PhysX graphics a big deal?

[runzwithsizorz]

Just wondering if physX graphics would be a reason to switch from AMD to Nvidia graphics cards? Thinking mainly of Witcher 3. Does PhysX make that much of a visual difference?

 

[Silverforce11]

For most games, no. For a few gems, yes. Overall, no. But if the NV GPU was good perf/$ already, then for sure, go with NV for the extra PhysX benefit in those few games that are good.. but its not worth a big premium.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Actually what exactly is physX anyway, and why would that nature of interaction in a game require the video card to have a special feature? Why can't they just code it in as normal graphics?

 

[boxleitnerb]

Because most games were/are developed with consoles in mind. It costs time and money to develop extra features, so AMD and Nvidia have to help with it or pay for it or do it themselves. In case of Nvidia, they want their effort to pay off only for them, so their PhysX is proprietary.

 

[Carfax83]

Just wondering if physX graphics would be a reason to switch from AMD to Nvidia graphics cards? Thinking mainly of Witcher 3. Does PhysX make that much of a visual difference?

Yes, PhysX can make a huge difference in visuals depending on the game. The best implementations in my opinion so far are the Batman Arkham series, Borderlands 2, Metro Last Light and Mafia 2..

Witcher 3 is going to be one of the first truly next gen games, so I'm excited to see how it's going to make use of PhysX.

One indication is that they will use PhysX for fur and hair. In this demo, an NVidia rep gives a demonstration:

Demo

 

[Carfax83]

Actually what exactly is physX anyway, and why would that nature of interaction in a game require the video card to have a special feature? Why can't they just code it in as normal graphics?

PhysX is just a game physics API that can run on both the CPU and GPU. Of course it runs much faster on the latter as you'd expect, and has more advanced features when using hardware acceleration.

As for why they can't code it in as normal graphics, it's because it's not graphics. It's physics, which means the effects have to be both calculated as well as rendered.

Hardware accelerated PhysX uses no canned animations like Havok, so everything is computed by the GPU.. This typically makes the effects more realistic in behavior and more impressive in overall effect.

Probably cuts down development time as well, since the devs don't have to make animations for things like cloth or hair, or explosions.

 

[Silverforce11]

Mirror's Edge and Batman was the best PhysX usage, everything else was horrid and overdone.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

You can do hybrid PhysX, which is what I'm doing right now.

Basically you render with your AMD gpu's, but do PhysX via a dedicated to PhysX nVidia card.


Obviously the other thought process here is if PhysX is something you're interested in, how much extra is better driver support, PhysX, and perhaps even the GeForce Experience software worth over a similarly performing Radeon?

For some it's all about the bottom dollar, for others there is some extra value in an experience.

 

[toyota]

pick a game with hardware physx, google it and look at videos to decide for yourself.

 

[toyota]

Mirror's Edge and Batman was the best PhysX usage, everything else was horrid and overdone.

you mean the the more "realistic" shards of glass that you did not even have time to slow down and look at it. or the the silly cloth physx tech demos that stuck out from the game anyway?

sorry other than smoke/fog effects, I just think physx is a joke for the most part. we still have the same stupid looking completely out of place chunks since physx began.

 

[Silverforce11]

I mean the first gaming experience with PhysX where I thought "WOW!".. since then, most of the PhysX effects in games are overdone and completely distracting to the point of negative impact on gameplay.

 

[toyota]

I mean the first gaming experience with PhysX where I thought "WOW!".. since then, most of the PhysX effects in games are overdone and completely distracting to the point of negative impact on gameplay.

ok I see what you mean. yeah a lot of it is just piled on and still looks gimmicky. even in Batman AA, the scarecrow levels look just like a physx demo and it was really overdone IMO.

 

[blackened23]

Just wondering if physX graphics would be a reason to switch from AMD to Nvidia graphics cards? Thinking mainly of Witcher 3. Does PhysX make that much of a visual difference?

No.

 

[NTMBK]

No.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

It's all subjective.

Personally for me it adds immersion to the titles it is in. It's far more important to me than a few percent difference in FPS that people have been arguing since time began.

You have to ask yourself what it means to you, because it's a subjective question. Nobody else can answer it for you.

Do you want 4% more performance for the same price, or do you want this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VafzR7JqO2I

Only you can decide. But remember you don't have to deal in black and white, you can spread a little butter on your toast: http://www.ngohq.com/graphic-cards/...with-latest-physx-and-geforce-285-solved.html

You can keep your Radeon, and just buy an nVidia dedicated card for cheap. There is more than one option.

 

[Red Squirrel]

PhysX is just a game physics API that can run on both the CPU and GPU. Of course it runs much faster on the latter as you'd expect, and has more advanced features when using hardware acceleration.

As for why they can't code it in as normal graphics, it's because it's not graphics. It's physics, which means the effects have to be both calculated as well as rendered.

Hardware accelerated PhysX uses no canned animations like Havok, so everything is computed by the GPU.. This typically makes the effects more realistic in behavior and more impressive in overall effect.

Probably cuts down development time as well, since the devs don't have to make animations for things like cloth or hair, or explosions.

Well everything in a game is physics, technically, so I still don't see how they can't code it directly.

Ex: I shoot a window, the glass breaks. Why can't that be done in code without using a special API? Server calculates bullet trajectory and all the physics involved in the shards flying, then sends the info to the clients that have line of sight to make that animation. Isin't that how everything else works anyway?

What happens if I have physx and my friend does not, and I shoot a window, what does he see, it just vanishes?

Or am I missing something?

 

[imaheadcase]

The problem with Physics is that it does not add much to gameplay, it just adds more stuff on screen. For instance in that Metro 2033 video posted above, lots of the scenes just show more of the same thing already on screen. Its not really immersive its just stuff.

