Official PhysX Thread

[SIrPauly]

This is the very beginning of the PhysX thread as we attempt to find out more data and resources about this new GPU technology moving forward. This info will be updated from time-to-time and hopefully others may join in to share views – positive or negative – or share info they may find while surfing the web or from first hand views.

Some of the aspects that are important to me are these areas:

1) What type of effects can be offered and how can they improve immersion?

2) What kind of performance compared to the CPU and performance hit over-all compared to without these new effects?

3) How many titles?

4) What does multi-GPU and SLI do to help here?

What’s the use of this new technology if the new 3d effects didn’t offer more immersion and improve game-play?

What’s the use of this new technology didn’t offer more dynamic abilities than what the CPU may offer?

What’s the use of this new technology if there isn’t any content of gaming titles moving forward?

What’s the use without flexibility?

So what this thread may hopefully do is build a data-point or resource about PhysX moving forward.

[caveman-jim]

How to play Unreal Tournament 3 PhysX level on a system without nVidia card installed - Link

[SIrPauly]

Latest Driver:

Originally Posted by weeds

Nvidia PhysX 8.09.04 WHQL

Download:
http://us.download.nvidia.com/Window...emSoftware.exe

Release Highlights:
Quote:
* Supports for NVIDIA PhysX acceleration on all GeForce 8-series, 9-series and 200-series GPUs with a minimum of 256MB dedicated graphics memory.
* Experience GPU PhysX acceleration in several full games and demos today by downloading the GeForce Power Pack.
* Supports AGEIA PhysX processors and software runtimes (no change to PPU driver support).
* Includes the latest PhysX runtimes used in the latest game titles.
* Supports the following NVIDIA PhysX runtime engines: 2.8.1, 2.8.0, 2.7.4, 2.7.3, 2.7.2, 2.7.1, 2.7.0, 2.6.x, 2.5.x, 2.4.x and 2.3.x
* Supports NVIDIA PhysX acceleration on GeForce via CUDA 2.0 for SDK versions 2.7.3, 2.7.2, 2.8.0 and 2.8.1 (requires graphics driver v177.81 or later).
* The PhysX control panel can be found in the Windows Start Menu under NVIDIA Corporation.
Supported:
Quote:
GeForce GTX 280
GeForce GTX 260
GeForce 9800 GX2
GeForce 9800 GTX+
GeForce 9800 GTX
GeForce 9800 GT
GeForce 9600 GT
GeForce 9600 GSO
GeForce 9500 GT
GeForce 9500 GS
GeForce 9400 GT
GeForce 9300 GS
GeForce 9300 GE
GeForce 8800 Ultra
GeForce 8800 GTX
GeForce 8800 GTS 512
GeForce 8800 GTS
GeForce 8800 GT
GeForce 8800 GS
GeForce 8600 GTS
GeForce 8600 GT
GeForce 8600 GS
GeForce 8500 GT
GeForce 8400 SE
GeForce 8400 GS
GeForce 8400
GeForce 8300 GS
GeForce 8300
GeForce 8200
GeForce 8100 / nForce 720a
GeForce 8100 / nForce 720a
AGEIA PhysX Processors (All)

Here are two unofficial sites that offer some nice info on PhySX:

http://personal.inet.fi/atk/kjh2348fs/physx.html

http://physx.cwx.ru/


Two titles this month of September that I believe offer GPU Physic support are Space Siege and Hell's Highway!

Space Siege:

Here is a quote from Chris Taylor about PhysX and Space Siege:

I haven't been this excited about a new gaming technology in years," said Chris Taylor, CEO and founder of Gas Powered Games. "We're focusing all of our physics efforts on PhysX, and it already delivers the kinds of advanced effects in Space Siege that takes the whole experience to the next level. And in the near-future, you're going to see real-time, Hollywood cinematic-level environmental effects on GPUs like the GeForce GTX 280. We're talking about some wicked-cool technology here!

http://www.reuters.com/article/press...08+PRN20080616

Those with PhysX support are treated with an excellent physics system that sends crates, bodies and gas canisters flying around with realism. You can tell GPG want to show it off as well – the Armstrong is littered (almost to the point of absurdity) with explosive barrels and gas canisters. I admit that it sucked me in though, as I couldn’t resist blowing up every single one I came across just to see the physics engine do its thing, even though it usually resulted in the death of either myself or HR-V.

http://www.theoldergamers.com/pc/review/space-siege/

Jonric: Are there particular aspects of your engine or other technology that you'd like to bring to our attention?

