6 ms·

Conway's game of life computed in WebGL

116 points by stared 11y ago

slavik81 11y ago
The concept is very simple. Conway's game of life translates to WebGL in a fairly obvious manner. The execution, however, is brilliant. The author added a few flourishes and made something absolutely beautiful.
jheriko 11y ago
make me wonder if anyone has ever made an actual game out of game-of-life? good work. the gradually fading trails are a nice touch. clever 'abuse' of the rgb channels being independent. :)
- train_robber 11y ago
  http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/
- vog 11y ago
  Two things on the top of my head: 1) There is a classic space shooter game whose physical engine is defined solely in terms of a cellular automaton. However, to make this work the rules are not exactly Conway's rules, and cells have more than two states (multiple colors instead of black/white). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaIkQUuHoSw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaIkQUuHoSw 2) Strategy Game: A long time ago I developed such a concept with a friend, but we never implementated that game. The idea was to have a strategic game whose units (and their strength/weaknesses) are fully described by Conway's rules, such that new "units" are not defined by the game designers, but by the players. And dicovering new interesting Game-of-life structure may give you an advantage over your competitor. 3) However, somebody else implemented a strategy game of top of Conway's game of life. It has a very different concept than what my friend and me envisioned, though, so I guess there is room for many more different games: http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/
- vortico 11y ago
  Powder Toy http://powdertoy.co.uk http://powdertoy.co.uk
  - foota 11y ago
    That's quite the throwback, I remember playing with a simpler version of this around ten years ago now.
- fastball 11y ago
  Not sure about Conway's Game of Life, but there is a tower defense game where the enemy is modeled like cellular automata, which is kinda like that. https://knucklecracker.com/creeperworld/playcwts.php https://knucklecracker.com/creeperworld/playcwts.php
  - 7373737373 11y ago
    There is also Survivium: http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/iPhone/Survivium/review.asp?c=26359 http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/iPhone/Survivium/review.asp?c...
- stared 11y ago
  I always chuckled at example of non-existent strip games: Conway game of life (https://xkcd.com/696/ https://xkcd.com/696/). But yes, there is an actual game out of the game of life: http://lifecompetes.com/ http://lifecompetes.com/.
- dspillett 11y ago
  I've got a couple bookmarked from when I once did a search (having had similar ideas myself). http://lifecompetes.com/ http://lifecompetes.com/ is interesting, as is http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ (already posted by vog). The other links I saved seem to have died. None of them worked quite the way I envisaged[!] but there have been a few interesting variations on using the basic rules to make a competitive game. [!] so writing my own is still on the list of "weekend projects that might happen if hell freezes over and I find the time"!
- Faint 11y ago
  Herbs in ADOM (adom.de, a roguelike game, a bit like nethack) grow with Conway's Game of Life rules, so you want to pick herbs so as to maximize herb growth next time they grow.
  - oneeyedpigeon 11y ago
    There's a similar growth mechanism (fungus?) in Populous 2.
- singold 11y ago
  I had a game of life based game on an old win95 machine. I cant remember it exactly but there was a grid and 2 teams with 2 different cell colors. Every turn the game of life rules were applied once to "advance" in time, and in every turn you can add a square of your team and remove a square from the other team
- sp332 11y ago
  Sure, you can do Game of Life in Game of Life :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP5-iIeKXE8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP5-iIeKXE8
tehbmar 11y ago
I have seen a lot of version of Conway's GOL but this is by far my favorite. I love the addition of tracking the mouse movement to create more organisms.
mattegan 11y ago
I had a similar idea on a flight last week and decided to implement it using Love2d's shader support. It works with Love 0.10.0. Had some fun with it, if you hit "h" while it's running, it spawns a grid of gliders across the entire window, which you can then disturb by clicking on a cell. It's fun to watch the disturbance propagate. code - https://github.com/mattegan/Love-GameOfLife https://github.com/mattegan/Love-GameOfLife
thecatspaw 11y ago
I think the title should be changed to "in GLSL", rather than "in WebGL"
- nness 11y ago
  I think WebGL is suitable to mention. Whilst it is strictly speaking GLSL, with a little WebGL wrapper to execture and pass parameters, it's the WebGL part which sets the users expectation that it is a live demo and functional in-browser. I don't think you'd have that same inference from GLSL alone.
akjetma 11y ago
Nice! I too made a GLSL game of life. It also uses your webcam as a secondary input during the lifecycle: https://akjetma.github.io/#/face-of-life https://akjetma.github.io/#/face-of-life
- rplnt 11y ago
  Great discussion why User-Agent sniffing is bad is on the front page right now...
  - akjetma 11y ago
    what browser are you using? well aware of the mess that is browser detection. the function i am using is horrible voodoo cargo-culted magic: https://github.com/akjetma/akjetma.github.io/blob/master/src-cljs/home/support.cljs https://github.com/akjetma/akjetma.github.io/blob/master/src...
    - rplnt 11y ago
      I was trying it in Opera. A chromium based browser that always had WebGL as far as I know. Even the previous version had optional WebGL (so user agent blocking would not made sense either). So unless this code was written 5 years ago, it's useless. And even if it was, it's obviously badly written and useless as well. > well aware of the mess that is browser detection It's a mess because people use it for other things than statistics. "Use IE5+" era apparently taught developers absolutely nothing.
      - akjetma 11y ago
        Oh you're an opera user. That explains the anger. Anyways, it's fixed now! edit: also want to clarify that I don't blindly use the user-agent string for browser detection and this was a bug in my app code. Nothing to do with my browser detection function which was working properly.
        rplnt 11y ago
KenanSulayman 11y ago
Extremely cool and I love the simplicity of the implementation. ... but wtf, another example in the gallery: http://glslsandbox.com/e#29946.0 http://glslsandbox.com/e#29946.0 saying »//hitler did nothing wrong //Swastika flag.«
- artmageddon 11y ago
  Looks like 4chan has leaked out...
7373737373 11y ago
Have a look at SmoothLife, a continuous generalisation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJe9H6qS82I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJe9H6qS82I
deepnet 11y ago
This is great. I am seeing a lot of gliders and some brief spaceships 'evolving' out of scribbling with this shader. For raw power, the hashlife algorithm, discovered by Brian 'Glider' Gosper, uses hash trees to memoise repetitions enabling staggeringly huge runs. [q.v. life in life video]
ivank 11y ago
Also http://xpl.github.io/expression/ http://xpl.github.io/expression/

