New Mafia II PhysX ON/OFF video.

[Keysplayr]

Even shooting at "brittle" rocks, which cobblestone isn't

How many cobblestones have you shot, let alone strike with a blunt hammer?
I certainly hope you don't shoot up the streets in your town!

 

[Janooo]

Keys,

The reason people are so hostile towards Physx is because it is being used a marketing tool. It hasn't been providing anything but some additional eye candy, such as debris (which doesn't look realistic anyway), or more realistic cloth movement. Minor improvements in the visual quality which end up costing a ton in performance.

Physx really should be focusing on world interaction, ballistics, cause and effect versus scripted animations. It should make you say, "wow! the game feels (not looks) so much more realistic, I just have to play with physx on" rather than "wtf I lost 40% of my frame rate for some lame debris and cloth?".

Nvidia is using it the wrong way, they are using it for eye candy which is the easiest thing to flaunt in the eyes the customer.

... and this is another marketing thread created by Keys. What a shame.

Personal attacks are not acceptable.

Moderator Idontcare

 

[Daedalus685]

This (bolded) is sort of the problem. More care goes into "who" did it, than what was done. Lot's of unexplainable things.

And what about spoiled rich kids? What does this even mean?

By the way, PhysX doesn't render anything.

People care about the 'who' because no matter what the situation people get irritated (some people) when forced to buy a particular thing. Even if the choice one has is an illusion (like at the super market where competing brands are often the same brand.. Kashi and Kellogg's anyone?) people feel better about it. These people see physX as "You can't use the other companies video cards" more than they see it as a physics API. They do have a point as well.

If Nvidia tomorrow removed the lock in the drivers and allowed folks to use their cards as dedicated physX regardless of the primary adaptor I bet most if not all of the harsh words about it woudl drop.. though many will still find it annoying that the physX games offer you slightly above average physics with the GPu acceleration or way less than average without.

 

[MrK6]

Although phsyX can add some cool effects to the gaming experience the implimentation in Mafia II looks to be heavily funded by nvidia! If you wanna praise or condone this kinda action then more power to you

It's implementation like this that make everybody frown on physX in the first place. And it's actions like this that make others frown on nvidia!

Hell next thing will be all the enemies your trying to kill will be rendered by physX and if you have an ATI card you'll see a stick figure!

Guess that's the way spoiled rich kids play anyways

One step forward and two steps backward is still a step backward .

How many cobblestones have you shot, let alone strike with a blunt hammer?
I certainly hope you don't shoot up the streets in your town!

I set a lot of stone when I did landscaping in high school. It doesn't look or react like that, plain and simple. Also, it's illegal to discharge a firearm within the vicinity of a roadway, that's a rudimentary firearm law.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

Weak. Not adding much at all to the game. Also they don't show the scenes without physx. They just show a still shot of debris missing. I would bet that the scene looks just as good without physx and they know this so they only show a screenshot of no physx instead of letting scene play without physx.

 

[Grooveriding]

Physx is pretty underwhelming. There are better physics in Crysis, and that runs on the CPU.

I guess if you want to actually stop playing a game, and just run around trying to break things and staring closely at the remnants on the ground afterwards, you might see something you like.

But just reading that, seems pretty silly doesn't it.

I did read something not too long ago saying nvidia is going to rewrite physx from the ground up to make it run better on the cpu.

Maybe they are waking up to the fact physx only sells video cards to suckers.

I'd like them to explain to me why when I enable physx on high in Mafia 2, my framerate gets cut in half. What the eff is that, for some chunks of rock on the ground, half the framerate ?

Truly unimpressive technology, in my opinion.

 

[Kenmitch]

By the way, PhysX doesn't render anything.

Not technicaly but others will get the meaning of it.

And what about spoiled rich kids? What does this even mean?

This comment was made towards nvidia as the corporate attitude is that of a spoiled rich kid....My way or the highway!

This (bolded) is sort of the problem. More care goes into "who" did it, than what was done. Lot's of unexplainable things.

The problem is when you take away a giveme like bullets and fragment etc. without the use of physX it just seems like waste of the technology! Or a penalty for not being on the Green team.

I'm not looking for a pissing match with you. I downloaded the beta drivers and was looking for a physX card to play around with my 5850 with hybrid physX as some of the features looked kinda cool to me. I have an open mind and am willing to try new things. My mind is not set in any particular way. I don't have an undieing love for the Red or Green team....But once I thought about it I just couldn't get myself to support nvidia's selfishness.

Just saying that physX could be put to alot better use than bullets, fragments etc. The biggest problem is it's a one sided proprietary technology that doesn't need to be. Not sure who the first game developer is gonna be to shoot themselves in the foot and fully utilize the technology.