Mike Marr: Space Siege uses our in-house Siege Engine, but the big addition is PhysX physics support, which added a whole new dimension to the game. None of the lighting is "baked"; it's all dynamically rendered at screen time.

http://videogames.yahoo.com/news-1236734-2

Brothers In Arms: Hell Highway:

A very impressive trailer:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/40244.html


http://www.nvidia.co.uk/object/io_1219845966676.html

We are unilaterally supporting acceleration through NVIDIA PhysX technology for our 3D games: Brothers in Arms, Aliens: Colonial Marines, and Borderlands,” said Corrinne Yu, Director of Platform Technology at Gearbox Software. “Going forward, it just makes sense to leverage the inherent parallel architecture of NVIDIA GPUs for physics. This enables GPU acceleration for everything from rigid body collision, vehicle physics, collision with destructible pieces, and numerous simulation effects. Gamers will be able to experience characters, objects, and effects that dynamically move and interact in their environments as they do in real life.”

[Jokerzwild]

YAY!! Stuck for great justice!!

[SIrPauly]

Thanks, this way data and resouces can be added without disrupting, hehe!

[SIrPauly]

PhysX is nothing or not worthwhile unless there is content that improves immersion -- pretty safe guess, hehe! To investigate nVidia and what they're up to is the thing to do. Other sides or camps may downplay PhysX as not very important and an open way is the correct way and my view is the dynamic way is better than the static way and while we wait for open standards to be agreed upon by the powers at be; why not have dynamic gaming offered to the gamer now while hardware can actually do it? Enough time has been wasted while politics play out their hands.

Will set up a post on games that have been officially named and will try to scour the Internet for any interviews, etc, on PhysX.

It's really not about just nVidia's PhysX but more so about what the GPU can do to enhance dynamic aspects for games. nVidia happens to be more aggressive and spending the resources to try to bring this now. As a gamer, of course, I'm going to appreciate this commitment now and very excited about it moving forward.

[SIrPauly]

Found this interview with nVidia's Roy Taylor and discusses PhysX and other subjects:

http://www.bit-tech.net/bits/2008/09...ng-games-fun/1

[SIrPauly]

Fudzilla and Roy Taylor discussion:

http://www.fudzilla.com/index.php?op...9095&Itemid=65

There are about 25 games coming out supporting PhysX before the end of the year and another 25 between January and March 2009. This is an impressive number but Physics in games is tough for developers and here is one reason why.

Today’s games have what we can call fixed state physics, and Havok or any other physics API is not running on a GPU can’t make physics scale. To enable scaling developers must construct objects with this in mind from the beginning of the development cycle. This is why it’s taking time to get really dramatic physics into games but when the arrive they will be so impressive.

For example, if you want to blow up a car into a hundred pieces you have to model the car from a hundred pieces. The base line experience for a console or software PC physics on a CPU will be fixed at the lowest common denominator. This might mean only destroying the car into 10 of the 100 available pieces.

[SIrPauly]

This is a nice article on the first Power Pack and somehow missed this one -- enjoyed the amount or type of products used and some of his discussion.

http://techgage.com/print/nvidias_ph...eport_-_part_2

[SIrPauly]

Originally Posted by Valconeye

This is a simple test done in the Unreal Tournament 3 Engine using a single GTX 260 to test over 3000 rigid body collisions

http://www.vimeo.com/1437619

[SIrPauly]

http://66.102.9.104/translate_c?hl=e...q1jpnrNhCrZ3_Q

nVidia did get 12 AAA titles in one month when taking over PhysX - which is more than Ageia did in two years according to the slide offered -- that's amazing to me.

Also, after watching the video in the post above was curious about rigid body acceleration with the GPU and according to this info it's not enabled or may not be possible.

From the link above:

From the outset, the GeForce GTX 260 and 280, and their predecessors, should be compatible with the subset of the overall PhysX API, as is the PPU, with a difference: the port of rigid bodies n ' has not yet been made and this feature may not, for the moment at least, be accelerated by the GPU.

The above rigid bodies point has been raised as not available, etc.......but according to this PR:

This enables GPU acceleration for everything from rigid body collision, vehicle physics, collision with destructible pieces, and numerous simulation effects.

http://www.nvidia.co.uk/object/io_1219845966676.html


More clarity and data is needed here to learn more

[moshpit]

I'm actually pretty stoked about PhysX having been enabled on cards all the way back to G80. I've had this card for almost 2 years which is unheard of since the Voodoo 2 days for a card to stay relevant for this long. Then to have even newer features like this added this far down the road of ownership is like the cherry on top of the sunday.

[acroig]

Agreed.

[SIrPauly]

It's a neat feature to add dynamic aspects moving forward.

Will try to add some videos of content in-case some haven't seen it. It's an evolving thread but hopefully in time an end-user may appreciate the data in here -- pro's with con's.

[caveman-jim]

Originally Posted by SIrPauly

http://66.102.9.104/translate_c?hl=e...q1jpnrNhCrZ3_Q

nVidia did get 12 AAA titles in one month when taking over PhysX - which is more than Ageia did in two years according to the slide offered -- that's amazing to me.

Also, after watching the video in the post above was curious about rigid body acceleration with the GPU and according to this info it's not enabled or may not be possible.

