Flashpoint 2 And The PPU

Deleted.

[gandalf the white]

Reading it...

but I don't see how it works?

so it's not replacing the CPU, but it'l be a piece of hardware that will take the task of calculating physics instead of the CPU?

Sounds... promosing http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif , but won't this mean motherboards will have to be adapted? or will it use PCI-X ? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif

[MATRA]

As I said in other threads Im looking foward to this, but AGEIA has to work hard with developers for the PPU API be acepted.

Personaly, I think the future game of BIS is the ideal game for all the AGEIA´s features, but only time will tell if this new addin card have the sucess that 3DFX had when they lunch the Voodoo cards.

Another thing that bother me, is the price tag between 250€ and 299€, its a lot for something that totaly new to the world of gaming.

[MATRA]

Quote[/b] ]so it's not replacing the CPU, but it'l be a piece of hardware that will take the task of calculating physics instead of the CPU?

Thats exactly what it does http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif .

AGEIA’s PhysX is the world’s first Physics Processing Unit (PPU), which offloads software physics processing from central processing units and graphics processing units to it. The architecture of the PhysX PPU is tailored for multi-threaded processing of vertexes, which allows game creators to develop detailed, soft and precise animation and simulation of movements, hair, clothing, liquids, fluids and other. Currently AGEIA PhysX is the world’s first and only dedicated physics processing unit.

Deleted.

[MATRA]

Quote[/b] ]Meanwhile i'm thinking of bumping up my GeForce 5700LE 128MB to a 6800GT 256MB AGP just for Flashpoint 2. Excellent.

When the game arrives the 6800GT will be a "old" card.

The G70, the new nVIDIA grafics card will be presented in less than a mounth http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

So if you are upgrading just for the new game, its not worth it, you can buy a card a lot better later for the price you ll bought a 6800GT now

Deleted.

[MATRA]

One presumath that you are talking about card with 512MB of GDDR3 RAM persay? Expensive they sound, a good card i would like. All for Operation Flashpoint 2. I think i'll start saving now. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif
GeForce 7800 GTX (G70) Specs

0.11 micron process TSMC
430Mhz core / 1.4GHz 256MB GDDR3 memory
256-bit memory interface
38.4GB/s memory bandwidth
10.32Bps Fill Rate
860M vertices/second
24 pixels per clock
400MHz RAMDACs
NVIDIA CineFX 4.0 engine
Intellisample 4.0 technology
64-bit FP texture filtering & blending
NVIDIA SLI Ready (7800 GTX only)
DX 9.0 / SM 3.0 & OpenGL 2.0 supported
G70 comes with 3 models; GTX, GT and Standard

256Mg http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif Curse later the 512 will apear too.

[gandalf the white]

They also said there would be a 512 MB for the Geforce 6 series... quite frankly, I don't believe there will...

Matra, I also don't see why you are posting your system specs in your signature... does it help anybody? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif

[MATRA]

Quote[/b] ]Matra, I also don't see why you are posting your system specs in your signature... does it help anybody? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif

Ur right Gandaf, http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif , but in thw foruns I usualy am we do this a lot, because it help here I simply didnt know what to put in there, when I remenber something Ill change it.

[BlackScorpion]

My upgrades before OFP2 (all pretty darn shure - had this PC for 1.5 years, without upgrades) include, and are propably limited to...

New CG.
New harddrive.
More RAM.
New screen (very propaby).
New CPU (though AMD Athlon 3000+ is still good, right?).

[Heatseeker]

Too expensive, they better drop the price significantly because not many are willing to pay that much just for physics, plus if it doesnt become standard no one will develop anything with it, though it sounds like the perfect solution for large scale games such has the OPF sequel.
I think this will be forgoten with the introduction of more powerfull cpu's, or even multiple cpu systems, we dont know.
Not everyone builds their own custom machine or choose their parts, i dont see Dell's being supplied with this kind of hardware or games having a 300€ physics hardware piece in their system requirements, i dont think it will go far http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif .

[Batstat]

... I think this will be forgoten with the introduction of more powerfull cpu's, or even multiple cpu systems, we dont know...

I hope u are wrong, this wil boost the gaming experince beyond our wildest dream. If needet I wil eat bread, drink water for a month to save moeny for this chip. Finaly somthing worty to spend money on http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif


If semiconductor company Ageia has its way, the PPU (physics processing unit) will soon join the CPU and GPU as another hardware component that has a major effect on gaming performance. Current CPUs are only powerful enough to support 30 to 40 physical objects that you can interact with onscreen, but systems with a PPU add-in card will be able to support more than 30,000 objects on screen

http://www.gamespot.com/news/2005/03/08/news_6119896.html

OK "If .. has its way", Sweeney is not sure he either.

