mlsanityData to 14 Oct 2026

SCAPE: Scenario-Conditioned Simulation-Augmented Policy Evaluation

arXiv 2608.19425 ↗First posted 19 Aug 2026cs.RO cs.AI cs.LGcited by 0

Not on the map. Why?

Abstract (arXiv)

Reliable performance evaluation is a central bottleneck for deploying robot-learning policies in real-world conditions. Real-world testing is faithful but costly and difficult to scale, whereas simulation-based testing scales easily but is inevitably biased by the sim-to-real gap. Existing simulation-augmented methods combine limited real-world rollouts with abundant simulation proxies, but focus on performance averaged over initial conditions and deployment settings. Such population-level averages obscure scenario-specific variation and provide limited guidance about when and where a policy can be safely deployed. We propose SCAPE, a scenario-conditioned simulation-augmented policy evaluation framework that predicts scenario-conditioned real-world policy performance using limited paired sim-and-real samples and large-scale simulation rollouts. SCAPE corrects sim-to-real bias in simulation labels before training the prediction model and calibrates prediction uncertainty through conformal prediction. We validate SCAPE on autonomous driving and quadruped velocity tracking. In sim-to-sim studies, SCAPE reduces scenario-level prediction error by 4.9%/34.7% (driving) and 14.5%/27.7% (quadruped) relative to scene-conditioned neural and aggregate statistical baselines on average. We further evaluate a velocity-tracking policy deployed on a physical Unitree Go2. SCAPE also improves testing sample efficiency, produces narrower calibrated prediction intervals, generalizes better to out-of-distribution scenarios, and enables fine-grained deployment strategies.

Key facts. No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026). Builds on 27 of its 31 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 19 Aug 2026.

Builds on

27 of 31 references.

References · 27

  1. 2017CARLA: An Open Urban Driving Simulatorcited by 2,449
  2. 2022RT-1: Robotics Transformer for Real-World Control at Scalecited by 2,061
  3. 2017Domain Randomization for Transferring Deep Neural Networks from Simulation to the Real Worldcited by 1,498
  4. 2019SuperGlue: Learning Feature Matching with Graph Neural Networkscited by 1,443
  5. 2021Isaac Gym: High Performance GPU-Based Physics Simulation For Robot Learningcited by 998
  6. 2021A Gentle Introduction to Conformal Prediction and Distribution-Free Uncertainty Quantificationcited by 792
  7. 2017Sim-to-Real Transfer of Robotic Control with Dynamics Randomizationcited by 672
  8. 2016Distribution-Free Predictive Inference For Regressioncited by 668
  9. 2018From Coarse to Fine: Robust Hierarchical Localization at Large Scalecited by 559
  10. 2021RMA: Rapid Motor Adaptation for Legged Robotscited by 508
  11. 2019Learning agile and dynamic motor skills for legged robotscited by 504
  12. 2024Evaluating Real-World Robot Manipulation Policies in Simulationcited by 495
15 more
  1. 2021NuPlan: A closed-loop ML-based planning benchmark for autonomous vehiclescited by 493
  2. 2019A Survey of Deep Learning Techniques for Autonomous Drivingcited by 403
  3. 2018Sim-to-Real: Learning Agile Locomotion For Quadruped Robotscited by 319
  4. 2023Orbit: A Unified Simulation Framework for Interactive Robot Learning Environmentscited by 295
  5. 2021MetaDrive: Composing Diverse Driving Scenarios for Generalizable Reinforcement Learningcited by 290
  6. 2023Prediction-Powered Inferencecited by 220
  7. 2024Deep Reinforcement Learning for Robotics: A Survey of Real-World Successescited by 176
  8. 2023Waymax: An Accelerated, Data-Driven Simulator for Large-Scale Autonomous Driving Researchcited by 160
  9. 2023ScenarioNet: Open-Source Platform for Large-Scale Traffic Scenario Simulation and Modelingcited by 60
  10. 2025Real-to-Sim Robot Policy Evaluation with Gaussian Splatting Simulation of Soft-Body Interactionscited by 30
  11. 2025GaussGym: An open-source real-to-sim framework for learning locomotion from pixelscited by 22
  12. 2024Large Language Models for Market Research: A Data-augmentation Approachcited by 20
  13. 2024How Generalizable Is My Behavior Cloning Policy? A Statistical Approach to Trustworthy Performance Evaluationcited by 15
  14. 2025Reliable and Scalable Robot Policy Evaluation with Imperfect Simulatorscited by 14
  15. 2025Sim2Val: Leveraging Correlation Across Test Platforms for Variance-Reduced Metric Estimationcited by 5

Built on by

Not cited yet.