CodeCombat partners with the IOI to deliver academic esports with the world’s best coders
SAN FRANCISCO – As the world’s most prestigious global coding competition for secondary school students, the International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI) utilized CodeCombat’s game-based competitive coding platform to challenge the programming skills of some of the world’s strongest coders, in a unique head-to-head coding competition.
“As a part of the programming team that developed the CodeCombat AI League, it’s an absolute honor to have it used at this esteemed event,” said Valentin Briukhanov, the principal architect of CodeCombat’s groundbreaking esports platform. “This validates the game as both a powerful learning tool and platform for creative play.”
Competitors’ code determined what champions to summon and how those champions engaged in battle. The innovative AI battle simulator ran participants’ code against others to determine who programmed the best strategies and tactics to win. After an initial ranking round the top sixteen were allotted additional time for code modification before entering a head-to-head bracket style tournament to crown a champion.
“Coding competitions or hackathons are not new,” said Nick Winter, CodeCombat’s CEO, “but our drive to evolve the format has led us to develop the CodeCombat AI League, a unique esport that is innovating competitive coding.”
Featuring some of the best programmers from around the world, the International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI) in partnership with CodeCombat and Caprikon Education executed the tournament on June 23, 2021 and awarded prizes to the top four performers.
“Working closely with our partner Caprikon Education has opened up incredible opportunities like this,” said Bill Wang, Head of Greater China and Asia for CodeCombat. “Being a part of the IOI event is an amazing platform to further our shared mission of supporting accessible coding education.”
CodeCombat continues to increase its presence in competitive coding. Recently partnering with AI Youth China, the regional coding competition featured 66,336 participants making it one of the biggest code-based hackathons in China. And with the launch of the CodeCombat AI League earlier this year, Season 1 hosted 16,775 competitors in the regular season competition and 5,240 taking on the challenge of the finals championship.
About CodeCombat
Our products have helped over 20 million students enjoy learning Computer Science, teaching them to be critical, confident, and creative learners.
https://codecombat.com/
About CodeCombat AI League
This innovation in esports combines a competitive AI battle simulator with an engine for learning real Python and JavaScript. Each competitor programs a team of AI heroes in asynchronous or real-time head-to-head matches where their code powers the strategies and tactics in battle.
https://codecombat.com/league
About The International Olympiad in Informatics
The International Olympiad in Informatics is one of several international science Olympiads held annually. Exceptional high school students from 87 countries compete in the prestigious algorithmic competition to sharpen their informatics skills—such as problem analysis, design of algorithms and data structures, programming, and testing.
About Caprikon Education
World class education service provider and a trusted partner to over 350 schools in Hong Kong, providing innovative school packages that promote tech learning within the school environment.
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