Second opinion on physx

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Keysplayr
Thilan, you could just give all the devs that signed on a chance to develop their new games with PhysX.

I don't believe it will take off until the consoles can do GPU acceleration. And that's not going to happen anytime soon as from what I've read the next xbox will have an ATI GPU and the next PS3 is a while off still and my not even have an nV GPU.

If all the games that are being developed with CPU PhysX now could somehow benefit just by plopping in a GPU to do physx and have extra effects that would be great but AFAIK it doesn't work like that.

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: thilan29
If all the games that are being developed with CPU PhysX now could somehow benefit just by plopping in a GPU to do physx and have extra effects that would be great but AFAIK it doesn't work like that.

Actually, it does, to a certain extent.
Ofcourse the developer actually has to put in the extra effects, but that's much like how games already work with graphics, allowing faster/more advanced GPUs to do dynamic shadows, HDR, higher resolution textures, more detailed geometry, more detailed shaders etc.
But if your game already supports PhysX, you can take advantage of the GPU/PPU very easily.

In fact, nVidia is developing tools to make it even easier to scale the PhysX content up and down, and employ it across various platforms. Take a look at what nVidia calls APEX:
http://developer.nvidia.com/object/apex.html

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Scali
But if your game already supports PhysX, you can take advantage of the GPU/PPU very easily.

From what I've read, that isn't correct. The only games to actually take advantage of GPU physx are the ones specifically coded for it. Mainly Mirror's Edge, Cryostasis, GRAW2, UT3, Sacred 2, and a couple of others I think.

Can you point me to the games other than those I mentioned that benefit from GPU PhysX (ie. framerate/effects increases by using a PPU/GPU)?

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: thilan29
From what I've read, that isn't correct. The only games to actually take advantage of GPU physx are the ones specifically coded for it. Mainly Mirror's Edge, Cryostasis, GRAW2, UT3, Sacred 2, and a couple of others I think.

There's no such thing as a free lunch, obviously. If you want to add new effects, you'll have to write some code. I'm just saying it's not a whole lot of work if you already have PhysX integrated in your engine.
You can't really speak of "specifically coded"... Compared to the total amount of work of writing the engine and integrating a physics API into it, adding the extra effects is a very small effort.

In fact, the PhysX mod for UT3 doesn't actually modify the original game code. It just installs some levels with extra physics content. The engine already supported GPU/PPU physics anyway.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Scali
The engine already supported GPU/PPU physics anyway.

Yes but it isn't actually taking advantage of it as I said unless the effects were coded in the first place.

You said:
"But if your game already supports PhysX, you can take advantage of the GPU/PPU very easily."

Of course it CAN take advantage of it...but my point is that currently it DOESN'T and IMO won't until the consoles can do it which will take a while to come to fruition.

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: thilan29
Yes but it isn't actually taking advantage of it as I said unless the effects were coded in the first place.

But they are, in the case of UT3.

Originally posted by: thilan29
You said:
"But if your game already supports PhysX, you can take advantage of the GPU/PPU very easily."

What I meant to say was that coding extra effects isn't that big of a deal.

Originally posted by: thilan29
Of course it CAN take advantage of it...but my point is that currently it DOESN'T and IMO won't until the consoles can do it which will take a while to come to fruition.

Mirror's Edge is actually a good example. It's a game ported over from the consoles, and extra physics were added to the PC port. So apparently it wasn't too big a deal for the developers to add extra effects.

Especially with technologies like nVidia's APEX, consoles don't necessarily have to support what PCs do, you just scale it down.
CryEngine is another example of this approach. They first developed CryEngine2 for PC, and now they're scaling it down to CryEngine3 for consoles.
While consoles have slowed down PC development to a certain extent for the past few years, it doesn't seem like this trend is going to last. As the gap between consoles and PCs gets larger, it seems that PC games will once again get additional content/features. Accelerated physics could be part of that, especially if a good toolchain makes it very easy to scale down to consoles.
I have little doubt that the next generation of consoles will have accelerated physics aswell. It doesn't matter who provides the GPUs. AMD, Intel, nVidia, they're all working on phyiscs support, and they all support OpenCL and DirectX Compute anyway. And if it isn't PhysX or Havok, then perhaps it could be an independent physics API such as Bullet Physics, driving the hardware accelerated physics.

