HRP-2 Promet Takes Robot Baby Steps Over Uneven Terrain

Considering the multitude of robots we feature here over the weeks, it's good to see one that's still at its most basic, starting at its roots. We've seen robots of all sorts: bipedal, four-legged, and even ones that have wheels instead of legs. There are plenty of humanoid ones out there, too. And while this one's got its own fair share of humanoid features, from the video embedded below, you can see that it's still well in its baby years. So there should be no fear of it taking over the world, quite yet.

That is, unless your a child's playmat. The HRP-2, which is a manufacturing project from AIST, is moving on in the world. It wasn't too long ago that it wasn't able to do what you see in the video below, which means the engineers and designers are obviously hard at work at making the Promet one of the best robots out there. As you can see, Promet is perfectly capable of handling small terrain changes — no, they aren't in any way mountains or even mole hills, but at least it's a start where the engineers can build from.

And considering all the "competition" out there, making sure that Promet sees the light of day, and the top of the hill, should make their priorities pretty clear. There's no word on when the next advancement in Promet's systems or capabilities will be completed, but as soon as this guy can jump or play soccer, we'll be all over it.

[via Plastic Pals]