Meet The Four-Legged Freaks Competing In DARPA's Robotics Challenge

Robots are immune to pain, don’t have to breathe, and depending on how they’re designed, can go places humans can’t. They’re also, as my colleague Erik Sofge notes, about as good at walking as toddlers. Sofge is present to witness DARPA’s rescue robot competition, where vaguely-humanoid mechanical beasts will open doors, climb over obstacles, and otherwise attempt to be human-but-better.Here are some of the 25 robots in the competition. That’s a lot of walkers, so below are the five robots that entered a competition for humanoids and decided to bring an extra pair of legs.AERO DRC, built by a…