 

[Zenoth]

I like PhysX, of the games I've tried and own in which PhysX effects are present I'd say that Sacred 2 is the one in which it was done the best (not in quantity but in quality) after it was added with the last 2.40 patch. The player will see leaves floating and temporarily being thrown in the air with the wind, pretty much all around the game world (which adds the impression that you play during autumn, but with beautiful summer colors), also water particles are better, and some magical effects now have particles around the character (there's one with some sort of a ice 'nova' which sends thousands of little ice particles around the player which then dynamically collides with the environment like other NPC's around or trees or houses or other entities).

I haven't played Mirror's Edge by the way, but I've seen many videos of it, it doesn't look fun, but the PhysX effects are indeed good looking.

 

[Fox5]

Originally posted by: Zenoth
I like PhysX, of the games I've tried and own in which PhysX effects are present I'd say that Sacred 2 is the one in which it was done the best (not in quantity but in quality) after it was added with the last 2.40 patch. The player will see leaves floating and temporarily being thrown in the air with the wind, pretty much all around the game world (which adds the impression that you play during autumn, but with beautiful summer colors), also water particles are better, and some magical effects now have particles around the character (there's one with some sort of a ice 'nova' which sends thousands of little ice particles around the player which then dynamically collides with the environment like other NPC's around or trees or houses or other entities).

I haven't played Mirror's Edge by the way, but I've seen many videos of it, it doesn't look fun, but the PhysX effects are indeed good looking.

The physx effects are mostly early in the game and aren't terribly impressive.
I've seen cloth effects before in games that were comparable (splinter cell series) and tons of blowing paper/glass shattering doesn't add much more than the typical ways games have done this before.
Also, as you get further in the game, the amount of physx effects die down, it's like they just put them in for reviewers and didn't even try to work them in throughout the entire game.

 

[Wreckage]

Originally posted by: thilan29
PhysX is a cool technology but adoption of GPU acceleration of games has just been too slow.

It can take years to develop a game. As and example most games released are still DX9. I think that PhysX has done a great job of getting games out with GPU physics in such a short time.

There have been plenty of studios jumping onboard so there will be more and more games released over the next year or so.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Scali
Especially with technologies like nVidia's APEX, consoles don't necessarily have to support what PCs do, you just scale it down.

As I said before, this is not currently the case and hopefully you're right. In the case of Mirror's Edge...the PC version actually came out several months after the console version so it takes time to implement it...and which developers are willing to spend the extra time and money to implement the extra effects? So far, not many (in terms of GPU acceleration).

Originally posted by: Wreckage
There have been plenty of studios jumping onboard so there will be more and more games released over the next year or so.

That's fine but are they going to have extra effects that require GPU acceleration for acceptable performance or will it just be the software PhysX that we currently have? I would like to see more hardware accelerated PhysX (I have a spare 8800GT that I can run it on) but I don't see it taking off in the near future.

 

[Wreckage]

Originally posted by: thilan29

That's fine but are they going to have extra effects that require GPU acceleration for acceptable performance or will it just be the software PhysX that we currently have? I would like to see more hardware accelerated PhysX (I have a spare 8800GT that I can run it on) but I don't see it taking off in the near future.

I was referring to hardware acceleration. The list for software accelerated titles is already very long.

I think NVIDIA should just pay to have it be in Half Life 3 or some other huge game. Then make sure that you can't play the game without using Physx.

Similar to how Microsoft bought Halo and made it exclusive to the Xbox.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Wreckage
I was referring to hardware acceleration. The list for software accelerated titles is already very long.

Which games coming out in the near future are going to have hardware acceleration?

 

[SSChevy2001]

Originally posted by: Wreckage

Originally posted by: thilan29
PhysX is a cool technology but adoption of GPU acceleration of games has just been too slow.

