well, you could have wind blowing your particles left or right. the wind variable would be changing all the time tho so it would be good to have a set value, unless when you pressed the left or right key you increased the wind affecting the object. remember to keep things a wee bit random tho. say the wind will effect every particle but it will affect some more than others, not much tho.
Another idea is to turn the particles as they rise. this would be ideal for smoke and maybe fire.
Regarding your water fountain idea, i don't image it would be that hard. a couple of ideas for that. First one being an animated texture of a water particle slow spreading out, again using the distance, maxdistance to work out how long till the particle dies. the second way you could do it ( i think it would be a fair bit harder too) would be to generate say 5-10 particles at a time and slow increase the distance between them. Also for the particles that are heavier than air, like water, have a gravity variable. you would substract this from the speed to have the particle rise into the air then fall due to gravity.
i'll think up more ideas for ya if u want.
cheers
ross
Another idea is to turn the particles as they rise. this would be ideal for smoke and maybe fire.
Regarding your water fountain idea, i don't image it would be that hard. a couple of ideas for that. First one being an animated texture of a water particle slow spreading out, again using the distance, maxdistance to work out how long till the particle dies. the second way you could do it ( i think it would be a fair bit harder too) would be to generate say 5-10 particles at a time and slow increase the distance between them. Also for the particles that are heavier than air, like water, have a gravity variable. you would substract this from the speed to have the particle rise into the air then fall due to gravity.
i'll think up more ideas for ya if u want.
cheers
ross