Where do I find powder toy history
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First of all let me say that I am so fascinated with powder toy
that its like I've made a major discovery. I honestly feel
like an explorer that has stumbled upon a race of advanced beings
from another planet
secondly - I thought this would be an appropriate place to pose my question
since it isn't actually about Powder Toy but the creators and developers
If this is in the wrong place please move it to a different area
My question is
Where can I find out more about how and why Powder toy was made?
are the creators and developers real physicists?
Is the physics of powder toy real, in the sense of if I mix A with B and apply C
in the real world would that combination react lthe same in the real world as in Powder Toy?
To me, this is something absolutely marvelous where what It does is only limited by my own creativity
I love things like powder toy as it feels like I am keeping my brain active just by using itEdited 2 times by four0. Last: 11th Mar 2020 -
Where can I find out more about how and why Powder toy was made?
I don't think we have a history page of why and how the game was made, but let me summarize the answer to those specific points. The answer is based on what has been said on the IRC by Simon, Skylark (who by the way lurks in the #powder freenode IRC channel these days), and my own observations as someone who has been a user since the near beginning.
Back around 2009 Skylark wanted to use The Powder Game, but couldn't because the Firefox browser didn't run java at the time and java is just plain clunky. Skylark then created The Powder Toy in C-language. The online portion didn't exist until around 2010, when bri3d created a website and server back-end to host the game (and subsequently a PSP version). Less than a year later, that server went offline for various reasons.
Right around 2011, Simon e-mailed Skylark to ask for the code to the game. The game itself has always been GNU GPLv2 and therefor the right to get a copy of the code was required. Simon reverse-engineered and scripted a new server back-end for the game's online functions (saving online, votes, tags, etc). This is generally were the modern/well-known portion of TPT history begins. There's other bits like when AMD used TPT as a performance bench marking tool for demonstrations:mcU89Td53GgWatch video on youtube
are the creators and developers real physicists?
Skylark does computer science stuff (software work). Simon is also a software developer. jacob1 is a software developer. cracker64 is also a software developer. Most people who have worked on developed with TPT are software developers with Computer Sciences as a major. The exception being certain people like mniip, Procom, Catelite, and me (I do international security and analytics).
Is the physics of powder toy real, in the sense of if I mix A with B and apply C. in the real world would that combination react lthe same in the real world as in Powder Toy?
Somewhat. We base the combinations and reaction on real life, but change things to be more fun and interesting. Not to mention the reactions need to be processed by the game's physics engine.Edited 3 times by Lockheedmartin. Last: 20th Mar 2020 -
I'm an undergrad in applied maths and physics but ironically I've never worked on any parts of the actual simulation... Albeit I would call myself a computer science person first and foremost.
Some physics of the game try to be realistic, such as heat, air and air heat simulation. Particle interactions for the most part are "inspired" by real world interactions but don't model them exactly. On the other hand there are elements that are completely made up, and that have been added to the game for any other reason than realism.