As long as physX is a one sided technology it belongs in a CONSOLE and not the PC

 

[Red Storm]

The biggest problem with physX is that it's just eye candy, it has no impact on game play whatsoever, which totally goes against the whole point of having realistic physics in game. Doesn't matter which company is behind it, it's pointless until we finally get REAL physics and not these bits of extra eye candy which I distinctly remember seeing years ago with things like Havok.

 

[hdfxst]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CexnUfcNiZY&feature=related side by side comparison

 

[Kenmitch]

Look at it this way....If your playing without physX disabled you'll have the advantage as your character won't be slipping and tripping on the bullet casings and fragments all over the ground

Hmm....Or will it be a disadvantage as they will be there and just invisible?

Nuff said....As this seems like a flamebait thread to me anyways!

 

[tincart]

I just bought a GTX 460 and have Mafia II. I play with PhysX off on this title, it adds nothing to the experience.

The behavior of those chunks of rock on the ground are ridiculous when watching that video closely. They seem to lose all their inertia after hitting the ground and bounce straight up and down once before settling. I don't recall physics working that way...

PhysX is a gimmick. I buy graphics cards for performance at a good price and that's what the 460 gives me, the PhysX capabilities were never a factor in my decision and likely never will be until I see something realistic that actually improves gameplay.

 

[Wreckage]

... and this is another marketing thread created by Keys. What a shame.

Another PhysX thread crapped on by ATI fans, what a shame. :thumbsdown:

Use the report post feature and vent in the comment box, don't vent it here. Or put it in PFI, or moderator discussions, or pm a mod.

Moderator Idontcare

 

[Lonyo]

Look at it this way....If your playing without physX disabled you'll have the advantage as your character won't be slipping and tripping on the bullet casings and fragments all over the ground

Hmm....Or will it be a disadvantage as they will be there and just invisible?

Nuff said....As this seems like a flamebait thread to me anyways!

Just like the other thread turned out to be.
Which discussed these features. And also had videos of them.

In fact, one might say that this thread could have been avoided altogether and the videos just posted in the other thread.
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2100261

 

[Annisman*]

I used to run a rig with 2X 5870's, I added a 9800GT for Physx, after applying the newest driver that played nice with ATI, I was rewarded with Physx on an ATI setup.

Paid only 80 dollars for the 9800GT, and was able to get Physx in all the games that supported it. How is this in any way bad ?

Yes, the way that Physx is touted by Nvidia is kind of shallow, and if it means degrading the eye candy of games just to reserve them for Physx, it is silly.

With that being said, in Mafia 2, the game is so much more immersive with Physx on. The video that Keysplyr first linked to only shows one aspect of Physx in this game. There are other affects: wood splintering, glass breaking apart piece by piece, fluid cloth movements on everything, realistic smoke careening off your rear tires when doing burnouts.... I mean unless you have played with it on, you don't entirely know what you are missing.

 

[railven]

Hell next thing will be all the enemies your trying to kill will be rendered by physX and if you have an ATI card you'll see a stick figure!

Oh man that made me LOL real good. If it ever comes to that - the consoles truly won.

Mafia 2 does look noticeably better with PhysX on as the video/clips here show. But, it is unfortunate you need to buy a nVidia card to get what other games have done in the past. Maybe not to this level of "precision" but I'd rather have a scripted event than no event.

In the end it wasn't worth the performance hit and I stopped playing with it on and just finished the game with PhysX off (that and the GTX 460 1GB wasn't littling things on fire either haha.)

 

[MegaWorks]

Another PhysX thread crapped on by ATI fans, what a shame. :thumbsdown:

Threadcrap needs to stop.

Moderator Idontcare

 

[BenSkywalker]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rMPYobj0g0

I get a good chuckle when people talk about Max Payne, the game was terribly ugly when new, it was shockingly bad technology wise the day it came out. Max Payne looked very bad by console standards the year it came out- it couldn't even compete with Halo. It's nice that some people can remember ejecting brass and equate that to an engine that has twice as many particles on screen at once as Max Payne had polygons, but really it's just an obnoxiously bad game to use as a comparison. If you want to talk about a game with ejecting brass, why not Duke Nukem?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRis-kH9l-c

And no, that isn't a link to Forever footage

Also, it's illegal to discharge a firearm within the vicinity of a roadway, that's a rudimentary firearm law.

In your commonwealth perhaps, but it certainly isn't like that everywhere. A short trip north for you and it is perfectly legal to fire within the vicinity of a roadway(you aren't allowed to shoot across a highway to try and hit wild birds or animals- and they are listed sperately in the law- other then that you are good to go). Older cobblestone roads actually blow apart quite a bit worse then that clip makes them seem, with that much gunfire you would have large patches of dirt after they were through, and reasonable divets throughout the area(not to mention where the cars blew up there would be massive damage to the road).

the PhysX capabilities were never a factor in my decision and likely never will be until I see something realistic that actually improves gameplay.