But look at the image on Ageia home site:
http://www.ageia.com/img/novodex/novodex_center.jpg

You can't do this realtime and ingame. Maybe if you drive your car by your self and in real life http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

The SDK utilize multiprocessing system. Acording to my memory BIS has not promised support for multiprocessing system yet, so the dev team get this also for "free".

Anyway and sadly, for OFPII I can't see how BIS could switch to use this PPU now. Its to late in the dev cycle I think.

I'm already looking forward to OFPIV  http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[RUKH]

I´ve been waiting for something like the PPU since forever...
Just think of the ballistics, driving and flight calculations it can do.

(I heard this on another forum so it´s just from the top of my head)
Think of it like this, the cpu wouldnt be a very effective way of rendering speculars and bumpmappings would it...just as bad would it handle physics.

All it does is streamlines all calculations with a dedicated unit build for the job with special tools inside.

[Batstat]

Hopefully the waiting are soon over.

To sucseed Ageia only need one good game to sell a lot. Then all gamers wil blow the brain out, and scream for more. The ball wil start rolling.

In OFP there are a lot of gas station scattered around. Think of it, you break the tank, gasoline wil flow out, following the terrain! Then you ignite it, he he. Hopefully people stop doing this in real life when they can simulate it ingames. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif

Maybe Moors law stil wil came true, measured in game realisme.  http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[Heatseeker]

Yeah but another expensive piece of hardware to upgrade every now and then, more driver updates, more compatbility issues, problems... i dont know, i believe some time from now CPU's will have the juice for it, i do see how this could save cpu in OPF sequel but i dont see many people paying 300€ for this, maybe if the price drops http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif .

[Batstat]

Yeah 300 Euro is a lot of money. I tried to google for the price of firct 3dFX voodoo cards, but did not find it for sure. I was not among the first to buy it either. But I think the first 3D GPU cards was pretty expensive also. If the PPU chip become reasonable popular, the price wil drop fast. If ATI and Nvida also se this as a new marked it wil drop faster.

The fact that the SDK help out using more than one CPU, wil maybe push dev teams to use it. How many among us, was happy with software rendring, we wantet the real thing.
I'm not quit sure about the multiprocesing part and using the SDK. Maybe you have the use the chip also, to utilize the multiprocessing part. The white papers are not crystal clear in all aspect.

[gandalf the white]

oh ffs, you all want every brick from a house to crumble when you fire an AT round at it, but you're not willing to pay for it? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif

I agree it's an outrageous price, but we're going to step into a new era of gaming here! you'll have to pay it one way or another (invest more in a CPU).

When allot of games support it, i'll save money for it http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[Daddl]

The problem with this card is that it's proprietary technology. Until M$ starts supporting this directly in a future DirectX version it will be expensive and not very widespread. Only then will gfxcard or motherboard manufacturers start implementing something like that in their designs.

Don't get me wrong: it's a great step forward, just as the old Voodoo cards were.Nevertheless it will just go the same way as the glide api: down the drain as soon as the 'big ones'™ start making their own standard.

[Kegetys]

I find it a bit odd that there are very little technical details available about the whole thing, the "white papers" they have on their site are mostly just PR talk. I couldn't even find a document that would say anything about what kind of license the Novodex SDK is available under, is it free to use or do developers have to pay a big load of cash to use it? How exactly does the chip work, what does it do in hardware, and why is the chip locked into that one single SDK?

It's a nice idea, but something like it would need to be alot cheaper, and I very much doubt that you could actually get what people seem to be dreaming about with it. If you have 100 000 bricks in your game world, it isn't enough to just calculate the physics for them, you need to render them too and that means alot of work for the CPU and video card. If they do manage to get support for it and make some "cool" demos then maybe something like this will be mainstream in 2-4 years, but I doubt "OFP2" would need to worry about it. I havent seen a game that would properly use these "advanced" physics yet anyway (Well, Stair/Truck Dismount (http://jet.ro/dismount/) maybe) even though you can do quite nice things already using the CPU alone.

[gandalf the white]

Kegety's, in Farcry I have seen screenshots (playable) where they rendered over 10 000 animated objects, I don't recall exact numbers, but "17 000" jumps to mind... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif

[Scrub]

From Tom's Hardware Guide:

Quote[/b] ]Asus first to integrate Ageia's physics chip


May 17, 2005 - 20:29 EST

Asus and Ageia reached an agreement to use the PhysX processor on add-in boards. According to a statement released by Ageia, Asus will develop boards using the chip and bring commercial products to market within this year. Further details such as features and pricing have not been released.


