulator is under construction. Here are some related projects that all make simulated robot soccer available for the youth.

• TeamBots robot soccer simulation for RoboCupJunior Web Site.

  TeamBots is a Java-based collection of application programs and Java packages for multiagent mobile robotics research. The TeamBots environment has been used in the development of a number of successful mobile robot systems, including a multirobot team that won the AAAI-97 Mobile Robot Contest.
  The TeamBots soccer simulator is being extended for RoboCupJunior. The current focus is on developing TeamConfig an easy-to-use Graphical User Interface for robot programming. The goal in developing TeamConfig is to enable students of different backgrounds to easily program a robot soccer team. TeamConfig provides three levels of programmability. The user may choose to program a team at a high level or drill down to more detail and complexity. The simulator was developed by Tucker Balch, MultiRobot Lab.

• TOYBOTS User-guided Evolution

  The TOYBOTS simulator is based on evolutionary robotics. Here, a population of robots is developed through Darwinian evolution. Instead of designing a specific fitness function in mathematical terms, children can choose which robots to reproduce by looking at graphical displays of the robot behaviors. Hence, children select generation after generation until obtaining the desirable robot soccer behavior. Afterwards, the developed robot control can be downloaded to LEGO MINDSTORMS robot soccer players, and games between the physical robots can take place. The important fact is, that in this game, there is no need to learn about programming language syntax and semantics in order to develop the robot soccer players, so even young children can participate. Developed by Henrik Hautop Lund, Luigi Pagliarini, and Henrik Madsen.

• Co-evolution of Robot Soccer Players

  In this game, it is possible to play with co-evolution in order to develop robot soccer players. In co-evolution, there exists two populations that compete (like predators and preys). If one population gets better, then the other population must become better as well in order to achieve high fitness. So an arms-race will take place. By experimenting with different parameters such as mutation rate, cross-over rate, speed, etc., the user can develop different robot soccer players to play a one-on-one soccer game. Further, the user can manipulate different fitness functions. The evolved controllers can be uploaded to a server where games against other uploaded (virtual) robot soccer players will take place. Afterwards, the evolved controllers can be downloaded to the Khepera miniature robot and a real robot Khepera soccer game can take place. Developed by Esben Ostergaard, Henrik Hautop Lund and Luigi Pagliarini.