Physx review on Tech Report

[Wreckage]

http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/15261

If you'd told me a year ago that my PC would have hardware PhysX support today, I'd have been a little dubious. Last summer, running hardware game physics simulations involved shelling out $150-200 for a PhysX card, and all you got for your investment was limited support in a handful of titles. Not exactly a stocking-stuffer.

That will all change next week. On August 12, Nvidia will release new graphics drivers that will allow owners of most GeForce 8, GeForce 9, and GeForce GTX 200-series cards to use PhysX acceleration without spending a dime. Along with the drivers will come a downloadable PhysX software pack containing free Unreal Tournament 3 maps, the full version of NetDevil's Warmonger, a couple of Nvidia demos, and sneak peeks at Object Software's Metal Knight Zero and Nurien Software's Nurien social-networking service. Nvidia provided us with early access to the pack, and we've been testing it over the past couple of days.

We have another, more comprehensive thread going on here. I'm going to lock this thread since it's in effect a dupe.

-ViRGE

 

[JPB]

Originally posted by: Wreckage
http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/15261

If you'd told me a year ago that my PC would have hardware PhysX support today, I'd have been a little dubious. Last summer, running hardware game physics simulations involved shelling out $150-200 for a PhysX card, and all you got for your investment was limited support in a handful of titles. Not exactly a stocking-stuffer.

That will all change next week. On August 12, Nvidia will release new graphics drivers that will allow owners of most GeForce 8, GeForce 9, and GeForce GTX 200-series cards to use PhysX acceleration without spending a dime. Along with the drivers will come a downloadable PhysX software pack containing free Unreal Tournament 3 maps, the full version of NetDevil's Warmonger, a couple of Nvidia demos, and sneak peeks at Object Software's Metal Knight Zero and Nurien Software's Nurien social-networking service. Nvidia provided us with early access to the pack, and we've been testing it over the past couple of days.

 

[airhendrix13]

This is great news for GeForce owners. Hopefully this will be ported to ATI or Havok will work just as well.

 

[Dkcode]

Just amounts to more crap been thrown around the screen pointlessly, current games that support Physx offer no new dimension to gameplay.

Don't take me as a naysayer, i like what is being done. However as it stands now for the 8/9 series, it does not seem a worthwhile performance hit for the current games available. Performance certainly wont be acceptable when running games that make full use of Physx. As a 8800GTX owner, this new feature does not really excite me.

The future potential looks very interesting, physics support streamlined into your video card. Hopefully we will see game developers make the most of it.

 

[MarcVenice]

If they left out g80 they'll piss of a LOT of people ... Including me haha. Although I doubt my 8800gts 320mb has any power left to do physics calculations at 1680*1050. On the other hand, if it CAN handle physics, I could keep it around for my next upgrade and perhaps throw it in a pci-e 4x slot, next to my new videocard ( be it ati or nvidia ) ...

 

[shangshang]

Originally posted by: Dkcode
Just amounts to more crap been thrown around the screen pointlessly, current games that support Physx offer no new dimension to gameplay.

Thrown around pointlessly? Sorry, but you're confused. Physx is just a technical thing, it doesn't injection meaning into actions. Whether something has a meaning or a point is up to the intrepretation of game developers and gamers.

As for new dimension. What is new dimension to you? And can you name me a current video card that offers such new dimension? To me, the only video card that offered any real new dimension was the original Voodoo. All the cards since Voodoo are just looking to push FPS faster, and Physx is no different.

 

[deerhunter716]

Sounds great and all but sure looks like a hell of a performance hit with those using the software only. Does not really seem worth it at all in my opinion.

 

[Dkcode]

Originally posted by: shangshang

Originally posted by: Dkcode
Just amounts to more crap been thrown around the screen pointlessly, current games that support Physx offer no new dimension to gameplay.

Thrown around pointlessly? Sorry, but you're confused. Physx is just a technical thing, it doesn't injection meaning into actions. Whether something has a meaning or a point is up to the intrepretation of game developers and gamers.

As for new dimension. What is new dimension to you? And can you name me a current video card that offers such new dimension? To me, the only video card that offered any real new dimension was the original Voodoo. All the cards since Voodoo are just looking to push FPS faster, and Physx is no different.