Link.. nothing more (http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20050517_202925.html)

Mainstream Physics, anyone  http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

From Ageia's site:


Quote[/b] ]Add-in Board Vendors
ASUS Computer: Will develop and market add-in boards with the AGEIA PhysX processor, the world’s first and only dedicated physics processing unit. Products are expected within 2005, coinciding with the release of popular game titles incorporating AGEIA physics technology.
Console Manufacturers
PlayStation©3: AGEIA is developing powerful physics-based middleware for the PlayStation 3 based on AGEIA’s NovodeX physics software. As the only multithreaded physics software in the industry, AGEIA’s NovodeX physics software is uniquely suited to harness the new capabilities of next-generation game consoles such as the PlayStation 3.
Game Developers/Publishers
Atari: Using AGEIA’s NovodeX physics software in Dragonshard™, a real-time strategy game based on the Dungeons & Dragons® universe created by Wizards of the Coast.
Atari’s Shiny Entertainment Studio: Creator of Enter the Matrix™using AGEIA’s NovodeX physics software for physics-based martial arts action and gunplay, as well as physics-defying stunts and aerobatics in upcoming game titles.
Big Huge Games: Targeting the AGEIA PhysX processor for hardware acceleration of upcoming real-time strategy game Rise of Nations:Rise of Legends.
Bongfish Interactive Entertainment: Incorporating AGEIA’s pioneering physics technology into snowboarding game Stoked Rider featuring Tommy Brunner.
Cryptic Studios: Source code agreement to use AGEIA’s NovodeX physics software as core physics engine for upcoming City of Villains and other next-generation titles.
PerfectPlay Entertainment: Building first game Metathrone Project from ground up with AGEIA physics technologies.
Phantagram Co.: Korean developer and creator of Kingdom Under Fire series using AGEIA’s NovodeX physics software for its upcoming title for the Xbox 360.
Ritual Entertainment: Source code agreement enabling Ritual to integrate AGEIA technologies, such as AGEIA’s NovodeX physics software, into their own core technology.
Spark Unlimited: New Pandora game will list AGEIA PhysX processor as minimum system requirement as part of larger technical and marketing partnership.
Ubisoft:Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon 3 is leveraging the unique multithreaded capabilities of AGEIA’s physics software to harness the power of next-generation consoles.


Link (http://www.ageia.com/pr_05182005a.html)

ME LIKEY!

Edit: added info

[RUKH]

small clip from Simhq e3 review showing some short ppu action.
http://www.simhq.com/_technology/technology_053e.html
(look under technology)

[gandalf the white]

yeeeees http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I'm sure the left one is fake, but right... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wow_o.gif *wants PPU* http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[Heatseeker]

Ah! and how will this work in MP may i ask? Wont this increase data transfer and cause major lag, desinc and latency problems? Or are these abundant physics stuff client side? Even so it would still increase data transfers betwean players and server and back to players considerably, no http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif .

[Korax]

Ah! and how will this work in MP may i ask? Wont this increase data transfer and cause major lag, desinc and latency problems? Or are these abundant physics stuff client side? Even so it would still increase data transfers betwean players and server and back to players considerably, no http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif .
Multiplayer physics will probably be a dumbed-down version of the singleplayer physics to reduce traffic, but with the same end effect.

[Tigershark_BAS]

I don't get it...so what will the CPU be doing while the PPu is working.

Isn't this what the CPU is designed for? Isn't it better to simply bet on new CPU technology like dual core processors rather than invest in a piece of technology which may only have limited application, will risk not being accepted and may become outdated with new 64bit dual core processors for home use about 2-3 years away?

[simulacra]

The CPU's main job will be AI and coordination etc.

[Antichrist]

The CPU's main job will be AI and coordination etc.
I won't be surprised if someone invents new APU (AI Processing Unit) card within couple of years! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[MattXR]

im confuesed.. i want a super computer http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/sad_o.gif

[simulacra]

I won't be surprised if someone invents new APU (AI Processing Unit) card within couple of years! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif
Well, we ARE heading towards having networked computing in our homes, it's been used in different industrial applications for a long time.
The upside is that you get more processing power since you distribute the workload, the downside is the cost and the need for faster buses...

