Show HN: A Marble Madness-inspired WebGL game we built for Netlify

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

A Marble Madness–style WebGL game built for Netlify is earning praise for its smooth physics, polished visuals, and clever browser-based implementation using Three.js, Rapier, and Howler. Commenters trade speedrun times, share bug reports about collision and respawn glitches, and express interest in features like timers, gyroscope controls, multiplayer, and open-sourcing the code. Many note that, while the game works well as a branded experience, it’s strong enough that they wish it were expanded into a full standalone title and accompanied by deeper technical write-ups.

Gameplay, Feel, and Design

  • Many found the game very fun, polished, and faithful to Marble Madness-style gameplay, with praise for level design, shortcuts, and “feel” of the marble.
  • Physics and friction are widely praised; drifting and rolling feel intuitive. Some compare the feel favorably to commercial titles.
  • Several wish it were a full standalone game with more levels, puzzles, enemies, and an editor or user-made levels.
  • Some players deliberately try to avoid the white info dots, treating it as a “0% info” or “avoid the dots” challenge.

Bugs, Glitches, and Difficulty

  • Frequent reports of collision issues: falling through floors, getting stuck in walls, tubes, or ramps, and infinite respawn loops.
  • A few specific soft-lock spots are identified (e.g., pink cubes and certain ramps on later levels).
  • One user reports a severe GPU-like browser flicker/crash behavior.
  • Some feel gravity could be stronger; others think current tuning keeps difficulty reasonable.

Controls and UX

  • Keyboard controls are generally praised, including correct handling of non-QWERTY layouts via the Keyboard API.
  • Some users report broken controls in certain browsers.
  • Mobile joystick is described as too sensitive; touch gestures on iOS sometimes trigger page scrolls, selection magnifier, or back navigation.
  • Requests appear for gyroscope / accelerometer controls, but these are not planned.

Technology and Implementation

  • Rendering uses Three.js with a custom render pipeline and shaders; physics uses Rapier via WebAssembly; audio uses Howler.
  • Levels are authored in Unity, exported to FBX, then processed in Blender scripts and exported as GLTF. Triangle-mesh colliders are generated from GLTF.
  • CSS3DRenderer is used to overlay 2D DOM content with CSS 3D transforms.
  • Unity WebGL was avoided due to lack of official mobile support and load-time concerns.

Open Source, Learning, and Documentation

  • Many request open-sourcing the project as a high-quality reference; creators say there are no plans but may publish behind-the-scenes material.
  • Discussion highlights a perceived gap between toy Three.js examples and polished, cross-platform WebGL experiences.

Marketing and Netlify Discussion

  • Many praise the ad as tasteful and non-intrusive; some still ignore or actively avoid the company info.
  • Multiple commenters say they still don’t clearly understand what Netlify does or find pricing opaque, comparing it to other hosting/Jamstack platforms.