To celebrate 40 years of Core War, The Core War Tournament Weekend was held on 9–10 November at the Retro Computer Festival in Cambridge, UK. An '88 tournament was held on the Saturday, and a '94 tournament on the Sunday. Just over 400 visitors attended the festival and were invited to see demos of genetic programming, optimization techniques, and related programming games. These were demoed on several SBCs including a Milk-V Mars, a Radxa X4, and an Adapteva Parallella. Full details are available in the tournament announcement.

'88 Tournament - Saturday 9th November

The first tournament of the weekend took place on Saturday using the CWS'88 Redcode standard, maximum length 25 instructions. Programs competed in a one-on-one round-robin, with no self-fights. Scoring was by sequential push off (the lowest-scoring warrior was eliminated and the scores recalculated, repeating until only one warrior remained). Congratulations to inversed, who claimed first and second place, and thanks to everyone who entered.

#WarriorPlayerScore
1Take the X Traininversed.......
2Supranatural Flameinversed100.711
3PickfortSteve Gunnell103.471
4stone explosionChristian Schmidt97.688
5mussel scannerChristian Schmidt104.376
6Bewitching-ZS.Fernandes112.030
7ExudeSteve Gunnell118.196
8Replicant-ZS.Fernandes100.917
9Tokamak SpitfireDave Hillis 105.192
10deadshotSimon Wainwright113.319
11Cheap ShotBjoern Guenzel97.848
12I got nothingIlmari Karonen87.024
13ThothAlchemic Raker70.128
14Constellation CoreAlchemic Raker60.045

'94 Tournament - Sunday 10th November

The CWS'94 tournament was run on the Sunday afternoon, maximum length 25 instructions. Scoring was by sequential push off. Congratulations to Christian Schmidt who claimed first place with kudzu. Thanks to everyone who entered, or who helped to support the tournament.

#WarriorPlayerScore
1kudzuChristian Schmidt.......
2holoshotSimon Wainwright117.900
3angel's trumpetChristian Schmidt137.650
4Neith 2024inversed 105.867
5Cliq ClaqSteve Gunnell131.975
6Tripwire 25Bjoern Guenzel132.540
7Stonewallinversed 126.367
8CHaiNS_oF_DeSTRuCTioNPatxy124.571
9OsirisS.Fernandes120.725
10Electra-ZS.Fernandes109.078
11PsydonSteve Gunnell107.300
12Simple ShotRobert Lowry95.436
13Corrosion_299Patxy88.408
14Laniakea.1Oxinetone95.792
15Scary VampireRobert Lowry89.707
16rdrc: Drowsy DecayDave Hillis86.160
17rdrc: Forgotten ArtifactDave Hillis81.519
18LeothricAlchemic Raker78.494
19Lamp of MurmuurGuillermo Calvo Arenaza74.856
20CyanotypeIlmari Karonen68.253
21SacremonaAlchemic Raker51.845
The Retro Computer Festival Core War tournament running on a Radxa X4 single board computer Yabevolver running on the EvoBOX (Raspberry Pi 3B+ with 3.5 inch screen) Test tournament running on Haiku OS on a Samsung N150 Plus netbook Simulated Annealing demo running on a Milk-V Mars RISC-V SBC