Squeezicks is a multiplayer 3D object-flinging game made for the Museum of Science, Boston. Take command of one of four spaceships to knock your opponents out of the sky with an assortment of squishy thingamajigs! Each player has a screen, which has been set up as if they were windows into the same miniature world. Plot and scheme with your fellow players to make alliances and decide who's going down first. If that's you, rest assured that you can take revenge even after your ship is gone to decide who's going with you. And remember, beware the Squid King!

To experience the true squishy glory of Squeezicks, you'll need to go to the Museum of Science, Boston, where you can also see our exhibit about the physics and development challenges behind the game. For those who can't make it to the museum, a two-player home version is available for download.

Squeezicks is a game based on research investigating the simulation of soft bodies in games. Physically simulated objects in games are usually rigid so they are only able to move and rotate. A block of wood is an example of a rigid body you see in everyday life.

However, this does not allow for such transformations as bending, stretching, twisting, and tearing. This requires soft body physics. Imagine a block of gelatin in your hand. It yields if you push on it, but goes back to its original shape when you stop. It jiggles if you move your hand, and if you're not careful you can poke a finger through it or rip it in half. These are the sorts of things soft body physics can do.

Achieving real-time soft body physics such as you see in a video game - as opposed to pre-rendered physics like in movies--is a difficult problem both because of the complex algorithms required to mimic soft bodies in a believable way and the thousands of computations per second it takes to make the game run at a reasonable speed. This game uses simulation techniques which make it possible.