[Scrub]

(Antichrist @<hidden> May 24 2005,14:17)
I won&#39;t be surprised if someone invents new APU (AI Processing Unit) card within couple of years&#33;


If the workload of the CPU keeps shifting away, IT will be the APU. It&#39;s nothing for it (or better yet, the bus itself) to shift skeletal/particle data to the PPU. Lotsa cycles left over for AI to better shoot you with. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/ghostface.gif

[Dwarden]

for me its important how much of AGEIA PPU can be used for other physical engines (Havok , Meqon, Tokamak, ODE etc) ...

i know that it was "discussed" but that was and is still part of rumours ... only time will show truth ...

for Novodex itself i think it will be successfull because Unreal Engine 3 is definitely good runner ...

[gandalf the white]

If they use the PPU, then we could open up a .50 on a group of soldiers and have a REAL mess http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif .

that would be like... so... totally... fucked up http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif (Me like&#33; http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif )

[Heatseeker]

Ah&#33; and how will this work in MP may i ask? Wont this increase data transfer and cause major lag, desinc and latency problems? Or are these abundant physics stuff client side? Even so it would still increase data transfers betwean players and server and back to players considerably, no http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif .
Multiplayer physics will probably be a dumbed-down version of the singleplayer physics to reduce traffic, but with the same end effect.
Another good reason not to invest 300€ on this i guess, ive heard BF2 features decent physics and ragdolls, for now game2 is far from being done, by the time it comes out CPU will most likely be up for the job of handling decent enough physics, i know this could save developers precious coding time but if it wont even work decently in MP im not interested. Imagine a huge map with alot of players, helicopters, tanks, AT launchers, lotsa stuff being blown up, coliding, really big data transfers, i wouldnt like this to limit the gameplay size, # of players and performance http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/sad_o.gif , i see this doing some cool stuff in small games but not really worth it for game2, im not convinced yet...

[gandalf the white]

stuff like limbs being seporated, or those VERY small wooden thingy&#39;s (read: anything non-lethal) could just be calculated on machines that have the hardware... the game already sends the data of every bullet, etc, so that wouln&#39;t be a problem.

now, about the .50 idea.... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[MATRA]

Quote[/b] ]WE WROTE a couple times before about some wizardry called a PPU (PhysX Processing Unit) and now we&#39;ve seen the actual hardware in action. Last time we saw this marchitectural miracle we saw the card but all the demos we saw were software rendered.

This time, demos were rendered in real time with all the fancy physics detailed and effects on.

We have to say that seeing hardware in action was breathtaking and we do believe that this is the next step in game evolution.

This hardware add-in card presents 40,000 bones (rigid bodies) on screen at a time, while even Dual core AMD or Intel CPUs can calculate just few hundreds. When it comes to Fluids, PPU can render even more rigid bodies. Your game will look like never before.

AGEIA says sample cards will be ready in Q3. Actually, hardware is ready even now but AEGIA wants to wait for content before launching. The cards should be available in retail sometimes in Q4.

A company spokesman said that in retail those cards should cost between 250 and &#036;300. WE understand Asus will be one of the first companies who will offer those cards in retail.

Its interesting to notice that many of the AGEIA executives comes from 3DFX and those guys sure know how hard it was to convince people to use 3D hardware back in 1995. Now AGEIA has to convince people that games need special hardware to accelerate the Physics in games.

One thing is certain, when you use see this hardware in action you will be convinced. Just a fair warning, it will be very hard to see this hardware in action just by looking at the pictures, you need to watch the video files.

With developers such is Epic, investors such as TSMC and Bank of America, this technology should have a very bright and successful future. µ
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=23468

This is getting more interesting each day, 3DFX engineers hum... sounds good to me http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Too bad the price is still in the same range, but as all the new HW goodies it will drop.

I hope game 2 will have support, at least we could choose if we want to use it or use the traditional physics of the CPU. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

Preview: http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=140

[shinRaiden]

Stretching a CPU&#39;s logic to 64bits does not open more lanes on the highway for more entities, it only allows for each lane to be wider. Dual cores do not totally fix that either, as they&#39;re essentially two paralell - but independent - roads.

What Ageia can do on their own silicon is do something totally different. They can design a custom ASIC that is specifically tuned to chunk a massive number of similar particle calculations. Appparently they&#39;re just in the generic build-to-order ASIC stage, and haven&#39;t gone and done anything truely insane like a vast array of vector-matrixed RISC processors etc. If I read the process correctly though, it&#39;s operations like this that Cell really shines in, that might be an option down the road.

