[HN Gopher] Alien - CUDA-powered artificial life simulation program
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Alien - CUDA-powered artificial life simulation program
Author : apitman
Score : 279 points
Date : 2024-08-17 16:41 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (github.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
| airstrike wrote:
| Website: https://alien-project.org/
| adin8mon wrote:
| I fondly remember a flash game that involved small particles with
| their own unique behavior. Each particle could collide, react,
| transform, or destroy other particle material. I can't remember
| the name of the website or game, but emergent gameplay is always
| such a joy to toy around with.
| iExalt wrote:
| "Powder Game"[1] is the Flash game off the top of my head that
| fits your description. If you're looking for a more fleshed out
| version with many times more elements/interactions, check out
| "The Powder Toy"[2]!
|
| [1] https://dan-ball.jp/en/javagame/dust/
|
| [2] https://powdertoy.co.uk/
| buildbot wrote:
| So many hours spent in these games :) Building distillation
| systems was way too fun!
| iExalt wrote:
| Definitely a gateway drug to the sandbox/simulation genre
| for me (Minecraft, Rimworld, Factorio).
|
| Countless hours spent blowing up pixel cities, tinkering
| with the particle interactions, trying to make a
| sustainable nuclear reactor... fun times indeed.
| ur-whale wrote:
| The first thing I wanted is not trivial to find (vids on github
| don't load for me), so here's a bunch of links:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/@alien-project/videos
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwbMGPkoJmg
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9R6zrdl6jM
|
| also: not entirely clear how this'll work on Linux, at first
| glance it looks like it is restricted to a Windows + NVidia
| setup. Happy to be proven wrong.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| I'm gonna have to get an external GPU aren't I ^_^
| InitEnabler wrote:
| Prety neat! Looks like AMD might be possibility as some folks are
| trying to run it: https://github.com/chrxh/alien/issues/99
| rdedev wrote:
| If someone is interested in building something like this but
| don't know where to start I would suggest
| https://natureofcode.com/
|
| It's targeted towards beginners and uses a JS library but the
| ideas presented are general
| croes wrote:
| Nature of code sounds like a book about code as such.
|
| Would have expected to be the other way around: the code of
| nature
| Vegenoid wrote:
| I think your intuition was correct, it is generally (but not
| entirely) about modeling behaviors from the physical world
| with code (for art rather than science).
| fedix wrote:
| Highly recommend
| oxide wrote:
| This is a fascinating piece of software. I played with it
| briefly, it's quite the little evolutionary sandbox.
| andybak wrote:
| This looks great but how the hell do you pan the view?
| tcsenpai wrote:
| I have a long running Alien simulation since some months (with
| power on and off based on my pc use).
|
| I started with a "RGB Triad" Initial Setting preset. The
| incredible thing is that the three types of creatures are forming
| complex cell-like structures, with different approaches.
|
| I have geometrical "crystals", long strings that try to eat
| others, spiked structures forming walls...is fascinating.
| CraftingLinks wrote:
| The visual aspect is important, but can you speed up the
| simulation by omitting the rendering?
| theptip wrote:
| Isn't the idea that it's running the simulation on the GPU;
| drawing to screen is presumably trivial, the physics is being
| run per-pixel so there is not much work required to actually
| draw the scene.
| tcsenpai wrote:
| For me the visual aspect is very important. I want to have a
| fully browseable frame per frame result. Anyway you can avoid
| using render sync which basically let the simulation free to
| run as fast as possible with a minimal overhead for the
| drawing thing each X step
| tcsenpai wrote:
| For me the visual aspect is very important. I want to have a
| fully browseable frame per frame result. Anyway you can avoid
| using render sync which basically let the simulation free to
| run as fast as possible with a minimal overhead for the
| drawing thing each X step
| BLKNSLVR wrote:
| Isn't this how Permutation City started?
| tetris11 wrote:
| Kinda, if someone ported Alien's rules into the Metaverse, and
| then went serverless
| f3b5 wrote:
| This is breathtaking. I watched a few videos, and am reminded of
| the alien evolution simulator that I am working on right now. But
| where my console-based program is crawling, this project is
| soaring through the sky!
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