It can take years to develop a game. As and example most games released are still DX9. I think that PhysX has done a great job of getting games out with GPU physics in such a short time.

There have been plenty of studios jumping onboard so there will be more and more games released over the next year or so.

With current consoles and ATi cards not supporting GPU PhysX, there's just no incentive for developers to support GPU PhysX effects. Like thilan29 mentioned there's still no announcement that Nvidia GPUs are even going to be used in the next generation of consoles, so Nvidia is going to have to do something to keep GPU PhysX going.

Originally posted by: Wreckage
I think NVIDIA should just pay to have it be in Half Life 3 or some other huge game. Then make sure that you can't play the game without using Physx.

Similar to how Microsoft bought Halo and made it exclusive to the Xbox.

Exclusive title like Halo or HL3 for Nvidia PC users only, sure that would be the day being they both use Havok for physics. :laugh:

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: thilan29
As I said before, this is not currently the case and hopefully you're right. In the case of Mirror's Edge...the PC version actually came out several months after the console version so it takes time to implement it...and which developers are willing to spend the extra time and money to implement the extra effects? So far, not many (in terms of GPU acceleration).

So you think all they did in those few months is adding physics effects? That if they didn't add physics effects, the PC port would have been ready at the same time as the console versions?
You don't really think that's right, do you?

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: SSChevy2001
With current consoles and ATi cards not supporting GPU PhysX, there's just no incentive for developers to support GPU PhysX effects. Like thilan29 mentioned there's still no announcement that Nvidia GPUs are even going to be used in the next generation of consoles, so Nvidia is going to have to do something to keep GPU PhysX going.

I think some of you are a bit too quick to assume that consoles rule the world, and PCs don't matter at all to developers.
Besides, the real point isn't GPU PhysX, it's accelerated physics in general.
I just don't get you people. Maybe I'm just getting old, but I can't recall people slagging off 3DFX and Glide back in the day, when they were offering a new kind of acceleration, which required special hardware and proprietary API.
Perhaps people were just smarter back then, because they understood that although in the end Glide may be superceded by a newer API, and even 3DFX may not make it, the 3d acceleration technology that 3DFX brought to the table was invaluable.

But people have been slagging off PhysX even in the Ageia days. Can't they see the potential of this technology? Don't they see that it's inevitable that we're going to have accelerated physics one way or the other? And isn't it obvious that the first or even the second iteration of a standard isn't going to be the final form? Look at Glide again... after Glide, there was a while when people thought that MiniGL and later OpenGL was going to be THE API. But now it's all but wiped out by Direct3D. And even Direct3D continues to change.
In other words, "duh", accelerated physics isn't going to be in its current form forever. That doesn't mean we shouldn't embrace the technology, because it currently delivers something that nothing else can. As soon as something better comes along, PhysX will have to adapt or die... again "duh". Until then, it's PhysX or nothing. More and more developers seem interested in adopting the technology, so we'll just have to wait and see what they come up with.

I have to say that Cryostasis is a true revolution. Now I don't even like the game, but as a developer I think it's incredible that we have water flowing through the entire game in such a realistic way. We couldn't even DREAM of having such effects in realtime, only a few years ago. And now it's there. Maybe some of you just don't understand the significance of this.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: SSChevy2001

Originally posted by: Wreckage

Originally posted by: thilan29
PhysX is a cool technology but adoption of GPU acceleration of games has just been too slow.

It can take years to develop a game. As and example most games released are still DX9. I think that PhysX has done a great job of getting games out with GPU physics in such a short time.

There have been plenty of studios jumping onboard so there will be more and more games released over the next year or so.

With current consoles and ATi cards not supporting GPU PhysX, there's just no incentive for developers to support GPU PhysX effects. Like thilan29 mentioned there's still no announcement that Nvidia GPUs are even going to be used in the next generation of consoles, so Nvidia is going to have to do something to keep GPU PhysX going.