No i am not confused. Maybe you should challenge your own perception on what Physx should be trying to offer.

All these demo's are showing is extra eye candy, the gameplay is only changing on a visual level, what i expect physics to do is alter the game world in behaving realistically and offer a more dynamic gaming experience.

For example, imagine a scene from a WWII FPS, your being chased up town street by two heavy tanks with buildings on either side of the road. You have the option to blow up the tanks using a bazooka, you could try and sneak up on the tanks and plant a satchel charge, or you could blow out a building to cover the road in debris and stop the passing tanks.

Half Life 2 took physics to the next level with its physics based puzzles but the gameplay was linear and physics was limited by the hardware that was currently available, although it was on the right track.

 

[SlowSpyder]

My guess is the performance hit will be too much for most people using a G92 based card, but at least the option will be there. As GPU's get more processing cores it'll be a nice option I'm sure.

 

[Eluros]

All these demo's are showing is extra eye candy, the gameplay is only changing on a visual level, what i expect physics to do is alter the game world in behaving realistically and offer a more dynamic gaming experience.

For example, imagine a scene from a WWII FPS, your being chased up town street by two heavy tanks with buildings on either side of the road. You have the option to blow up the tanks using a bazooka, you could try and sneak up on the tanks and plant a satchel charge, or you could blow out a building to cover the road in debris and stop the passing tanks.

Half Life 2 took physics to the next level with its physics based puzzles but the gameplay was linear and physics was limited by the hardware that was currently available, although it was on the right track.

That's because HL2 used the Source Engine-- a whole new graphics engine. Unless I'm mistaken, Physx never claimed to be a new engine, merely a form of acceleration. May be wrong on that account, though.

At any rate, I dare say that if we ever see physx affect gameplay, it will not be for many years. Game developers wouldn't want to force a small marketshare upon themselves (unless they're the makers of Crysis, which is likely why it didn't sell well). Until the vast majority of gamers have Physx, it won't actually affect gameplay in many games, because they'd sell the games to less people.

Edited to fix a quote.

 

[shangshang]

Originally posted by: Dkcode

For example, imagine a scene from a WWII FPS, your being chased up town street by two heavy tanks with buildings on either side of the road. You have the option to blow up the tanks using a bazooka, you could try and sneak up on the tanks and plant a satchel charge, or you could blow out a building to cover the road in debris and stop the passing tanks.

Half Life 2 took physics to the next level with its physics based puzzles but the gameplay was linear and physics was limited by the hardware that was currently available, although it was on the right track.

What you described is called "imagination", and imagination can only come from the human mind. And I don't find anything "new dimension" about the scenario you described either.

When I think of "new dimension" in gaming, I think of

- the original Voodoo (because it brought realistic 3D graphics to PC gaming to the mass)
- online gaming experience & online questing (a revolution in gaming experience because actual offline communities sprouted out of it, and still do to this day)
- the Nintendo Wii (first console that encourages the whole family sit around the living room)

That's what I would consider as new dimensions in the last 20 years. Being chased around a city block and blowing up tanks with a bazooka with a bit more eye-candy explosions is not a new dimension in my book.

 

[Dkcode]

Originally posted by: shangshang
That's what I would consider as new dimensions in the last 20 years. Being chased around a city block and blowing up tanks with a bazooka with a bit more eye-candy explosions is not a new dimension in my book.

I was going to play smart arse with you, but after the way you have thrown my argument way out of context. Have this one on me :beer:

 

[ajaidevsingh]

Originally posted by: SlowSpyder
My guess is the performance hit will be too much for most people using a G92 based card, but at least the option will be there. As GPU's get more processing cores it'll be a nice option I'm sure.

I agree.. Tried the old Physx drivers for athe GTX260 and it seemed to run UT3 a little slow but not by much

 

[james1701]

I find it interesting that Nvidia is going to let a third party develope this for ATI. I wonder if they are hoping that by being done by a third party developer, it will not be as optimized for ATI's cards and knocking their performance down a notch or two and Nvidia takes no blame for this because they did not develope it.