Overview
Neon Fluid is a platformer whose physics engine is a real incompressible fluid solver. The player is a glowing liquid character, and movement comes from mouse-driven pressure waves pushing that fluid through 100 levels. There is no game engine or physics library underneath, the simulation is hand-built.
What it demonstrates
- Using a genuine fluid solver as gameplay physics, not just a visual effect
- A dual-simulation architecture splitting physics accuracy from render quality
- Hand-rolled WebGL2 and Web Audio with no engine or framework
Key features
- Dual-simulation architecture: a CPU sim (256x256, TypeScript in a Web Worker) for physics, a GPU sim (up to 512x512, WebGL2) for visuals
- Stam's "Real-Time Fluid Dynamics for Games" solver with vorticity confinement
- 10 handcrafted levels plus 90 procedurally generated levels (seeded PRNG)
- Mouse-driven pressure waves for character movement
- Mechanics: moving platforms, pushable boxes, enemies, wind blowers, fluid barriers, pressure switches
- Real-time Web Audio synthesis for music and sound effects
- GPU tier detection for adaptive performance
Stack
- Next.js 16 (App Router, static export), React 19
- TypeScript (strict, no
any) - WebGL2 for GPU fluid rendering, Web Audio API for procedural synthesis
- No game engine or physics library
Requires a desktop browser with WebGL2.