Widescreen Gaming Forum

this is already happening now though mate. Example COD2, a great way to score easy kills on a good rig is to throw smoke granades everywhere. anyone on a dull/old computer gets massive frame crawl, and pop, job done. now is this cheating/unfair? probably, but then is WS or a 200dpi laser mouse cheating/unfair? never keep everyone happy, and no easy way of capping everyone :)

There's an excellent article on Extremetech that covers the upcoming physics debate. It covers the various APIs, hardware acceleration, multi-core cpus, and mentions rumblings of DirectX being expanded to add a Physics API.

Also physics calculations are already being done on GPUs to calculate and render visually scientific simulations such as galaxy formation and ocean currents fluid dynamics. This work is being done at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1943837,00.asp

This just suggests to me that it will make programers even more lazy. The particle effects and destructable environments on FEAR seem to be on a par with those effects from the GRAW video at the top of this thread. So why is there a need for this card really?? isnt it just a case of the company trying to cash in?

Example COD2, a great way to score easy kills on a good rig is to throw smoke granades everywhere. anyone on a dull/old computer gets massive frame crawl, and pop, job done. now is this cheating/unfair?

No... because i used to do that playing CounterStrike. Smoke grenades were affectionately called "lag bombs". :D The secret was to drop the lag bomb behind you, so your frame-rates remained high and the enemy looking at you dropped to 5fps. :lol:


It's interesting where this whole PPU thing is headed. I personally think nvidia and ATi will realize they need to do this before the PhysiX becomes the defacto standard for physics.

Apparently MS have a physics API on the way as part of Dirext X, unless the PhysX can support this id say that Ageia have lost the battle before theyve started:

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=31385

Looks like a lot of people are surprised that games run slower under the physX too, of course they run slower, the GPU has to draw a LOT more things, its bound to take a performance hit!

Looks like a lot of people are surprised that games run slower under the physX too, of course they run slower, the GPU has to draw a LOT more things, its bound to take a performance hit!

Well, if the options are

A) Don't buy a PhysX chip and run at normal graphics details with good framerates
B) Spend money on a PhysX chip and run at slightly l33ter graphics details at lower framerates

then I think a lot of people won't bother with PhysX. If people are going to spend money on optional hardware, they'll want an overall performance improvement. Improved graphics effects at the cost of framerates isn't an improvement if you ask me.

Of course, I don't know how bad it really is, or whether the problem is simply GRAW being crap...

If the card has to draw 10,000 extra shards of glass when a window explods then of course its going to be a drag on the graphics card.

However, we need to start using this technology, even if we dont use it to its full potential. The extra features that the physX brings could be great, so long as developers dont go too overboard on things like smoke particles and glass/metal shards. They need to be carefull about what they include in games, and then can slowly start including these features further down the line.

Could you imagine full water effects with alpha transparency and reflections with the first few versions of Direct X on your Voodoo2? I cant, and i think thats the problem here, theyre trying to do too much for the launch, when the rest of the hardware isnt quite ready.

PREVIEW!!!!

AGEIA PhysX PPU Videos - Ghost Recon and Cell Factor

http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=245

Contains screenshots and VIDEO!!!

CellFactor demo out now ... http://www.3dgamers.com/games/cellfactor/downloads/

I'm just downloading now to try out my new PhysX card ... :D

BTW ... the explosions etc. are much better in GRAW with the card ... 8) ... but I haven't had time to really test it out yet.

I'll report back later ...

Cell Factor is amazing ... :shock: :D

All the widescreen and TripleHead resolutions are available in the game ... 8)
and it runs very well ...

Screenshots here ... http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=39461#39461