Built by Kamie Shinju in a 45-minute sprint from the concept of 'excuse' — won the division on combined team and solo results for reliably working output.
A 45-minute build measures judgement more than skill. In a beginner division what separates entries is knowing what to leave out, and anchoring on a single idea like excuse means almost no time goes into explaining the concept, leaving the rest for making the thing actually run. That reliability is what the division was won on. In a setting where newcomers tend to pile on features, cutting back was the harder and evidently the winning call.
Across five years of winners, polish and reliability beat flashy ideas.
Companies field real teams. Japanese events lean hard toward work that could ship into an actual operation.
It looks like a fight against corporate teams, yet individuals do win. What they share is how narrowly they scoped.
Summaries are written by this site. Project pages include demo videos, screenshots and the team's own write-up (videos may autoplay).