The 1997 RoboCup 2D Soccer Simulation League was the first RoboCup competition promoted in conjunction with International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence held in Nagoya, Japan, from 23 to 29 August 1997. This event was supported by important sponsors and organizations such as Namco, Sun Microsystems, ElectroTechnical Laboratory, Softopia Japan, International Academy of Media Arts and Sciences, Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence, Robotics Society of Japan, IEEE R&A Society, Nihon Silicon Graphics-Cray Inc., Fujita Corporation, Net-One Systems, SOUM Corp.