This bot, on display at the iRex conference a few weeks ago, boasts that it can play table tennis against a human opponent. The fast-reacting robot, dubbed Topio (version 3) and created by the Vietnamese company Tosy, has 39 degrees of freedom. While very cool with its movie star-esque carved torso and sunglasses, how well does it actually play ping-pong?

To do it successfully, a robot would need fast-processing computer vision. The mechanics of a robotic hand swinging a paddle is fairly straightforward (one, unaltering hand position), as long as it can move fast enough. And with robots like these, it seems well within reach to design a robot that can react fast enough to an incoming ball.

You can see version 2 of Topio playing below, admittedly, a bit slow. (So far, no luck in finding a video of version 3 from iRex, unfortunately. I’ll update if I come across any.)