Fans ofPhysX

[liquidsnake718]

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-physx-amd-gpu-multicore,9481.html#BOM_comments

I made the mistake of believing the marketing hype and bought a 5850 Ati card which is still very pleasing and worth the money but in the end I realized what Nvidia had to offer with their cards and propriety software. PhysX makes the difference.

What do you think.

 

[hell_storm2004]

The question is would all games in future be optimized for PhysX? When i mean all, i mean all! Only then PhysX would make sense. If physX is something of a choice that game developers use only if they want to, then it may not be a total success.

 

[bystander]

What games are you playing? I've seen your complaint before, but I'm baffled, because I've only seen you complain about one game which used physX. All the other games you claim the physX was better in, didn't use physX at all.

 

[jyjjy]

Batman: AA is the only game where PhysX makes a real difference and that was mostly a design choice. That they didn't even enable AA on ATI cards(like every other game around) just shows how much the developers were in Nvidias pocket on that one.

 

[welshmousepk]

everything Physx does can(or has been) be done BETTER on havok, while costing less and performing better.

 

[swifty_morgan]

Stop with the fan boy isms already. I don't buy games specifically because they have phisx capabilities. I buy them to play the game. Physx is a real good asset to have when it does exist in any given game. If nvidia gives you a better show, then yes, nvidia is better. I think some of you don't even know it exists in some of the games you play but you still knock it. Clouds, smoke, particles, explosions and chunks flying all over are/contain certain amounts of "physx" components. I can name more than ONE game that has it unlike the other poster who only thinks it exists in just ONE game. I think that the Nvidia "physx" takes it to the nth providing more for the eyes to see vs ATI. Will it change, yes, but not over night. ATI/AMD needs to pump money into game development or they need to hope the "open", "free" physx gets adopted quicker by game developers. it'll take years for that, nvidia already has it.

 

[yannifb]

Seriously you got an ATI 5850, a cutting edge dx11 card, and you think physx overshadows that??? Seriously, after I bought my GTX 295 and the 5870 came out a month later, I beat myself up for not waiting.

 

[megamanx00]

PhysX doesn't seem to matter to me in the games I play. The only time I noticed a difference was after I saw the video of it on in Batman, and it made me kind of want it, but not really. Anyway, I think it's nice, but it's not a game changer for me. I think nVidia has done a better job of marketing it than competitors like Havok, but Havok still offers some similarly impressive effects as welshousepk said. I plan on upgrading to an ATI DX11 card in the near future. nVidia's delay of a DX11 card is weakening the position of PhysX as people buy ATI cards instead.

 

[welshmousepk]

Clouds, smoke, particles, explosions and chunks flying all over are/contain certain amounts of "physx" components.

none of those are even related to PhysX. they are physics, but done on other, open platform, software. usually Havok. Physx has so far allowed for nothing that Havok can't do better, and it leeches GPU power to do so.
when Physics calcualtions are done on a CPU, the performance hit is negligible. thus far, GPU accelerated physics (physx) has proved to cause massive performance loss.

Id love to see Physx attempt to handle volumetric clouds and smoke, or realistic terrain deformation. but it hasn't. and like i said, Havok can do it better anyway.

 

[bystander]

Stop with the fan boy isms already. I don't buy games specifically because they have phisx capabilities. I buy them to play the game. Physx is a real good asset to have when it does exist in any given game. If nvidia gives you a better show, then yes, nvidia is better. I think some of you don't even know it exists in some of the games you play but you still knock it. Clouds, smoke, particles, explosions and chunks flying all over are/contain certain amounts of "physx" components. I can name more than ONE game that has it unlike the other poster who only thinks it exists in just ONE game. I think that the Nvidia "physx" takes it to the nth providing more for the eyes to see vs ATI. Will it change, yes, but not over night. ATI/AMD needs to pump money into game development or they need to hope the "open", "free" physx gets adopted quicker by game developers. it'll take years for that, nvidia already has it.

I have seen him complaining about physics in Crysis, grand theft auto, farcry 2 and how much better it was with nvidia. Those games do not use physX, they are not on any list that includes physX. This is why I don't believe he is actually seeing a difference. I have both cards in my system, so I'd be happy to have physX work well, but the games I've seen him talk about don't use it, at all.

The reason I said the one game he complained about, was in this other post, he did include Batman.

 

[skolpo]

Batman: AA is the only game where PhysX makes a real difference and that was mostly a design choice. That they didn't even enable AA on ATI cards(like every other game around) just shows how much the developers were in Nvidias pocket on that one.