Can you imagine the outrage when a game *requires* PhysX to be playable? That is precisely what is needed to make gameplay altering changes using PhysX. I can see the outrage on the forums now, the fringe lunatic loyalists can't help but thread crap everywhere now to denounce the tech that hasn't been deemed holy by their churches, it would be far, far worse if any of it was required to so much as play the game.

 

[blckgrffn]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rMPYobj0g0

I get a good chuckle when people talk about Max Payne, the game was terribly ugly when new, it was shockingly bad technology wise the day it came out. Max Payne looked very bad by console standards the year it came out- it couldn't even compete with Halo. It's nice that some people can remember ejecting brass and equate that to an engine that has twice as many particles on screen at once as Max Payne had polygons, but really it's just an obnoxiously bad game to use as a comparison. If you want to talk about a game with ejecting brass, why not Duke Nukem?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRis-kH9l-c

And no, that isn't a link to Forever footage



In your commonwealth perhaps, but it certainly isn't like that everywhere. A short trip north for you and it is perfectly legal to fire within the vicinity of a roadway(you aren't allowed to shoot across a highway to try and hit wild birds or animals- and they are listed sperately in the law- other then that you are good to go). Older cobblestone roads actually blow apart quite a bit worse then that clip makes them seem, with that much gunfire you would have large patches of dirt after they were through, and reasonable divets throughout the area(not to mention where the cars blew up there would be massive damage to the road).



Can you imagine the outrage when a game *requires* PhysX to be playable? That is precisely what is needed to make gameplay altering changes using PhysX. I can see the outrage on the forums now, the fringe lunatic loyalists can't help but thread crap everywhere now to denounce the tech that hasn't been deemed holy by their churches, it would be far, far worse if any of it was required to so much as play the game.

And yet, if nVidia let us use our ATI primary graphics, many of us would like buy a card for physx as well.

I thought it looked neat and I have a 8800GT sitting in my basement that would probably be OK for the application but I can't use it.

*shrug*

 

[BenSkywalker]

And yet, if nVidia let us use our ATI primary graphics, many of us would like buy a card for physx as well.

Go into your MafiaII folder, delete the Cloth folder in the Apex directory and run it on the CPU, it will work just fine without GPU acceleration(even a lower end processor should get ~40-50fps).

 

[Madcatatlas]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rMPYobj0g0

I get a good chuckle when people talk about Max Payne, the game was terribly ugly when new, it was shockingly bad technology wise the day it came out. Max Payne looked very bad by console standards the year it came out- it couldn't even compete with Halo. It's nice that some people can remember ejecting brass and equate that to an engine that has twice as many particles on screen at once as Max Payne had polygons, but really it's just an obnoxiously bad game to use as a comparison. If you want to talk about a game with ejecting brass, why not Duke Nukem?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRis-kH9l-c

And no, that isn't a link to Forever footage



In your commonwealth perhaps, but it certainly isn't like that everywhere. A short trip north for you and it is perfectly legal to fire within the vicinity of a roadway(you aren't allowed to shoot across a highway to try and hit wild birds or animals- and they are listed sperately in the law- other then that you are good to go). Older cobblestone roads actually blow apart quite a bit worse then that clip makes them seem, with that much gunfire you would have large patches of dirt after they were through, and reasonable divets throughout the area(not to mention where the cars blew up there would be massive damage to the road).



Can you imagine the outrage when a game *requires* PhysX to be playable? That is precisely what is needed to make gameplay altering changes using PhysX. I can see the outrage on the forums now, the fringe lunatic loyalists can't help but thread crap everywhere now to denounce the tech that hasn't been deemed holy by their churches, it would be far, far worse if any of it was required to so much as play the game.

I didnt think id see the day when the "destructiong of older cobblestone roads" was discussed, with fervor, on anandtech forums by the likes of benskywalker and co.

Btw, are you turning a blind eye to the "outrage" in this topic over the lack of impact/functionality which phyxs represents?

A game that requires physx to play is something like ..cryostasis? Belive me, thats not a game many have heard of. No game developer will make such a game if he/they value their buisness.

Anyway, i really cant see how this mudslinging and namecalling on your part is justified and i guess your just here in defence of your great leader.

best regards

" the fringe lunatic loyalists "

Personal attacks are not acceptable.

Moderator Idontcare

 

[Genx87]

I was at a family gathering at the weekend. One of my cousins (who is 4, and female) got a new pair of shoes. The reason she chose that pair over any others? It had glitter.

