Frequently Asked Questions

About

What is Halite?

Halite is a multiplayer turn-based strategy game played on a rectangular grid; the objective of the game is to take over the entire grid and eliminate the other players in the game.

Where does the game come from? Who invented it?

The Halite game was created by Benjamin Spector and Michael Truell during a summer internship at Two Sigma in 2016.

The game format is inspired by the 2011 Ants AI Challenge sponsored by Google.

Why did they invent it?

Halite’s creators heard about the Ants AI Challenge a few years too late 😢

They couldn’t find any other competitions quite like it, so they decided to create one.

How are rankings computed?

Rankings are based on the outcome of organized games where bots play against each other. A good analogy is the Elo rating system used for chess.

More precisely, rankings are computed using a Bayesian algorithm variant of the Glicko system, specifically using the TrueSkill Python library available here.

Trueskill is configured with tau = 0, draw probability = 0, mu = 25, and sigma = 8.333. This configuration is based on the analysis done in A Quick Rating System Comparison.

Bot Programming

Do I need to be a programmer to play the game?

Yes. Halite is a programming competition. You need to program a bot that will play the game in the Halite tournament.
However, you definitely don’t have to be a very good programmer to play Halite effectively. Success is more about coming up with a good strategy to play the game than coding this strategy expertly.

What languages does the game support?

Any and all! If the language can read from stdin and print to stdout, we can support it.
We provide out-of-the-box starter packages for the following languages: Python, Java and C++. See here for our growing list of starter packages.
We’re counting on the community to add support for as many languages as people want. Visit this page for more information on writing your own starter package and the protocol used by the game environment to talk to your bot.

How do I submit my bot?

To submit your bot, you'll first need to zip your source code. Then, after signing in, click the "Submit" button on the top-right part of the page. Then, simply select your zipped source code to submit.

The Code behind the Tournament

Is the code open source?

Yes! Check out the Github repo.