March 17, 2026
Orbit drama: stars yeet, comments heat
Show HN: I built an interactive 3D three-body problem simulator in the browser
Space marbles in your browser — fans cheer, critics spot chaos, rivals show off builds
TLDR: A dev launched a browser-based 3D gravity simulator, and the crowd loved the eye candy while nitpicking the physics. Users praised export features, complained that random setups slingshot objects to “infinity,” and debated math methods—proof that making space fun is easy, making it accurate is hard.
A browser toy turns into a gravity soap opera: someone built a 3D simulator where you fling three “space marbles” around, zoom with the mouse, and watch chaos unfold. The crowd shows up with equal parts heart-eyes and side-eye. One user deadpans that the “Random3D” mode just sends everything flying to infinity, essentially turning cosmic ballet into a cosmic escape room.
Then the math police arrive. A sharp-eyed commenter warns that the result depends on the solver — the step-by-step math used to predict movement. They roast the basic “Euler” method as too simple for this kind of wild physics, saying you can see it in the Helix preset when the bodies just yeet off the screen. Translation: cool demo, but accuracy matters when space gets spicy.
Meanwhile, a friendly flex stirs the pot: another dev pops in with “Had a similar idea!” and drops their own prototype. It’s less a dunk and more a “look what I made,” but fans clock the energy. On the wholesome side, people cheer that you can export JSON — essentially saving your cosmic setup as a shareable recipe. Verdict from the comments: it’s gorgeous, chaotic, occasionally wrong, and absolutely addictive to break — on purpose.
Key Points
- •Interactive 3D simulator of the gravitational three-body problem
- •Runs in the browser for direct, in-page use
- •Focuses on visualizing chaotic gravitational dynamics
- •Camera can orbit using the mouse
- •Zoom is controlled via the scroll wheel