It's amazing the number of little girls we have who like pretty shiny glittery things even when they add no substance, despite being based on something which could potentially fundamentally improve or change game experiences.

Right, I bet you feel the same way about all the advances in graphics we have had over the past 15 years. You one of those people who whined about Glide and the original Voodoo because it was proprietary and only made graphics pretty and fast? How about T&L? The Shader model?

 

[Genx87]

I'm not sure how resentment towards a method of doing something many feel is done already using more available means makes them a Luddite... Perhaps if the physX off videos really were the best physics we have ever otherwise seen there would be a point but this is not even remotely the case.

The problem is not "omg in game physics is new and scary" but that the examples physX provides are quite contrived... I don't feel anyone woudl care if physX looked exactly as good as it does now but that "off" provided something more akin to the general software physics we are used to in things like crysis.. It is the artificial delta that pisses folks off, not the look of physX. Though the few who own a card for physX that can't use them due to ATI primary are likely pissed for very different reasons.

So it isnt Physics, it is who is pushing it. I see......

 

[Wreckage]

Right, I bet you feel the same way about all the advances in graphics we have had over the past 15 years. You one of those people who whined about Glide and the original Voodoo because it was proprietary and only made graphics pretty and fast? How about T&L? The Shader model?

I've seen people on this forum argue over 4xAA vs 8xAA.

AA, AF, advanced textures, tessellation..... it's all eye candy. I think some of the people who don't like PhysX, would be best served with integrated graphics or a console. Not a new console either because those use Physx, but an older one with no AA or anything like that.

 

[BenSkywalker]

I didnt think id see the day when the "destructiong of older cobblestone roads" was discussed, with fervor

Can you comprehend the fact that I was pointing out that as shown in Mafia II it is *very* inaccurate? Judging by the rest of your comments I assume not. I was pointing out that one of like mind with you was correct in saying it was horribly inaccurate, he was just at the exact opposite end of *why* it was inaccurate.

Btw, are you turning a blind eye to the "outrage" in this topic over the lack of impact/functionality which phyxs represents?

I have a hard time as that line of thought is so shockingly moronic it is hard for me to comprehend. Does anistoropic filtering change the functionality of a game? How about AA? How about shaders? How about tesselation? Seriously, this is a discussion about graphics and graphics cards and games using said devices. That graphics don't change the functionality of a game is nothing new in the least bit, not in any way, shape or form. No matter how drunk I get myself, I can't make myself think down to that level, perhaps I will experience a massive head injury at some point robbing me of almost all of mental capacity and I will be able to see it like some of you claim to, although honestly I don't believe any of you do. When ATi was pushing TruForm years ago noone on these forums were bashing them(although some of the bugs in the early CS that supported it were rather comical) as everyone realized that any progress brought to the graphics game was progress. Times change, now too many just want to champion their own company and do everything they can to put an anchor around the neck of progress.

A game that requires physx to play is something like ..cryostasis?

There aren't any games that require PhysX to play, that is the point. Think along the lines of a racing sim that only ran at 5fps on the best possible AMD setup because it was using a physics model that was too complex for a CPU to run- not an option to enable it, the default physics engine. We won't see anything like that, and if we did it would cause huge outrage on the forums. Same thing if a game required Eyefinity to run.

Anyway, i really cant see how this mudslinging and namecalling on your part is justified and i guess your just here in defence of your great leader.

You realize my post was pointing out how badly PhysX is showing?

" the fringe lunatic loyalists "

Start up an Eyefinity thread if you want to spot the green versions. Every single one of them that posts to bash on Eyefinity in a thread about it certainly warrants being tossed into that exact same category.

BTW- Personally I think the subtle touches like the snow slowly blowing off the cars as you drive around and the debris you kick up driving down the road in the winter is far more impressive in MafiaII then any of the flying concrete- the smoke is also pretty nicely done in terms of how it interacts with physical objects.

 

[Genx87]

I've seen people on this forum argue over 4xAA vs 8xAA.

AA, AF, advanced textures, tessellation..... it's all eye candy. I think some of the people who don't like PhysX, would be best served with integrated graphics or a console. Not a new console either because those use Physx, but an older one with no AA or anything like that.

Yeah it is really silly argument. "Only eye candy". Isnt that what all the shit they do on graphics cards ends up being? If these purists want us to take them seriously, they should run the game at the lowest possible resolution with all "eye candy" turned off. 640X480 0aa,no texture filtering, and all reflections, shadowing, and shaders turned off.

But what they arerally saying is Nvidia bad, ATI good. Well that is fine, let us know when ATI is capable of finally delivering Physics on a GPU. I know they were yapping about it 4 years ago. Nothing yet......