Some cases it looks worse, shooting a brick wall to show more chunks of brick pieces on the ground..yet the wall only shows small bullet holes? Not very real looking.

Its not worth it for a pure upgrade path, but if you already happen to have it for it its ok. But never change cards just for it. Its not done well in lots of games, and even if it is, its still a performance tradeoff.

 

[Erenhardt]

If you think that artificially locking competitors hardware, and fighting against gamers who oposed to nvidia only physx, by hacking the system, is OK - then go buy nvidia graphics card.
Oh... remember to pick one priced @$650+ because otherwise you would have to sacrifice graphics settings to get 'better visuals' with physx (aka.enable physx but turn shadows to low to maintain reasonable FPS)

If you are not OK with the above, let them know what you think about it and:
1. Dont buy nvidia graphics cards
2. Dont buy games with nvidia physx
That will kill physx entirely or make nvidia change their minds about locking it from amd.

 

[Keysplayr]

Mirror's Edge and Batman was the best PhysX usage, everything else was horrid and overdone.

Incorrect.

 

[tviceman]

I appreciated the physx in Cryostasis, Mafia II, and Darkest of Days in addition to Mirror's Edge and the Batman games.

 

[Keysplayr]

If you think that artificially locking competitors hardware, and fighting against gamers who oposed to nvidia only physx, by hacking the system, is OK - then go buy nvidia graphics card.
Oh... remember to pick one priced @$650+ because otherwise you would have to sacrifice graphics settings to get 'better visuals' with physx (aka.enable physx but turn shadows to low to maintain reasonable FPS)

If you are not OK with the above, let them know what you think about it and:
1. Dont buy nvidia graphics cards
2. Dont buy games with nvidia physx
That will kill physx entirely or make nvidia change their minds about locking it from amd.

Talk about steering the conversation with loaded comments. LOL.


OP, PhysX is an extra feature added to games by Nvidia. It gives a bit more immersion to games. Not all games that have PhysX do this well, but many also do. Point is, EVEN if the PhysX is implemented poorly in any given game, you have the OPTION to turn it off and basically have the functionality of an AMD card. My 2 cents is, might as well have the OPTION rather than NOT.

How is THAT for steering, Eranhardt?

 

[tviceman]

It's all subjective.

Personally for me it adds immersion to the titles it is in. It's far more important to me than a few percent difference in FPS that people have been arguing since time began.

You have to ask yourself what it means to you, because it's a subjective question. Nobody else can answer it for you.

Do you want 4% more performance for the same price, or do you want this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VafzR7JqO2I

Only you can decide. But remember you don't have to deal in black and white, you can spread a little butter on your toast: http://www.ngohq.com/graphic-cards/...with-latest-physx-and-geforce-285-solved.html

You can keep your Radeon, and just buy an nVidia dedicated card for cheap. There is more than one option.

Wow hadn't seen the metro last light comparison yet. Looks pretty damn good.

 

[Carfax83]

Well everything in a game is physics, technically, so I still don't see how they can't code it directly.

That's not really true. A lot of the things you see in game physics aren't really physics, but canned animations. I recently experienced this for myself. I had an issue in Crysis 3 with tree destruction, and in the end, the root cause of it was that Crysis 3 apparently uses canned animations for many of their destruction effects.

So the destruction isn't even real, because the physics isn't real. Crytek didn't even have the sense to allow for the animations for tree destruction to be loaded into memory for faster access.

That's consolitis right there my friend.

Ex: I shoot a window, the glass breaks. Why can't that be done in code without using a special API? Server calculates bullet trajectory and all the physics involved in the shards flying, then sends the info to the clients that have line of sight to make that animation. Isin't that how everything else works anyway?

It depends on how the glass breaks. Is the breaking of the glass an actual simulation using physics algorithms, or is it a canned animation(s) that repeats itself over and over again almost the same way with little variation.

And that kind of physics which requires instant updates to the game world wouldn't work well with cloud computing I think.

What happens if I have physx and my friend does not, and I shoot a window, what does he see, it just vanishes?

Or am I missing something?

In online gaming, game physics is done locally for the most part so if your friend doesn't have PhysX, the glass will break differently for him. It will still break, but not as realistically.

 

[Erenhardt]

Talk about steering the conversation with loaded comments. LOL.


OP, PhysX is an extra feature added to games by Nvidia. It gives a bit more immersion to games. Not all games that have PhysX do this well, but many also do. Point is, EVEN if the PhysX is implemented poorly in any given game, you have the OPTION to turn it off and basically have the functionality of an AMD card. My 2 cents is, might as well have the OPTION rather than NOT.

How is THAT for steering, Eranhardt?

If OP is interested in games with nvidia physx, he better get nvidia card. Even if he is not going to use physx!
PhysX implementation is done with nvidia development team. They are involved in designing game/engine and they make sure that AMD graphics cards have enough calculation to do to 'distinguish' themselves from the REAL GRAPHICS ACCELERATORS.

 

[Keysplayr]

If OP is interested in games with nvidia physx, he better get nvidia card. Even if he is not going to use physx!
PhysX implementation is done with nvidia development team. They are involved in designing game/engine and they make sure that AMD graphics cards have enough calculation to do to 'distinguish' themselves from the REAL GRAPHICS ACCELERATORS.

I think you're catching on. You can turn off PhysX if you want to. If the game has a so-so implementation of PhysX, like Cryostasis for example, you can simply play the game with it off just as you would have to with any AMD card.
So, best of both worlds. Worst case scenario is that you play the PhysX title as you would experience it on AMD hardware. Best case is you get your PhysX content. The point? You can have it either way.