There&#39;s two parts to the system however, the physics SDK and the PPU. If you want to use the PPU you have to use the SDK, but the SDK is one of many options in the SDK market if you do not plan to use the PPU. Haven&#39;t seen the commerical terms either, but I assume that it&#39;s inline with the other standard offerings out there. You can get a preview copy of the SDK for the cost of a name and email address registration, neither I nor my spam filter have recieved one hit or anything as a result.

Speaking of SDK&#39;s though, BIS has been using a licensed SDK from Immersion for some functionality in OFP and VBS, although I&#39;m not sure that they take full advantage of all the libs offered in that SDK. M&#036;&#39;s Dependency Walker doesn&#39;t show a whole lot of hooks going into the ifc22.dll.

[RUKH]

New PPU clip, the plane crash at the end is soooo nice http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

http://www.fz.se/filarkiv/?s=&p=mov/physx/

[gandalf the white]

the boxes looked a bit buggy, but the rest was too nice to be true... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

I really hope OFP2 will have this... *imagines opening .50 on a group of bushes* http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[Daniel]

It would be great, if not a little unsettling, to actually hesitate before you ripped a group of infantry apart with an M2 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rock.gif http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif

[Antichrist]

There&#39;s two parts to the system however, the physics SDK and the PPU. If you want to use the PPU you have to use the SDK, but the SDK is one of many options in the SDK market if you do not plan to use the PPU. Haven&#39;t seen the commerical terms either, but I assume that it&#39;s inline with the other standard offerings out there. You can get a preview copy of the SDK for the cost of a name and email address registration, neither I nor my spam filter have recieved one hit or anything as a result.
I believe that would be the thing to kill that PPU eventually. Even if it is extremely successful at launch. Not supporting other physics SDK is an extremely stupid idea. And by the looks of it they&#39;re going down that road. I am not really sure what those guys are thinking. They&#39;re supposed to be experienced executives who worked on 3dfx. I mean, come on. Don&#39;t they realise that if they start supporting ANY physics SDK that wants to be supported and drop price down to 100-150 USD they will make way bigger profit than with their current "business plan".

[gandalf the white]

Maybe the PPU guys know something we don&#39;t?

If OFP2 supported the PPU technology I&#39;d bet you would scream like a little girl and run for the shop http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge_o.gif .

The price is a bit high, but like I said: we are entering a new era of gaming&#33; 35 000 objects, compared to the couple hundred objects that most CPU&#39;s can currently draw, is a huge leap, and will change the way games are made forever http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif .

Bunker busters, blowing up a dam, once it sounded too far away for any system to handle, now, we&#39;re &#036; 270 away from it&#33;

[shinRaiden]

New PPU clip, the plane crash at the end is soooo nice http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

http://www.fz.se/filarkiv/?s=&p=mov/physx/
The issues seen in the video are due to the game, not the physics system. It&#39;s played back in slow motion so you can see the effects, and while the weights are obviously not accurate, that&#39;s not the point, the movement is.

[Hidden]

I for one welcome the PPU. It is the next logical step in games and simulations, really. As for CPU&#39;s, how great is the progress in CPU developement the past couple of years? Not that great. The PC that I own now, I put together some 2 years ago, using a P4 2.8. Today&#39;s most efficiant Intel CPU&#39;s with a pricetag you and me can afford, is a 3.66. Not much of a difference, really. The focus has been moved onto the GPU for some years now, and it has become insanely powerful and so hot, you can forget about heating expenses during winter (just close the window every now and then) <- joke.

When I first read about the PPU, my initial thoughts were those of a madman who finally realize his fantasy world is real. Or to put it in other words: I had a feeling all along it could come some day.

I welcome the PPU with open arms, and if I can afford it when it is out, I would like to buy one, too. Of course they will be pretty expensive in the beginning; all new technology cost an arm and leg until it goes mass production. Then prices will go down.

Microsoft will be interested in this, I cannot see any valid reason why not. Anything that makes the game and entertainment scene move forward should be of interest to them.