From the link above:




The above rigid bodies point has been raised as not available, etc.......but according to this PR:



http://www.nvidia.co.uk/object/io_1219845966676.html


More clarity and data is needed here to learn more

When I looked into more for getting Ut3 physX levels on my Radeon system I was provided with links to developers in the Nvidia cuda developer forum stating that only PhysX 2.7.4 SDK supported GPU accelerated physX, and it was restricted to softbody and fluids. rigid bodies were on the development map, but after OpenGL 3.0 support - which has now arrived. I suspect that the different PhysX drivers released with the Forceware drivers are including newer versions of the SDK to be accelerated. Whats not in that PR is which version of the PhysX API is enabling this feature - I'm sure there are internal version of the SDK which are available to the main dev houses, but not to joe public for general release, until later or even when the games using it are released.

[SIrPauly]

Thanks, that offers some more clarity on this issue. Speculated something similar to what you're offering but nice to learn more.

[SIrPauly]

Looks like nVidia may brand PhysX/Sli as Sli 2 -- makes sense to separate the two.

http://www.fudzilla.com/index.php?op...=9660&Itemid=1

[SIrPauly]

This was actually a pretty informative article and where I did find this original quote some time ago but might as well add it in this thread"

The example that Roy gave me was about an unnamed and unreleased title which uses PhysX, and supports GPU accelerated physics. This title focuses on sea battles in the mid 1800’s using wooden ships. In one scene if the user is able to hit the opposing vessel in the powder magazine, the ship explodes with a thousand pieces being thrown into the air, each piece making an individual splash and wave when it hits the water. Apparently the scene is quite breathtaking, and the coolness factor is simply second to none. This is all done with GPU physics, and if that is turned off then the ship merely explodes with no shrapnel and just sinks into the ocean.

This article touched on many aspects of PhysX -- good read actually:

http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=584

[SIrPauly]

Sort of older news but a newer article though:

http://www.developmag.com/news/30550...des-with-PhysX

Here is the video of the developer here:

http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_cr...is_videos.html

Never would of imagined effects like this with Physics.

[SIrPauly]

Trying to learn more about the GameBryo engine from Emergent.

nVidia and Emergent did come to an agreement utilizing PhysX:

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/new...hp?story=19919


This is some info on Emergent:

http://www.emergent.net


One title that is listed is Divinity2 that may be utililizing GPU Physics and the GameBryo engine:

http://physx.cwx.ru/

http://www.divinity2.com/

Don't know any others but will continue to look around utilizing the Gamebryo engine.

[SIrPauly]

Found another Gamebryo game called World Shift and uses PhysX but not GPU Physics though based on the interview:

http://www.emergent.net/en/Products/...gy/WorldShift/

Interview with the developer:

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/aid,63...dA_WorldShift/

However, thought these comments offered some irony:

PCGH: Does the game support hardware accelerated physics? What is your personal opinion about that topic?
Mikhail Balabanov: WorldShift doesn't rely on hardware support for physics because at the time we considered the install base too small to support such a decision. Nevertheless, we think that PPUs have the potential to deliver new types of visual and gameplay experience, and their integration in the video cards will make them more widely available.

[SIrPauly]

Getting tough to find info now -- and found this article that touches on PhysX a bit -- it's a bit dated but what the hell, hehe!

http://www.techradar.com/news/comput...obscene-364646

[SIrPauly]

I didn't want to really add ATI in this discussion but this article touches on the decision making on ATI's part on why they didn't want to have PhysX on ATI products.

One of the views was the "Open" aspects and lack of control that has been raised but this question always was on my mind:

If ATI is so adamant about "open" why are they going with "Havok" which isn't open? Always thought that was a bit odd -- Thankfully this question was asked and ATI responded to this and is in the article.


Good read here:


http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...2324555,00.asp

[moshpit]

I would have thought AMD would be quicker to jump in bed with Nvidia then Intel anyday. Havok is Intel, PhysX is Nvidia. But maybe AMD is playing the "safer" bet by going with Intel on this one?

[SIrPauly]

Here is another title that has PhysX -- but don't know what type yet:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/40282.html

Actually enjoyed this music video of Sacred 2 above -- well done I thought!

http://www.sacred2.com/landingpage/index_en.html

[SIrPauly]

The developers of Sacred2 did sign an agreement with Ageia for the PPU back a few years ago but wonder with future drivers one may enjoy Physics with the GPU with this title? Could be something to do with rigid bodies maybe, wish I knew.

http://www.gamezone.com/news/09_19_05_10_49AM.htm

[SIrPauly]

A small sampling of data on the nuts-and-bolts of PhysX from nVidia's site -- good reads:

http://origin-developer.nvidia.com/o...8-PhysX_X.html

http://origin-developer.nvidia.com/o...ion08-PhysX_X2

http://origin-developer.nvidia.com/o...ion08-PhysX_X3

[SIrPauly]

A bit more on PhysX Features:

http://origin-developer.nvidia.com/o..._features.html

[KAC]

Some PhysX demos and a free game called Warmonger...

http://www.nvidia.com/content/forcew...s/download.asp

[SIrPauly]

There is going to be a second power pack coming some-time this month as well.