The JD Posted May 11, 2006 Share Posted May 11, 2006 (edited) As everyone who's anyone probably knows, the next big things to hit the PC gaming world are Game Physics Cards. At the moment I have only heard about one such company that makes these cards and that is: AGEIA. I've already played Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter which supports this and even without the hardware, the software rendered a pretty good physics system. I was just wondering if the new GTA IV will use this technology. It's coming out two years from now and it also is having a graphics engine makeover so will R* juice it up some more by using the PhysX cards? Your thoughts and comments please... Edited May 11, 2006 by The JD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spaz The Great Posted May 11, 2006 Share Posted May 11, 2006 Well, we aren't ENTIRELY certain it will be released for PC. I mean, we can pretty much assume it will, because all the others were, but we aren't positive that it will be. Besides, what type of improvement does those cards do, anyways? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 11, 2006 Share Posted May 11, 2006 Well if it's 2 years until release then R* won't use it for GTA IV, simply because GTAIV for the PC is likely to also be 2 years away. It won't be ready for them to develop for it. You can be sure GTA IV is going to require a decent graphics card anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The JD Posted May 11, 2006 Author Share Posted May 11, 2006 (edited) Well if it's 2 years until release then R* won't use it for GTA IV, simply because GTAIV for the PC is likely to also be 2 years away.It won't be ready for them to develop for it. Ahh you misunderstood! The card is already out. I meant that GTA IV is coming out in 2 years for the PC. R* had better not leave us PC fans in the dust. It will be the end of GTA Modding as we know it! Unless of course someone actually manages to make a mod for a PS3 or Xbox 360 although the probability of this happening is very low indeed. Does anyone actually have any evidence (Hard or Circumstantial) to suggest that a PC release of GTA IV is unlikely? Spaz: The benefits are huge! I mean, imagine completely destructible 3D environments, a feature that has been posted on the GTA IV wishlist a million times. Then comes better car physics, airplane handling in extreme weather conditions etc. Just check the website out. Its got an entire section on the benefits. Edited May 11, 2006 by The JD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 11, 2006 Share Posted May 11, 2006 Oh ok my bad, yeah well that would be great if GTA IV uses it. And I think Spaz was just making a point that it isn't confirmed for PC yet. I'm pretty sure it will come out for it though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris82 Posted May 11, 2006 Share Posted May 11, 2006 Yeah, the card basically allows for insane physics because the load is taken off of the graphics card/cpu. I personally don't like them. Just another card to buy and fill a slot with. I doubt GTA4 will support it. Half-Life 2, which is known for its physics, is not going to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The JD Posted May 11, 2006 Author Share Posted May 11, 2006 I didn't know about HL2 not supporting it. Maybe they decided taht the physics system was good enough as it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slayer Posted May 12, 2006 Share Posted May 12, 2006 Unless you didn't know, all those "improved physics" are just eye-candys. They don't provide any real phisycs. That card just adds more effects to the game, but they don't influence the gameplay. Example: A grenade explodes and deals 100HP damage to all units in an area. Without PhysX card, you just see a normal, "classical explosion". With that card, you'll see a grenade exploding and lots of clusters appearing, smoke, bigger explosions, objects tearing appart... However, that's all that card does. It doesn't calculate the speed, weight, or damage caused by every cluster. Those clusters won't damage nearby objects, they'll just dissapear when they make a contact with an obstacle (or dissapear in the air). Still, this looks good, but the card costs about 250$, and as an alternative you can use Havok FX engine (software renderer) that is free for all nVidia users with new graphics cards. So I think it would be better to buy another graphics card and put them together into SLI, where one GPU makes physics caluculations and another renders picture. If a game doesn't support Havok FX, then you can run a game with better quality. Software wins among hardware! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Righty Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 I don't think that will be a good idea - too much extra money added to a computer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pyronoodle Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 (edited) Example: A grenade explodes and deals 100HP damage to all units in an area. Without PhysX card, you just see a normal, "classical explosion". With that card, you'll see a grenade exploding and lots of clusters appearing, smoke, bigger explosions, objects tearing appart... However, that's all that card does. It doesn't calculate the speed, weight, or damage caused by every cluster. Those clusters won't damage nearby objects, they'll just dissapear when they make a contact with an obstacle (or dissapear in the air). Actually, the reason these clusters would appear is because your graphics card(s) do not have to handle the physics side of gameplay, allowing it/them to produce more realistic graphics, because the physx card does that. However, you need compatible games for this to be realised... Edited June 14, 2006 by Noz51 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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