And having it being one of very few games to utilize Physx decently, the additional effects are quite minuscule. I've played with Physx on and off with a GTX 285 in Batman: AA. The thing I noticed most wasn't the flying papers or moving spiderwebs, but instead the most noticeable effect was the SIGNIFICANT dip in framerate. I'm actually a fan of Physx, but I don't want to have to use a dedicated Physx card nor do I want to have to SLI in order to keep at least 60FPS.

Physx is only a small luxury for having an nVidia card, just like 3D Vision. Both are great eye candy in some cases, but they both do damage to framerate. It's nothing immensely outstanding that would make you regret buying an ATI card.

 

[liquidsnake718]

What games are you playing? I've seen your complaint before, but I'm baffled, because I've only seen you complain about one game which used physX. All the other games you claim the physX was better in, didn't use physX at all.

Well I have alot of games, the ones that I play the most or even mess around with physX are Crysis, Crysis WH, GTA4, Batman AA, Stalker, Far Cry2, Resident Evil5, l4d2, gears of war, cod MF2, COD5, COD4, and Fallout. Most of these games have a sense of physics but nothing like Crysis, Batman, and GTA4. Unfortunalty I cannot use PhysX anymore as my GPU is now a 5850 from a 9800gtx+. So I miss the option of using it over Havok.

I also have Dirt but only have tried it a few times. I downloaded it with my GPU5850.... as for the list fo gmaes I have, it goes on and on and on and on

 

[welshmousepk]

Well I have alot of games, the ones that I play the most or even mess around with physX are Crysis, Crysis WH, GTA4, Batman AA, Stalker, Far Cry2, Resident Evil5, l4d2, gears of war, cod MF2, COD5, COD4, and Fallout. Most of these games have a sense of physics but nothing like Crysis, Batman, and GTA4. Unfortunalty I cannot use PhysX anymore as my GPU is now a 5850 from a 9800gtx+. So I miss the option of using it over Havok.

I also have Dirt but only have tried it a few times. I downloaded it with my GPU5850.... as for the list fo gmaes I have, it goes on and on and on and on

of the games you listed, only one of them uses Physx.

you dont seems to realise the difference between Physx and Physics. Physx is Nvidia proprietry and very few games use it. the best in game physics are done with Havok.

 

[masterjaw]

I also agree with the sudden lag in framerate when using Physx even in an Nvidia card (I have a GTX 260). IMO, better framerates would give me better gameplay than lower framerates with added eye candy.

 

[4745454b]

L4D2 is a source game, and doesn't support PhysX. I suspect several others of those games don't support it as well. (I don't think GTA4 does either. I'd look them up, but not on the slow laptop.) This makes you seem like you don't know what your talking about when you claim X game does support it.

I actually happen to like PhysX, or at least the idea of PhysX. Offloading things from the CPU to make things faster and/or adding physical effects is great. But it needs to be more then just extra papers flying around in an alley, or bigger explosions. We need to have total control over our virtual environment, to be able to do things in games that are possible in real life. PhysX is a good start, but I'll be very disappointed if bigger bangs is as far as it gets.

 

[swifty_morgan]

Clouds, smoke, particles, explosions and chunks flying all over are/contain certain amounts of "physx" components.

none of those are even related to PhysX. they are physics, but done on other, open platform, software. usually Havok. Physx has so far allowed for nothing that Havok can't do better, and it leeches GPU power to do so.
when Physics calcualtions are done on a CPU, the performance hit is negligible. thus far, GPU accelerated physics (physx) has proved to cause massive performance loss.

Id love to see Physx attempt to handle volumetric clouds and smoke, or realistic terrain deformation. but it hasn't. and like i said, Havok can do it better anyway.

I know what you're getting at.... but.......... find the new nvidia physx trailer.... with the guy on the rocket sled..... I think hard ocp had it and maybe guru3d............ check out what I'm talking about........ it's all particle physx.....cant find the whole rocket sled thing but this might work.....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGCZtXg5LyA

 

[welshmousepk]

who cares? if its not an actual video game using physx to do something Havok can't, then its pointless.

hardware accelerated Physics is a great idea, but it needs to be an open platform. Physx is just a gimmick, and as long as nvidia keep it locked to their hardware it will never be more than that.

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

It's a non-issue.

PhysX is pretty weak, but if that's your bag, then get a cheap nVidia card to do it REGARDLESS of whether your graphics card is an ATi or nVidia, because adding the physX workload to any nVidia card robs it from its graphics ability, so the argument isn't really relevant to a graphics choice. Even in the early days when nVidia loved Havok-GPU and bad mouthed PhysX we all were talking about taking old cards and turning them into physics co-processors, not about adding the workload to main GPUs.

