The Spring Tournament was held on the 31st May in the 80s classroom at The Centre for Computing History in Cambridge, UK. Programs had to compete in three different core sizes, 800 (tiny), 8000 (standard) and 55440 (large). Full details of the rules are available in the tournament announcement. The original invite is also available. A number of people popped in during the day to chat about Core War and watch the tournament unfold on the big screen.

  • The large core was first up. Focus by Inversed claimed first place after just over four hours.
  • The tiny core only lasted a few minutes with Gérman Labarga's lucky shot taking first place.
  • Finally in the standard core Triggerfinger claimed first place for Roy van Rijn in about an hour.

    Congratulations to Gérman Labarga whose program lucky shot had the highest total score and was awarded first prize — $50 and a signed copy of The Armchair Universe by A K Dewdney. The top program in each core size also won a signed copy of Life As It Could Be by Thure Etzold.

    Thanks to everyone who entered or otherwise supported the tournament: A K Dewdney and Thure Etzold for providing the prizes and the Centre for Computing History for hosting the tournament.

    Final Scores

    WarriorAuthorTinyStandardLargeScore
    The lucky shotG.Labarga289122870329277115595
    Focusinversed264002861831151114787
    Silent SpikeRoy van Rijn277442831728876113254
    TriggerfingerRoy van Rijn255982876929458112594
    Amberinversed263942703828276108746
    YAHSACRobert Macrae249792672429932108359
    Sneaky TNXChristian Schmidt247632695126337105002
    ReconstitutedRobert Macrae205622617229719102625
    The FloodKiv21131255812463596928
    flintsimon wainwright22953200281828781296
    HoneycombS.Fernandes20890204211839780129
    Impatient DarwinianDave Hillis27079182921594279605
    The Utterer TNXChristian Schmidt23475187161862979536
    JumpP.Kline20719195951904878957
    MisakiLezek15545130291508456687
    Blood Thirsty v1.0Kiv1254119690446256383
    AuraLezek14741132771489156186
    NotAScannerRoman Muentener15534140071037753925
    bibradidopydyperiprihuDataWraith14432127011200951843
    dipromudogrydebalogreleDataWraith12728118601165148099
    RedPixel Unprepared v2.0John Kipling Lewis621364081040029429

    Gallery

    man vs machine: a hand-coded program (red) battles an evolved program (green) gallery of fractal art displayed in pMARS Sneaky TNX (green) vs Silent Spike (red) results from the standard core Focus (green) vs Sneaky TNX (red)