PC Games hardware as done a really nice and in-depth Q&A interview with the Battlefield: Bad Company 2 PC version producer, Anders Gyllenberg. In the interview pretty much every technical aspect of the PC version of BFBC2 was talked about, from the use of DX11, ATI Eyefinity support, AA support, Multicore CPU support, and most interesting to us the physics used in the game. As we know BFBC2 uses the Havok Physics engine to produce some impressive physics and destructible environments in the game but PCGH asks why they chose a middleware physics solution such as Havok and asks what his opinion is on GPU-Accelerated physics. Read the rest of the interview here.
PCGH: Frostbite Engine uses Havok physic engine. Why do you decide to work with a middleware solution? Does Frostbite support an advanced destruction system [yeah, we know it do so “Destruction 2.0”] like terra forming or other physic that influences gameplay? What is your personal opinion about GPU-accelerated PhysX or physics in general?
Anders Gyllenberg: Havok is a good base for us and we have built many layers of our own on top of it to support destruction and our large-scale multiplayer worlds. One interesting feature and quite unique feature is the destructible terrain – it actually affects gameplay and allows the player to take cover in the craters created. We are currently performing all our physics computations on the CPU cores in parallel. CPU/GPU hybrid solutions are an interesting future prospect.
Free Falling Blocks AKA Physics Based Tetris is a really interesting idea to change a game we have been playing for years. In Free Falling Blocks the Tetris blocks fall down based upon physics and then react to the bottom and the other blocks based upon physics, which is being powered by Bullet Physics. The creator of this has uploaded a video to YouTube showing this in action. There is also a video on YouTube of a PhysX powered Tetris like game which looks like it is being developed for the iPhone. Pretty interesting stuff, check out the videos below.
A demo of a physics based falling blocks game I’m developing. It looks better then in the video, and the win message at the end is off because I forgot to turn off lighting for that bit. Also the audio loses syne… but the game has impact sounds like at the beginning. The game was over 22minutes so I had to cut it down some. I will upload better videos once I make more significant changes. I have lots of enhancements still in store for this.
The pieces are manipulated by applying left/right and rotational forces. At each level the blocks gain more and more mass, thus making those forces have less effect. There is also a super gravity button that makes it fall faster which doesn’t change as the mass increases because that’s how gravity works. Because of the on restrained nature of the pieces, it’s easily possible to get them stuck in a bad position, they won’t lock in like that, and you can press r to teleport them back to the starting point (with a 100 point deduction for teleportation costs.) For most of the game I was using the super gravity and the quick lock. Without the quicklock (w) the piece will need to settle for a couple seconds before locking. In both cases it needs to be aligned closely to the grid in order to lock, you can notice a few times where the piece flashes, that’s because I tried to lock when it wasn’t lined up.
www.freefallingblocks.com will be updated as I progress.
This video trailer featuring NVIDIA PhysX technology in the PC game Dark Void, shows various enhanced effects when using weapons, the grenade and the jetpack. NVIDIA PhysX technology has been fully integrated into the dangerous and exciting world of Dark Void to bring you a more realistic and physics based experience in the Void. In fact, Dark Void has the distinction of being the first game to use dynamic, accurate smoke effects and smoke trails for the games innovative jetpack, UFOs, and spaceships, all of which will be hardware-accelerated by GeForce GPUs when played on compatible PCs.
Dark Void PC Game Technology Trailer Featuring NVIDIA PhysX Technology:
This comparison video features NVIDIA PhysX technology in the PC game Dark Void, shows various enhanced effects when using weapons, the grenade and the jetpack. NVIDIA PhysX technology has been fully integrated into the dangerous and exciting world of Dark Void to bring you a more realistic and physics based experience in the Void. In fact, Dark Void has the distinction of being the first game to use dynamic, accurate smoke effects and smoke trails for the games innovative jetpack, UFOs, and spaceships, all of which will be hardware-accelerated by GeForce GPUs when played on compatible PCs.
Dark Void PC Game Comparison Video Featuring NVIDIA PhysX Technology:
We have been excited about and following all news about Metro 2033 for several months now since it was first announced that it would make extensive use of hardware PhysX and be a graphics and PhysX showcase for Nvidia when released.
Along with the press released several DX11 images of metro 2033 were released to Flickr check them out here or check out the photo gallery below.
be sure to check out the previous posts we have made about Metro 2033:
AGOURA HILLS, Calif., Feb 17, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) — THQ Inc. (NASDAQ:THQI) and NVIDIA today announced that Metro 2033TM, the upcoming first person shooter from 4A Games, will support a number of advanced DX11 features with the latest generation of DX11 graphics cards, as well as NVIDIA 3D Vision support. Metro 2033 will also feature advanced, hardware accelerated physical effects using NVIDIA PhysX.