Originally posted by: Wreckage
I think NVIDIA should just pay to have it be in Half Life 3 or some other huge game. Then make sure that you can't play the game without using Physx.

Similar to how Microsoft bought Halo and made it exclusive to the Xbox.

Exclusive title like Halo or HL3 for Nvidia PC users only, sure that would be the day being they both use Havok for physics. :laugh:

If ATI does not support GPU physics by the time new consoles are being planned for their final specs, we really don't need an announcement to know that either Larrabee, or Nvidia GPU's will
be in the next consoles. ATI/AMD has quite a bit of catching up to do both in hardware and software. Nvidia IS doing something to keep PhysX going. Working with many developers are who signed on
for PhysX. You and I and the neighbors cat understands Nvidia has always kept close relations with developers, have always worked closely with them to make sure their game titles work as best as possible on Nvidia GPU's. TWIMTBP program is vast.

At any rate, consoles, for the past few generations, have been evolving closer to what a PC is anyway. Crack one open and you'll find a PC in there.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: Scali

Originally posted by: thilan29
As I said before, this is not currently the case and hopefully you're right. In the case of Mirror's Edge...the PC version actually came out several months after the console version so it takes time to implement it...and which developers are willing to spend the extra time and money to implement the extra effects? So far, not many (in terms of GPU acceleration).

So you think all they did in those few months is adding physics effects? That if they didn't add physics effects, the PC port would have been ready at the same time as the console versions?
You don't really think that's right, do you?

I can think of many games that didn't port to PC from Console right away and took months. Non PhysX titles of course. Call of Duty X, Gears of War, etc.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Scali
So you think all they did in those few months is adding physics effects? That if they didn't add physics effects, the PC port would have been ready at the same time as the console versions?
You don't really think that's right, do you?

I have no idea what they added to the game. Maybe some better graphics (it looks better on the PC of course compared to the PS3 version I tried) and optimization? Games that launch on PS3, XBox, and PC usually launch at the same time. You skipped right by my point though...which is that few developers have actually added the GPU accelerated effects.

Originally posted by: Keysplayr
I can think of many games that didn't port to PC from Console right away and took months. Non PhysX titles of course. Call of Duty X, Gears of War, etc.

Gears of War was an XBox exclusive (like Halo, Halo 2 on PC came a while after the console version). And which Call of Duty? The last 2 have launched simultaneously for all platforms. I will add GTA4 to the list but it was a mess when it did finally come out on PC and Rockstar usually launch on the PC afterward.

 

[BenSkywalker]

With current consoles and ATi cards not supporting GPU Physx

While the consoles don't support precisely GPU PhysX, the PS3 can run what would have to run on GPUs on the PCs for PhysX using Cell. Check out Heavy Rain on the PS3, far more impressive physics then what we saw in Mirror's Edge, and running on Cell.

You skipped right by my point though...which is that few developers have actually added the GPU accelerated effects.

Very few developers have adopted DX10 also, so should we just give up on it and stick to DX9? In actuality, accelerated physics offers a much larger improvement then the move from DX9-DX10. DX11 brings a bit more to the table, but one of those elements will be CS which will allow developers to utilize GPU accelerated physics no matter how badly some companies try to hold the industry back.

 

[Genx87]

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: Kakkoii
@Astrallite: While a CPU can do physics, it sucks at it, even with 8 threads. It's really no match for the massive parallelism of a GPU, which plows through physics a lot quicker. And it's also relative to how much physics is going on in a game. You could easily get to the point of so many physics calculations going on, that even an i7 Extreme wouldn't be able to handle it, while a 8800 still could lol.

ATI needs to swallow it's pride for once, and just accept Nvidia's offer to help implement CUDA on their hardware, along with PhysX.

