February 6, 2026
Neon waves, spicy raves
Plasma Effect
Retro eye-candy returns: fans vibe to 90s beats while devs roast the cryptic code
TLDR: A classic flowing color effect returns with a shiny twist, showing simple waves turned into hypnotic visuals. Commenters split: some cheer the gloss and 90s demo vibes, while others slam the cryptic code and “draw the rest of the owl” explanation, asking for a clearer, friendlier walkthrough
Neon nostalgia just crashed the feed: a throwback “plasma” effect—those wavy, rainbow screens from old-school computer art—made a glossy comeback, complete with a shiny highlight trick that makes it look extra slick. The reveal: simple waves plus color gradients, wrapped in a modern shader. The reaction: anything but simple.
On one side, the hype train: “Specular is a cool addition!” cheered fans, marveling at the extra sparkle. Others went straight to memory lane, blasting the legendary 90s demo track—“All I hear is the music from Second Reality,” one user sighed, dropping a link. Another swerved into gaming nostalgia: “Plasma-Pong was a great game,” because of course it was.
But then the code-slingers showed up with side-eye. The shader’s cryptic variables had folks grumbling—“could’ve used proper variable names”—and one commenter delivered the killer meme verdict: this write-up is “and now draw the rest of the owl.” Translation: pretty pictures, not enough hand-holding. The thread turned into a showdown between ooh-shiny vibes and “explain it like I’m five.”
Bottom line: dazzling visuals, split audience—half dancing to 90s beats, half begging for a clearer walkthrough. Drama level: pulsing
Key Points
- •The plasma effect combines multiple sine and cosine waves to produce flowing, organic interference patterns.
- •Early implementations on Commodore 64 and Amiga often relied on precomputed lookup tables to avoid real-time trigonometric calculations.
- •Modern GPUs render the plasma effect in real time at high resolution and complexity.
- •Color output is typically mapped using cosine-based palettes for smooth gradients.
- •Specular highlights can be added by using GLSL derivatives (dFdx/dFdy) to infer normals from color-field gradients.