[shinRaiden]

There&#39;s two parts to the system however, the physics SDK and the PPU. If you want to use the PPU you have to use the SDK, but the SDK is one of many options in the SDK market if you do not plan to use the PPU. Haven&#39;t seen the commerical terms either, but I assume that it&#39;s inline with the other standard offerings out there. You can get a preview copy of the SDK for the cost of a name and email address registration, neither I nor my spam filter have recieved one hit or anything as a result.
I believe that would be the thing to kill that PPU eventually. Even if it is extremely successful at launch. Not supporting other physics SDK is an extremely stupid idea. And by the looks of it they&#39;re going down that road. I am not really sure what those guys are thinking. They&#39;re supposed to be experienced executives who worked on 3dfx. I mean, come on. Don&#39;t they realise that if they start supporting ANY physics SDK that wants to be supported and drop price down to 100-150 USD they will make way bigger profit than with their current "business plan".
the optimizations for the hardware accelerator is done in the physics libs, not in the end product, although there would need to be an api method to detect and compensate for the varying physics capabilities.

licensing the sdks gives them direct revenue regardless of ppu sales, while ppu sales are limited by market ability to support the cost and the revenue sharing with other entities in the channel. supporting other sdks on the ppu would theoretically increase low-margin chip sales, but negatively impact high-margin sdk licenses.

conversely, vendors such as microsoft (directx), nvidia (cg, nv_gl_extensions), and others provide their sdks free of charge to promote usage of their core product. ageia&#39;s in a bit of a sticky spot here, novodex is nowhere near being the incumbent physics sdk like others mentioned here. but you have to use novodex to use the ppu. to change a system in development is a non-trivial matter. ofp1/vbs1 use a partial package from immersion "we sued sony" fame, and unless jordan man derek is hiding something mind boggling juicey about the physics system, it&#39;s rather difficult to explain to the accounting dept why you would want to abandon an expensive licensed lib, splurge on another, and force a major calendar slippage, unless jmd&#39;s already been using novodex for some time...

[Tigershark_BAS]

Found this today. John Carmack&#39;s take on the PPU at Quakecon.
Physics acceleration&#39;s prospects

Carmack said he considers the prospects for the upcoming physics acceleration chip on the PC iffy, because physics presents a very fundamental problem that graphics doesn&#39;t have: it isn&#39;t easily scalable for level of detail. Either an object in the game is a true physics object with which other objects can interact, or it isn&#39;t. Carmack predicted this constraint would lead to a number of physics-accelerated titles where acceleration affects only elements, such as flowing water, that are peripheral to the core gameplay experience.

Another of his concerns about physics acceleration was speed, not in the sense of peak processing throughput but in terms of the immediacy of real-time interactions. Carmack recalled that the first pre-3dfx graphics chips made Quake feel slower due to lag between user input and visual output. He worried that the first generation of physics chips could cause similar problems, leaving us with games that are fragile and slow. He also happily conceded that he is more of a graphics guy than a physics guy, and admitted that his worries about the bar being raised in physics are probably similar to the worries other have had about his own standard-setting work in graphics.

[Chipper]

Flashpoint 2 and its websote was removed from flashpoint1985.com&#33; They are maybe changing it to look kickass and more info http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wow_o.gif

[Ryujin]

Check out these fluids&#33; HOLY @<hidden>&#036;#%&#33;

http://dlx.gamespot.com/pc/eyeofthestorm/moreinfo_6125715.html

[SgtH3nry3]

for me its important how much of AGEIA PPU can be used for other physical engines (Havok , Meqon, Tokamak, ODE etc) ...

i know that it was "discussed" but that was and is still part of rumours ... only time will show truth ...

for Novodex itself i think it will be successfull because Unreal Engine 3 is definitely good runner ...
Yeah but I hope that Havok dies&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;

ODE and Meqon sound great though, but a competitor like NovodeX which also is powered by the Open Dynamics Framework (OpenDE is too) and also features real-time physics calculation (like Meqon does)...

Next to that its fluid simulation looks promising, and metal bending too...

Full-Scene Dynamic Destruction is the best though http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif:D

VBS1 has Dynamic Destruction too but not as advanced as this so I&#39;d say... Bring on the PhysX PPU and NovodeX (and of course the Game2 physics with full PPU support)...


Quote[/b] ]The upside is that you get more processing power since you distribute the workload, the downside is the cost and the need for faster buses... Not necessary, the current PCI bus and PCI-X bus can handle it perfectly.

Maybe the good &#39;ol ISA bus would be quick enough...

Transfer wouldn&#39;t be that huge, it is only about the coordinates of the bones of an object.
Nothing more... Maybe we could drop Pixelshader on water too, since the PPU does the terrain leveling of the water surface http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif:D

[Kegetys]

The commercial license cost of the Novodex SDK is said to be 50 000 dollars for one title on one platform, which is quite expensive considering the SDK itself is nothing that special compared to the other choices. For BIS that money would propably be better used to hire a extra coder or an artist to work on more important things...