Want to play with physX features, then buy a GTS240/250 and add it to your rig for that purpose, however to me it still doesn't make it a compelling features until it actually does something more than debris physics. Until physX actually has an effect on game physics the CPU will remain the source of the best physics features in games.

 

[hell_storm2004]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PhysX
These are the games that have used PhysX. But we don't see too many successes, do we?

 

[randomizer]

Batman looked nice, and was probably the best showcase of what PhysX has to offer - smoke and paper. I prefer Havok if only because the implementation has always been better, albeit more crude. HL2 had physics that were actually useful, although it would have been better if Valve had tried something other than the see-saw thing. No physics engine is really "better" as far as what it looks like or what it can do, as this is down to each individual developer's implementation. Crysis and Ghostbusters both use their own engines (neither have Havok or PhysX or any GPU-accelerated physcis) and are quite impressive, although Crysis does have some bugginess to the physics that defies many laws.

PhsyX does what any other engine can do, but it kills your framerate as a bonus (unless you do what Ape said).

 

[outlw6669]

Well I have alot of games, the ones that I play the most or even mess around with physX are Crysis, Crysis WH, GTA4, Batman AA, Stalker, Far Cry2, Resident Evil5, l4d2, gears of war, cod MF2, COD5, COD4, and Fallout. Most of these games have a sense of physics but nothing like Crysis, Batman, and GTA4. Unfortunalty I cannot use PhysX anymore as my GPU is now a 5850 from a 9800gtx+. So I miss the option of using it over Havok.

I also have Dirt but only have tried it a few times. I downloaded it with my GPU5850.... as for the list fo gmaes I have, it goes on and on and on and on

Take a look at nVidia's List of GPU PhysX PC Games.
Of the games you play, only Batman AA uses GPU PhysX.
Of the games that Use GPU PhysX, only Batman AA has any noticeable improvements from PhysX.

As others have stated, there is nothing PhysX offers that Havoc or other CPU based physics engines can not match or top.
GPU processed physics was a nifty idea that just does not pan out.

Also, if you are using XP or Win 7, you can use your old nVidia GPU as a PhysX accelerator card.
Just be sure to use the 186 or older driver package.

 

[gamerk316]

Batman: AA is the only game where PhysX makes a real difference and that was mostly a design choice. That they didn't even enable AA on ATI cards(like every other game around) just shows how much the developers were in Nvidias pocket on that one.

Don't bring up that argument; The Unreal Engine [which Batman AA uses] is not CAPABLE of standard AA due to the way in processes/renders images. In this case, a special AA algorithm is needed that is not part of the DX API. NVIDIA helped the devs implement their proprietary AA algorithm that allows AA to be run on that game engine, and for whatever reason (Lazy Devs, Evil NVIDIA, or Clueless ATI, your choice), ATI's implementation didn't make it in. Other Unreal3 games have the same exact problem.

PhysX is by far a deaper API then Havok is. But because ATI refuses to support it, no dev will be crazy enoguh to create a physics engine built around the advanced functions [which will only work on NVIDIA cards]. So we get some cheezy effects tacked on.

We should be well past the point where bullet type x causes y damage; physics should have advanced to the point where you can track a bullets path, and when it hits an object, determine if it passes through, how much speed/force remains, and finally, how much damage it does to the object. No game in existence has even implemented this yet, let along the fully interactable environments that I dream of...From a gameplay perspective, Physics should be far more important then improving Rasterization is at this point...

We need a universal Physics API that can run far more advanced physics calculations in a parallel nature. As of today, PhysX is the closest we have to that API, and its gimped because AMD refuses to support it.

 

[randomizer]

We don't need another proprietary API like PhysX, we need something to be used that is integrated into existing APIs like DirectX, or an open API as you mentioned (although I think integrating it is better than having an API department store on your PC). Physics should always be done on the CPU too.

 

[outlw6669]

PhysX is by far a deaper API then Havok is. But because ATI refuses to support it, no dev will be crazy enoguh to create a physics engine built around the advanced functions [which will only work on NVIDIA cards]. So we get some cheezy effects tacked on.

My understanding was that nVidia will not allow an open source implementation of GPU PhysX, instead relying on a propitary CUDA implementation.
As CUDA is a closed nVida only standard, ATI is not able to support it.
I believe ATI has stated they would be happy to support an open standard implementation of PhysX (OpenCL or DirectCompute).

 

[hell_storm2004]

Ya. Developing something and not sharing is bad!

ATI should also develop something like PhysX and so in future games would have both implemented in it. So have a card of any brand and not worry about the eye candy!