It's not a matter of pride, it's a matter of adopting an open standard versus adopting a very niche proprietary solution that happens to be owned by the company they are competing with. nVidia could arbitrarily make it run better on their cards or worse on ATI's for instance.(Nobody would put this past them either, they've done some pretty sleezy things in the past to cut out competition; the ULI chipset and SLI issue comes to mind)

It's also because to date, PhysX hasn't shown itself to be worth investing in yet. At the very least, if a propriety standard is going to be used, it would be MUCH smarter to use one made by a company that isn't ATI or nVidia, such as Microsoft. I fully expect PhysX to slowly be replaced by other physics solutions with time. PhysX has done too little too late while being given a large amount of time to prove its worth.

AMD is using Intel's Havok, their competitor. So it doesnt pass my sniff test they arent accepting PhysX because it is owned by a competitor. A competitor btw which allows anybody to use it for free minus the console makers and will help implement it.

 

[Wreckage]

Originally posted by: Genx87

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: Kakkoii
@Astrallite: While a CPU can do physics, it sucks at it, even with 8 threads. It's really no match for the massive parallelism of a GPU, which plows through physics a lot quicker. And it's also relative to how much physics is going on in a game. You could easily get to the point of so many physics calculations going on, that even an i7 Extreme wouldn't be able to handle it, while a 8800 still could lol.

ATI needs to swallow it's pride for once, and just accept Nvidia's offer to help implement CUDA on their hardware, along with PhysX.

It's not a matter of pride, it's a matter of adopting an open standard versus adopting a very niche proprietary solution that happens to be owned by the company they are competing with. nVidia could arbitrarily make it run better on their cards or worse on ATI's for instance.(Nobody would put this past them either, they've done some pretty sleezy things in the past to cut out competition; the ULI chipset and SLI issue comes to mind)

It's also because to date, PhysX hasn't shown itself to be worth investing in yet. At the very least, if a propriety standard is going to be used, it would be MUCH smarter to use one made by a company that isn't ATI or nVidia, such as Microsoft. I fully expect PhysX to slowly be replaced by other physics solutions with time. PhysX has done too little too late while being given a large amount of time to prove its worth.

AMD is using Intel's Havok, their competitor. So it doesnt pass my sniff test they arent accepting PhysX because it is owned by a competitor. A competitor btw which allows anybody to use it for free minus the console makers and will help implement it.

It's also a straw man argument on his part. Should AMD also not support DirectX because it is proprietary? Why don't they only support OpenGL, if they are that worried about an "open standard". Of course Havok is also proprietary.

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: thilan29
I have no idea what they added to the game. Maybe some better graphics (it looks better on the PC of course compared to the PS3 version I tried) and optimization? Games that launch on PS3, XBox, and PC usually launch at the same time. You skipped right by my point though...which is that few developers have actually added the GPU accelerated effects.

As far as I know, games launching on multiple platforms at the same time is more of an exception than it is rule.
There are various reasons for this, including:
1) Publishers want to have a title out exclusively for one platform first, to maximize sales, so a 'staggered' publishing schedule is used.
2) Ports to various platforms aren't always performed by the same company or by the same team. In that case, one platform version has to be finished first, then it is handed over to the team that deals with the port.
3) The development team doesn't have the resources to develop/QA all ports in parallel, so they finish them one after another.

In other words: there may be various reasons why Mirror's Edge wasn't released on PC at the same time as the console versions. I'm quite sure that the addition of GPU PhysX effects didn't have much to do with it. So your statement "In the case of Mirror's Edge...the PC version actually came out several months after the console version so it takes time to implement it..." was a poor judgement of the actual situation.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker

You skipped right by my point though...which is that few developers have actually added the GPU accelerated effects.

Very few developers have adopted DX10 also, so should we just give up on it and stick to DX9?

I never stated PhysX is worthless did I? Just that it has not picked up a lot of momentum yet.

Originally posted by: Scali
As far as I know, games launching on multiple platforms at the same time is more of an exception than it is rule.

When games are going to be launched on ALL platforms then they usually launch around the same time (even more so in the recent past). Exclusive titles as you mentioned...of course they would launch after on another platform since they are exclusive (at least initially) to whichever platform...and I already mentioned a game like Halo/Halo 2 in that regard.

In other words: there may be various reasons why Mirror's Edge wasn't released on PC at the same time as the console versions.

