nu-be, thats right, its just not everything, the large box around them is their area of effect sort of, and thats generally the area where they'll effect, and tho it doesn't show it, this area(as well as the metaball itself) gets bigger if you put another metaball directly inside it, also, everything merges, not just the shape, but everything about the materials as well, which means you can make some very confusing animations with them .) also something you need to know about is negative metaballs, they're almost just like them except instead of being a shape, they're just the negative version of the force that makes the metaballs merge like they do, if you think of them like some sort of(reversed) magnetic syrup and thier pull is directly in the middle, and the box is the extent of thier pull. Or, maybe that doesn't make any sense, either way, I want magnetic syrup now.