Quote[/b] ]Speaking of SDK&#39;s though, BIS has been using a licensed SDK from Immersion for some functionality in OFP and VBS, although I&#39;m not sure that they take full advantage of all the libs offered in that SDK. M&#036;&#39;s Dependency Walker doesn&#39;t show a whole lot of hooks going into the ifc22.dll.

The IFC22.dll is the Immersion Foundation Classes library, and as far as I know it only does force feedback effects.

[SpecOp9]

I think BIS will have no problem with their own physics engine in this game.  They do everything on their own from scratch.

This PhysX engine seems like it&#39;s more for games like Halo, Half Life, and other shooters.  Using this for Game2 would be pointless, knowing Game2&#39;s architecture is going to be more different than any other games we have seen.

It would be like making a Super Mario engine where it looks pretty when you collect a star, and using that engine for Doom 4.  Just doesn&#39;t seem right.

Game2 should have its own coded game, with its own coded physics, with it&#39;s own everything. And, that&#39;s the way Game2 will likely turn out in the end.

[SgtH3nry3]

I think BIS will have no problem with their own physics engine in this game.  They do everything on their own from scratch.

This PhysX engine seems like it&#39;s more for games like Halo, Half Life, and other shooters.  Using this for Game2 would be pointless, knowing Game2&#39;s architecture is going to be more different than any other games we have seen.

It would be like making a Super Mario engine where it looks pretty when you collect a star, and using that engine for Doom 4.  Just doesn&#39;t seem right.

Game2 should have its own coded game, with its own coded physics, with it&#39;s own everything.  And, that&#39;s the way Game2 will likely turn out in the end.
So basically you want to have 20-30 objects real-time in a huge island of 25km˛ with over 400.000 objects by itself.

That means lag, unless the physics would be as crappy as Op. Flashpoint...
Which means loosing potential buyers.

I think BIS would have to make their physics engine compatible with the PhysX PPU.

I mean not using fancy NovodeX features just like in Meqon or Havok ordinary rigid body simulations.
But not like in Flashpoint.

Your comparison isn&#39;t right, look at Age of Empires 3 and Company of Heroes, totally different games also Havok physics powered and look what the effect is&#33;

Totally different (in a positive manner) compared to the ancient gameplay of Age of Empires 2.

And PhysX isn&#39;t a engine but a processing unit http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif next time look what you are facing http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

And coded physics? :S do you know what a physics engine is and how to make one?
You can make a physics engine but coding it?

[shinRaiden]

Found this today. John Carmack&#39;s take on the PPU at Quakecon.
Physics acceleration&#39;s prospects

Carmack said he considers the prospects for the upcoming physics acceleration chip on the PC iffy, because physics presents a very fundamental problem that graphics doesn&#39;t have: it isn&#39;t easily scalable for level of detail. Either an object in the game is a true physics object with which other objects can interact, or it isn&#39;t. Carmack predicted this constraint would lead to a number of physics-accelerated titles where acceleration affects only elements, such as flowing water, that are peripheral to the core gameplay experience.

Another of his concerns about physics acceleration was speed, not in the sense of peak processing throughput but in terms of the immediacy of real-time interactions. Carmack recalled that the first pre-3dfx graphics chips made Quake feel slower due to lag between user input and visual output. He worried that the first generation of physics chips could cause similar problems, leaving us with games that are fragile and slow. He also happily conceded that he is more of a graphics guy than a physics guy, and admitted that his worries about the bar being raised in physics are probably similar to the worries other have had about his own standard-setting work in graphics.
Well, I hate to be the one to throw pointy barbs at John Carmack of all people, but here goes.

First off, consider the analogies to graphics systems design. CG fixed on triangular polygons eons ago. No matter how &#39;smooth&#39; something maybe, it&#39;s still triangles. Even nurbs, which are merely another process to ultimately arrive at triangular polys. With the understanding that virtual worlds are made up of polys instead of other surfaces in RL, that changes the whole mindset of systems programming.

Look at really old games. There&#39;s the very basic triangular constructs. From those elemental levels, everything now is just padding more triangles onto the base. The key point though is you&#39;re starting from the minimal LOD, and stepping up to the maximum LOD.

Same thing goes for vegetation. The most complex systems modeled on L-System mathematical constructs merely consist of polygonal and vector subdivision from basic to complex.

Physics on the other hand is still thought through top-down. Think of a RL dust cloud, with each particle of dust as a seperate indexed particle. How do you determine which to cull, how to cull, and how to even process something at that scale? There&#39;s your problem, you&#39;re taking it backwards.