So you're not really sure either why it was delayed? And again my point is that PhysX has not picked up much momentum (why that is I'm not really sure).

If it was as easy as you claim to add the extra effects then why do YOU think we haven't had more developers adding those extra effects (I'm asking an honest question here)?

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: thilan29
When games are going to be launched on ALL platforms then they usually launch around the same time (even more so in the recent past).

I simply disagree with that, I already stated this before. And I'm not just talking about exclusive titles either.
Just to take one example, BioShock:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BioShock
It was released in August on PC and XBox, and in October on PS3.
Or Doom 3:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doom3
Released almost a year later on Mac and XBox than on PC.
Unreal Tournament 3:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreal_Tournament_3
PS3 version about a month later than the PC version, XBox version almost half a year later... OS X and linux versions still not released.
I could probably go on and on, but you get the idea.

I really don't think the ~two months delay with Mirror's Edge PC version is a big deal in the greater scheme of things. Just business as usual.

Originally posted by: thilan29
So you're not really sure either why it was delayed?

Nope, but I think it's highly unlikely that PhysX is the sole reason, and I've given several alternative reasons, which are all very likely.
What you call 'delayed' may just be their business strategy anyway. They may have wanted to take some extra time to validate the PC version, because PCs are just more errorprone with their variety of APIs, OSes, hardware and all.
If you really want to know, I could ask. I know one of the developers at DICE (although he didn't work on Mirror's Edge himself). I'm not sure if you'd get an answer though, because this sort of business strategy may be considered a trade secret.

Originally posted by: thilan29
If it was as easy as you claim to add the extra effects then why do YOU think we haven't had more developers adding those extra effects (I'm asking an honest question here)?

Basic management strategy. One of the golden rules in software development is to NOT change your requirements during an ongoing project. In general it's just not very smart to be in a project that's nearing completion and then say "Okay, let's do something completely different". There are too many risks involved in general. Adding some extra PhysX effects may not be difficult from a technical point-of-view, but that doesn't mean the management is willing to take any risk at all.
You have to realize that not all reasons are technical.
PhysX is still a very young technology, and games where the decision was made to use PhysX at an early point aren't nearing completion yet. What we have so far is some developers who were willing to take the risk and change their planning and game design a bit, to incorporate PhysX.
We will probably see the same thing with DX11. You can convert a DX10 engine to DX11 in just a few days, singlehandedly. Technically it's not that difficult. We will probably see a few developers taking that risk and releasing DX11 titles early on, while others will stick to DX10 because that's what they were committed to at the start of the project.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Scali
Just to take one example, BioShock:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BioShock
It was released in August on PC and XBox, and in October on PS3.
Or Doom 3:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doom3
Released almost a year later on Mac and XBox than on PC.
Unreal Tournament 3:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreal_Tournament_3
PS3 version about a month later than the PC version, XBox version almost half a year later... OS X and linux versions still not released.
I could probably go on and on, but you get the idea.

Bioshock for the consoles was developed by different teams apparently which you've mentioned before. Bioshock 2 apparently will launch simultaneously. Doom 3 came out for the PC first because that was the dominant platform at the time for iD. UT3 I think made more sense on the PC following on from the other UT games.

I think you've illustrated something there though. The next games coming from those studios are launching simultaneously for all platforms and/or were developed primarily on the consoles (even iD software said recently they've switched mainly to the xbox360). This is going to make it even more difficult for GPU PhysX in its current form to take off but hopefully as BenSkywalker mentioned more games will be made with GPU PhysX even for the consoles....at least PS3 anyway.

PhysX is still a very young technology, and games where the decision was made to use PhysX at an early point aren't nearing completion yet.

Well hopefully we see more and more games using GPU PhysX. I think having some sort of accelerated physics is better than not having anything (I'd prefer if everyone could run it)...I'm just sort of annoyed that it hasn't picked up more steam (I can use my 8800GT if I want to experience PhysX like I did for Mirror's Edge) which probably comes off as me dismissing it which I don't.