116 points by stared 11y ago

The concept is very simple. Conway's game of life translates to WebGL in a fairly obvious manner. The execution, however, is brilliant. The author added a few flourishes and made something absolutely beautiful.

jheriko 11y ago

make me wonder if anyone has ever made an actual game out of game-of-life? good work. the gradually fading trails are a nice touch. clever 'abuse' of the rgb channels being independent. :)

train_robber 11y ago
http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/
vog 11y ago
Two things on the top of my head: 1) There is a classic space shooter game whose physical engine is defined solely in terms of a cellular automaton. However, to make this work the rules are not exactly Conway's rules, and cells have more than two states (multiple colors instead of black/white). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaIkQUuHoSw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaIkQUuHoSw 2) Strategy Game: A long time ago I developed such a concept with a friend, but we never implementated that game. The idea was to have a strategic game whose units (and their strength/weaknesses) are fully described by Conway's rules, such that new "units" are not defined by the game designers, but by the players. And dicovering new interesting Game-of-life structure may give you an advantage over your competitor. 3) However, somebody else implemented a strategy game of top of Conway's game of life. It has a very different concept than what my friend and me envisioned, though, so I guess there is room for many more different games: http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/
vortico 11y ago
Powder Toy http://powdertoy.co.uk http://powdertoy.co.uk
- foota 11y ago
  That's quite the throwback, I remember playing with a simpler version of this around ten years ago now.
fastball 11y ago
Not sure about Conway's Game of Life, but there is a tower defense game where the enemy is modeled like cellular automata, which is kinda like that. https://knucklecracker.com/creeperworld/playcwts.php https://knucklecracker.com/creeperworld/playcwts.php
- 7373737373 11y ago
  There is also Survivium: http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/iPhone/Survivium/review.asp?c=26359 http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/iPhone/Survivium/review.asp?c...
stared 11y ago
I always chuckled at example of non-existent strip games: Conway game of life (https://xkcd.com/696/ https://xkcd.com/696/). But yes, there is an actual game out of the game of life: http://lifecompetes.com/ http://lifecompetes.com/.
dspillett 11y ago
I've got a couple bookmarked from when I once did a search (having had similar ideas myself). http://lifecompetes.com/ http://lifecompetes.com/ is interesting, as is http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ http://gameoflifetotalwar.com/ (already posted by vog). The other links I saved seem to have died. None of them worked quite the way I envisaged[!] but there have been a few interesting variations on using the basic rules to make a competitive game. [!] so writing my own is still on the list of "weekend projects that might happen if hell freezes over and I find the time"!
Faint 11y ago
Herbs in ADOM (adom.de, a roguelike game, a bit like nethack) grow with Conway's Game of Life rules, so you want to pick herbs so as to maximize herb growth next time they grow.
- oneeyedpigeon 11y ago
  There's a similar growth mechanism (fungus?) in Populous 2.
singold 11y ago
I had a game of life based game on an old win95 machine. I cant remember it exactly but there was a grid and 2 teams with 2 different cell colors. Every turn the game of life rules were applied once to "advance" in time, and in every turn you can add a square of your team and remove a square from the other team
sp332 11y ago
Sure, you can do Game of Life in Game of Life :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP5-iIeKXE8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP5-iIeKXE8