This is not supercomputing, this is gaming. As such, not only can we look at things differently, imho to some extent we should.

Instead, what I think should be done is simple expand existing models. For example, moving bodies have two vectors, inertial and moving. Those are fairly simple to model vectors, that you can then make more complicated in terms of time and space domain LOD&#39;ing.

Fluid physics such as particles, air, and fluids can be done similarly. Simply define some basic models - like a mass with various types of simple vectors, then set parameters to control the scaling. Do you need to do full particle modeling on every water drop in a river? Absolutely not. Make the river as a model, then decide how many water drops you are willing to support and in what circumstances.

Now speed is a different subject. Using the traditional model of input -> physics -> visualization, you can never crunch physics fast enough because it is inherently late in that model. This is why physics modeling is much better suited to dual-core or multi-sub-core systems like Cell. A drop-in card with a chip like Aegia&#39;s would help, but syncronization could be tricky.

The point is that physics has to be done and calculated before the graphics can be accurately rendered, and the rendering and input need to be concurrent to be realistic and not laggy. So in that sense, there needs to be some banging of heads against the wall to figure out how and where to crunch the physics to have the results all ready to go for input and visualization.

BIS&#39;s tendency has been to do everything in-house, including graphics and physics and netcode and what-not. I suppose that would preclude them licensing some external libs, and tbh, integrating external libs of that sort can be as much pain as it is a help.

HOWEVER, massive physics is still in very infant stages in gaming. If we immediately demand physics performance levels comparable to the current state of PC 3D graphics - which have taken 20 years and countless billions of dollars of development and sales - that&#39;s shaking the baby, and we&#39;d get a lot worse in the process.

[quiet_man]

[quote=Tigershark_BAS,Aug. 16 2005,04:09]Found this today. John Carmack&#39;s take on the PPU at Quakecon.
...
- that&#39;s shaking the baby, and we&#39;d get a lot worse in the process.
agreed on this, simulating the destructing of a few objects within an optimized environment is one thing, maybe suited to some FPS or wathever games. A full scale tank/Infantry battle in a city is something different and even if the PPU could handle it, graphics and gamelogic would be overloaded by change of the battlefield.

The destruction modeling the demos show is mostly eye candy. IMHO improved simulation of objects that are already single graphical/gameplay instances would be more helpfull for OPF style games.

e.g. how does the PPU support simulating a tank suspension or bullet flight? Calculation of correct bullet flight with penetration and deflection at surfaces or simulating the effect of a single tank wheel destroyed would improve the simulation without overloading other parts. IF the PPU supports this better than a multicore cpu and people are willing to pay the price.

on part of eyecandy it might be usefull to integrate PPU functions at the graphic cards&#33;?

quiet_man

[Scrub]

Sorry, I put this in NGG2 Suggestions - game physics, but it seems the actual discussion was here.

I hope this isn&#39;t pushing a dead horse, but I thought you all might want to see these two pieces of info.

BFG to retail a range of AGEIA boards (http://ageia.vnewscenter.com/press.jsp?id=1125064384975)
AGEIA acquires Meqon (http://ageia.vnewscenter.com/press.jsp?id=1125064384972)

(I&#39;ll delete the origional post)

[Tigershark_BAS]

Shin and quiet man. Enjoyed reading your posts&#33;

Nice to have great discussion on such topics http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[blackjack[VS]]

couple of days ago i got an email from a teacher recruting plp with interest in 3dsmax,photoshop,3dsound,c++,and other mechanical/technical specs.so today i was invited to a kind of project briefing.i&#39;v been 1h watching and listening a master degree student presenting both Novodex and Ogre 3dengine. i was amazed with both, and just cant wait to start working with that team. after reading in Ogre website (free open source 3d engine btw) i presume that is out of question for a game like ofp... but for other 3d aplications it&#39;s a blast&#33;
about novodex engine,it is something really ahead.. i really want to test a game(dont care what style) that uses this kind of technology.its the 1st time i see this kind of software, so i went nuts with it&#33;
for those who want to see what i&#39;m talking about just go to both websites and download the small files with demos. not videos&#33; u really intereact and able to do a lot of stuffs.
if this is oldnews, i&#39;m really sory... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/whistle.gif

ogre 3d engine (http://www.ogre3d.org/index.php?option=com_remository&Itemid=74&func=fileinfo&filecatid=6&parent=category)

Novodex rocket 1.1 (http://www.novodex.com/rocket/NovodexRocket_V1_1.exe)

enjoy it&#33; http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/nener.gif