CyberBiology

Artificial evolution

This is a little entertainment project, evolution simulator. Every little cell on screen ("a bot") has its own little neural net. Bot makes moves based on output layer data, it can produce energy via photosynthesis, attack other bots, move and divide. When dividing bot creates a copy of his brain, but there is a chance it will mutate a little in the process.

What's new?

• Automatic adaptation added! Just press "Adapt winds/divers" button, lean back in your chair and watch adaptation do its magic! Beware that it depends on parameters you choose. At least you have to set world width = 2 screens for winds and width > 10 for divers. While auto adaptation is working do not touch adaptation window settings (open it, but don't interfere).

• No saved worlds in this version unfortunately, file size too large

Screenshots

What you need to build it

• SDL

• DearImGUI

• ImPlot

You can build it using CMakeLists.txt file with Visual studio.

Interface

Main window

Contains all info about simulation

Controls

• Start/Stop button (Pause/unpause)
• PS reward - how much energy a bot gets with one tick of photosynthesis
• skip - how many turns you calculate before you draw new frame (set to 0 if you want to render every frame)
• brush - brush size for mouse actions sich as remove (eraser tool)

Selection

Info about selected bot, some useful buttons to mess with it

Display

Rendering method.

• Bot natural color (just its color)
• Bot rations (carnivores red, herbivores green, grey if never ate, blue if eats apples or organics)
• Energy (yellow = low energy, red = maximum energy)
• No render means you only compute without rendering, starts to simulate very fast

Mouse function

Choose what to do with your mouse clicks

Aditional

Some more windows

Keyboard

Using keyboard is more handy because interface becomes laggy during simulation

• "Space" - Start/Pause
• "Plus sign near numpad" - make 1 step
• "F1" - Spawn a group of random bots
• "F2" - Create vertical wall
• "Numpad 1-4" - Select rendering method
• "Home" - Set camera at X = 0
• Arrow keys (left, right) - Move camera
• "Page Up", "Page Down" - Move camera fast
• "End" - Find first bot on screen

How to use Settings file

First of all you need to setup your screen resolution, otherwise you wouldn't see the interface. After that you change your rendering area width ("FieldRenderCellsWidth") and world height ("FieldCellsHeight") to match your screen. World can be wider than your render area, but you have to keep its width divisible by 16 without a remainder, it's needed for multi threading.

All changable parameters are listed in that file.