tehbmar 11y ago

I have seen a lot of version of Conway's GOL but this is by far my favorite. I love the addition of tracking the mouse movement to create more organisms.

mattegan 11y ago

I had a similar idea on a flight last week and decided to implement it using Love2d's shader support. It works with Love 0.10.0. Had some fun with it, if you hit "h" while it's running, it spawns a grid of gliders across the entire window, which you can then disturb by clicking on a cell. It's fun to watch the disturbance propagate. code - https://github.com/mattegan/Love-GameOfLife https://github.com/mattegan/Love-GameOfLife

thecatspaw 11y ago

I think the title should be changed to "in GLSL", rather than "in WebGL"

nness 11y ago
I think WebGL is suitable to mention. Whilst it is strictly speaking GLSL, with a little WebGL wrapper to execture and pass parameters, it's the WebGL part which sets the users expectation that it is a live demo and functional in-browser. I don't think you'd have that same inference from GLSL alone.

akjetma 11y ago

Nice! I too made a GLSL game of life. It also uses your webcam as a secondary input during the lifecycle: https://akjetma.github.io/#/face-of-life https://akjetma.github.io/#/face-of-life

rplnt 11y ago
Great discussion why User-Agent sniffing is bad is on the front page right now...
- akjetma 11y ago
  what browser are you using? well aware of the mess that is browser detection. the function i am using is horrible voodoo cargo-culted magic: https://github.com/akjetma/akjetma.github.io/blob/master/src-cljs/home/support.cljs https://github.com/akjetma/akjetma.github.io/blob/master/src...
  - rplnt 11y ago
    I was trying it in Opera. A chromium based browser that always had WebGL as far as I know. Even the previous version had optional WebGL (so user agent blocking would not made sense either). So unless this code was written 5 years ago, it's useless. And even if it was, it's obviously badly written and useless as well. > well aware of the mess that is browser detection It's a mess because people use it for other things than statistics. "Use IE5+" era apparently taught developers absolutely nothing.
    - akjetma 11y ago
      Oh you're an opera user. That explains the anger. Anyways, it's fixed now! edit: also want to clarify that I don't blindly use the user-agent string for browser detection and this was a bug in my app code. Nothing to do with my browser detection function which was working properly.
      - rplnt 11y ago

KenanSulayman 11y ago

Extremely cool and I love the simplicity of the implementation. ... but wtf, another example in the gallery: http://glslsandbox.com/e#29946.0 http://glslsandbox.com/e#29946.0 saying »//hitler did nothing wrong //Swastika flag.«

artmageddon 11y ago
Looks like 4chan has leaked out...

7373737373 11y ago

Have a look at SmoothLife, a continuous generalisation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJe9H6qS82I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJe9H6qS82I

deepnet 11y ago

This is great. I am seeing a lot of gliders and some brief spaceships 'evolving' out of scribbling with this shader. For raw power, the hashlife algorithm, discovered by Brian 'Glider' Gosper, uses hash trees to memoise repetitions enabling staggeringly huge runs. [q.v. life in life video]

ivank 11y ago

Also http://xpl.github.io/expression/ http://xpl.github.io/expression/