Discover the incredible (and hilarious) ways that video games can simulate evolution. From Conway’s ‘Game of Life’ to Evolution by Keiwan, we’ll look at how games and other simulations can reproduce natural selection.

Games and Simulations Featured

Conway’s Game of Life:
Game https://golly.sourceforge.net/webapp/...
Info https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway'...

Life Engine:
Game https://thelifeengine.net/
Channel    / @emergentgarden  

The Bibites:
Game https://leocaussan.itch.io/thebibites
Channel    / @thebibitesdigitallife  

Cute Mold:
Game https://erytau.itch.io/cutemold
Creator https://itch.io/profile/erytau

Clusters:
Game https://www.ventrella.com/Clusters/'>https://www.ventrella.com/Clusters/
Creator https://www.ventrella.com/

Lenia:
Channel    / @bertchan9774  
Info https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenia

Evolution by Keiwan:
Game https://keiwan.itch.io/evolution'>https://keiwan.itch.io/evolution
Creator https://keiwan.itch.io/

Evol Pedal:
2D Game https://evolgames.itch.io/evolpedal'>https://evolgames.itch.io/evolpedal
3D Game https://evolgames.itch.io/evolpedal'>https://evolgames.itch.io/evolpedal3d
Creator https://evolgames.itch.io/

Swimming SoftBodied Creatures:
Video    • Evolving Swimming SoftBodied Creatures  
Paper https://www.researchgate.net/publicat...

Evolving SoftBodied Animats:
Video    • Harnessing evolutionary creativity: e...  
Paper https://direct.mit.edu/isal/proceedin...

Flexible MuscleBased Locomotion for Bipedal Creatures:
Video    • Flexible MuscleBased Locomotion for ...  
Paper https://www.goatstream.com/research/p...

Accelerated Policy Learning with Parallel Differentiable Simulation:
Video https://shorthorizonactorcritic.gi...
Paper https://openreview.net/forum?id=ZSKRQ...

Spore:
Game https://store.steampowered.com/app/17...
Info https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_(...)

Adapt:
Game https://store.steampowered.com/app/88...
Creator https://itch.io/profile/paulherve

The Sapling:
Game https://store.steampowered.com/app/99...
Channel    / @thesapling  

Thrive:
Game https://store.steampowered.com/app/17...
Homepage https://revolutionarygamesstudio.com/

OpenWorm:
Game https://openworm.org/
Channel    / @openwormorg  

Thumbnail by:   / hotcyder  

This video is about evolution. Not the biological evolution you’re familiar with, where living organisms adapt to their environment. No, this is about virtual evolution. About discovering the extent to which video games, neural networks, and machine learning can shatter the natural order and let us experiment with the building blocks of life itself. …And the extent to which they can make us laugh.

The ambitious dream of using computers to simulate life dates back to Conway’s Game of Life, and you might be amazed at just how far the technology has come with games like Spore, Thrive, and Adapt.

So, for this entry into the archive, we’ll take natural selection into our own hands, and see how far we can push this concept before things get out of control...

0:00 Simulating Evolution
1:00 Dawn of Life
3:59 Cellular Models
6:09 Stepping onto Land
8:45 Machine Learning
11:12 The Dream of Spore
13:25 Biosphere Simulation
15:15 The Ultimate Game?
17:35 Unlimited Power
19:28 What Comes Next…

Copyright Disclaimer: Under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education, and research. All video/image content is edited under fair use rights for reasons of commentary.

I do not own the images, music, or footage used in this video. All rights and credit goes to the original owners.

♫ Music by Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio:
Mysterious Green Fluid, Sanity Unravels, Haddonfield Horror, Alone in the Dark, Dusk, The Witch, The Vanishing, Tenebrae, The Guardian

♫ Additional music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com):
Beauty Flow
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b...

♫ Classical Music:
Requiem 1 Giuseppe Verdi Dies irae
Mozart Requiem Dies irae