HighLife Screensaver
HighLife is a Conway's Game of Life sibling with the rule B36/S23 — a cell is born with exactly 3 or 6 live neighbors and survives with 2 or 3. That single extra birth condition (6 neighbors) gives HighLife something classic Life lacks: a small pattern that genuinely replicates itself across the grid.
How the HighLife screensaver works
Like Conway's Life, every cell is alive or dead, and the next generation is computed from each cell's eight neighbors.
HighLife's rule is B36/S23: a dead cell is born with 3 or 6 live neighbors; a live cell survives with 2 or 3.
That added "birth on 6" condition is small, but it's enough to support a real self-replicating pattern that clones a copy of itself elsewhere on the grid every so many generations.
Starting from random noise, HighLife produces its own mix of gliders, oscillators and short-lived replicator-like structures before settling or reseeding.
A worked example
Random noise collapses within a few dozen generations into scattered stable blocks and blinking oscillators, occasionally throwing off a small moving glider that drifts until it collides with something else and disrupts it.
Settings & tips
- Cell color recolours every live cell.
- Starting density sets how much of the grid begins alive.
- The board reseeds automatically once the pattern settles into stillness.
Frequently asked questions
- What makes HighLife different from Conway's Life?
- One extra birth rule — 3 or 6 neighbors instead of just 3 — which is enough to support genuine self-replicating patterns Life can't produce.
- Does a replicator always appear from random noise?
- Not reliably — true replicators need a specific starting pattern; random noise mostly produces ordinary gliders and oscillators.
- Is a key needed?
- No — it's a pure local computation.
- Is it free?
- Yes — free, no download, in your browser.