Why specify the language? Any language should be a possible choice. What is the purpose of the contest? If it is about demonstrating the team's skills at sol

Why specify the language? Any language should be a possible choice. What is the purpose of the contest? If it is about demonstrating the team's skills at solving a well specified problem, the choice of language should be part of the solution, not the problem statement. Languages get chosen for a variety of reasons including familiarity, ease of interface to supporting systems like game engines, and so forth. But that is precisely why you ought to let the teams make their own choices, good or bad. On the other hand, if you are interested in leveling the playing field and removing rote skills, you might consider specifying a language with which the teams are unfamiliar such as go, erlang, clojure, or the like. That will tend to force the programming team to think about what they are trying to accomplish in abstract, conceptual terms rather than just hacking.