Gamers with DX11 cards will experience advanced Depth of Field effects as well as Full Tessellation on character models. You can see the results on the official Metro 2033 Flickr Collection at http://www.flickr.com/photos/metro2033.
“Our engineers have been working closely with 4A Games to ensure that Metro 2033 takes full advantage of some of the spectacular effects made possible with the next generation of DX11 hardware,” said Tony Tamasi, Senior Vice President of Content and Technology at NVIDIA. “The 4A Engine is one of the most advanced game engines we’ve ever worked with, and with DX11 enabled, Metro 2033 is undoubtedly one of the best looking PC games of 2010. Combine this with NVIDIA 3D Vision and PhysX and you will experience mind-blowing visuals.”
Metro 2033 is scheduled for release in North America and Germany on the 16th March, Australia on the 18th March, and in the UK and the rest of Europe on the 19th March, on the Xbox 360(R) video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and PC.
For the latest Metro 2033 news, visit Metro2033Game.com, follow Twitter.com/Metro2033 or become a fan at Facebook.com/Metro2033.
I am pleased to announce that GamePhys will soon have a dedicated test and benchmarking system for the site. This was a project I have been meaning to do since I started the site back in 2009 but never got around to it. The first phase of this project really got started this past BlackRead More
On Friday at GDC 2012, Aron Zoellner and Kevin Newkirk of NVIDIA presented a really nice hour long session titled Enhancing Games with APEX PhysX (Clothing, Destruction, Turbulence). In this presentation they went over the features of APEX PhysX Cloth, Destruction, and Turbulence which we have seen implemented in recent games like Mafia II andRead More
We have been hearing rumors for the past year now that AMD GPU’s will be used in the next generation consoles however, aside from reports that the Xbox would use a Fusion variant of Bulldozer, we have not been hearing to much about the actual CPU that may be used. Now SemiAccurate claims that theRead More
Zombiethatatehimself creator of the Awesome Apex PhysX Impact Damage Demonstration and Apex PhysX Impact Damage Demonstration With Stucco/plaster, and the Apex PhysX Voronoi Fracture and Destruction Demonstration has made another cool Apex PhysX demonstration with the Unreal Development Kit. This time a similar to the Voronoi Fracture and destruction demonstration but with some cool plasterRead More
Some nice news from Havok as they have announced that they have entered into a “worldwide license agreement with Nintendo Co., Ltd., to make Havok Physics and Havok Animation available to studios around the world developing on Nintendo’s Wii U™ platform” Hopefully we will see some cool games implement Havok Physics and destruction. The WiiRead More
F1nalspace has made a pretty cool PhysX SPH fluids sandbox you can download and play with showing off some awesome PhysX based SPH(smoothed particle hydrodynamics). Check it out below. I made a fluid simulation in C++ with several customizable scenarios using PhysX SDK 3.0.2 rendered with OpenGL. Fluid rendering is done using a technique calledRead More
I just wanted to post these cool UDK PhysX videos I came across on YouTube. UDK wood fracture from 19minimin91 UDK/Apex Destructible Level Test from lankeytom UDK Physics Fun by GrinchPa
Now this is exciting news, Epic Games has announced in their GDC 2012 press release that they will be showcasing Unreal Engine 4 behind closed doors at GDC 2012. Last year at GDC 2011 we saw the Samaritan demo which was jaw dropping graphics wise but did not showcase much physics, at least destruction wise.Read More
NVIDIA has released new GeForce 295.73 WHQL Drivers which include PhysX 9.12.0209 System Software for improved compatibility and performance in Alice: Madness Returns and Batman: Arkham City. NVIDIA has posted an in-depth article about the improvements you can see in various games on the official Geforce website. There was also a PhysX System Software 9.12.0213Read More
This is old now but I never got around to posting about it back during CES 2012. During the CES 2012 Intel press conference, they showed a lot of information about the upcoming Ivy Bridge Ultrabook processor including a DX11 graphics demo showing off different games that the DX11 capable Ivy Bridge processor will beRead More
The NvidiaApexDeveloper YouTube page has uploaded a new video from the Art Gallery demo showing off some awesome Apex physics and destruction. Check it out below. For more footage of this demo in action check out the original Art Gallery Destruction Demo in UE3 using APEX Destruction with GRB’s video. Hopefully this demo becomes availableRead More
Charlie over at SemiAccurate has posted an interesting rumor that the upcoming NVIDIA Kepler, GK104 GPU will have optimizations for physics calculations in the form of dedicated PhysX hardware described as a “PhysX block.” It is unclear whether these optimizations will be actual dedicated PhysX hardware or just more shaders and other PhysX optimizations butRead More
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“Destruction 2.0”] like terra forming or other physic that influences gameplay? What is your personal opinion about GPU-accelerated PhysX or physics in general?
