What Physics Engine is Better?

Started by
12 comments, last by EMascheG 11 years, 8 months ago
Hi.

One Question about SDK or Engine Physics. I dont know is my question is good.

How Engine is better and more easy to use to create destruction or create really enviromments.
And what is the difference with Bullet,Newton,Tokama

Thanks for read and Thanks for answer.
Advertisement
As far as I can recall Tokamak has been dead for a while. It never truly worked so well in my opinion.
Newton has extreme issues with determinism. Or at least it had issues last time I checked their provided demos. And if they cannot be deterministic... well, you get the idea.
Newton is still fairly good, it has a lot of features which seems to be beginner-oriented. I like it but still without determinism... no way.

So the real battle is Bullet, PhysX, Havok.

I cannot say much about Havok. It seems you're supposed to pay for it.

PhysX appears to be better performing in general (on NV cards), it has more features (such as SPH and built-in destruction). The license is a bit odd.

Bullet is opensource and license is very clear (zlib). It's a bit rough here and there and although the API often does not support this or that, extra code is provided to help users in working around the limitation. For example, Bullet does not have destruction built in but it comes with extra code to support it. The code is not ready to go IMHO but a very good starting point. In general I think the maintainer is doing an excellent job at growing the library in a "clear" way. I'm not up to date with the new GPU-assisted OpenCL solver but it sounds very promising.

I have no idea what is a "really environment" I suppose you mean "really big"? If so, define "big". In general, define your needs clearly.

Previously "Krohm"


PhysX appears to be better performing in general (on NV cards), it has more features (such as SPH and built-in destruction). The license is a bit odd.


Last time I checked you had to give them credits for using PhysX (readme, loadings screens, etc), if game is B2P you have to provide them a few copies of the game, and give them permission to use your game in advertisment of "How good PhysX is".

As far as I can recall Tokamak has been dead for a while. It never truly worked so well in my opinion.
Newton has extreme issues with determinism. Or at least it had issues last time I checked their provided demos. And if they cannot be deterministic... well, you get the idea.
Newton is still fairly good, it has a lot of features which seems to be beginner-oriented. I like it but still without determinism... no way.

So the real battle is Bullet, PhysX, Havok.

I cannot say much about Havok. It seems you're supposed to pay for it.

PhysX appears to be better performing in general (on NV cards), it has more features (such as SPH and built-in destruction). The license is a bit odd.

Bullet is opensource and license is very clear (zlib). It's a bit rough here and there and although the API often does not support this or that, extra code is provided to help users in working around the limitation. For example, Bullet does not have destruction built in but it comes with extra code to support it. The code is not ready to go IMHO but a very good starting point. In general I think the maintainer is doing an excellent job at growing the library in a "clear" way. I'm not up to date with the new GPU-assisted OpenCL solver but it sounds very promising.

I have no idea what is a "really environment" I suppose you mean "really big"? If so, define "big". In general, define your needs clearly.


Thanks Krohm for the great info and respone. Now i more clear my doubts about physics with bullet,havok and nvidia.
I dont like too much Nvidia Physx because only work with Nvidia Cards, i want the ATI cards work also. Havok like a little. The Havok Physics is free for no commercial use and Havok Physics and Havok Destruction need to create a contract and depends too much of the use you give but dont have access to source code and cant release with the engine. Thing i want to my engine when i persons use my engine include the programm of physics.
Then only remains Bullet for me to use is free, with access to source code. Then also need improved bullet on my own to create destructions with Bullet.

Another think in case someone know Sandbox or Engine or SDK to destruction how Havok Destruction.
Link:
http://www.havok.com/products/destruction

About Create Enviromments Reals express bad, I want to sat for example if the engine can use soo in a program how Autodesk 3DS Max, Visual C++ Express,etc.

if the engine can use soo in a program how Autodesk 3DS Max, Visual C++ Express
Sort of.
You can do physics in source code, but it's not a good way to do things, it will get really complex really soon, with arrays of data having hundreds, if not thousands of entries each.
Physics must be set up in a DCC tool (Max, Blender). There are filters ready to go but they might be a bit rough. My experience is limited to Blender+Bullet. I don't know much else. Blender+Bullet is "officially" supported but you're going to need quite some glue anyway. But I'm currently not very inclined to discuss that, unless you have very specific questions.

[size=2]

i want the ATI cards work also
There's no such thing as ATi anymore. It's AMD now. And it's way better. I feel a shiver down my spine every time I read about ATi.

Previously "Krohm"

I just need to point out that PhysX works perfectly with AMD cards... so ditching it is not really a smart move.

Stefano Casillo
TWITTER: [twitter]KunosStefano[/twitter]
AssettoCorsa - netKar PRO - Kunos Simulazioni

ok thanks Krohm
PhysX is hardware accelerated on NVidia cards (GTX 400 series and above only I think) but not AMD cards, otherwise its a fully functioning high quality physics library that you should seriously consider (assuming the license is compatible with your project, dependant on what the project is you may have to pay or you may be able to use it for free). It has been used in many commercial games: Mirrors edge, arma 3 (when released), mafia 2, metro 2033, ghost recon, borderlands 2, batman arkham asylum (and city) and quite a few more.

Havok is a commonly used engine in the games industry although its not free to use unfortuneately. There are too many games to list that use it (326 here: http://www.giantbomb...s/92-502/games/). EDIT: It is apparently free for some projects although I can't find anything on the havok site with any sort of guidelines or even priceplans.

Newton is apparently a bit more limited, true if you want to roll a ball down a hill then its overkill but I wouldn't make a serious game with it. Infact the only game I've actually heard of on their list of games using it is ship simulator which is something that has a billion copies sitting on the bargain rack of my nearest PC game store.

Bullet is a pretty good engine. Although by default it runs on the CPU like most engines they do now provide libraries allowing it to use CUDA (Same thing that PhysX uses for hardware acceleration) aswell as OpenCL (which can optionally be hardware accelerated on most GPU's). It has been used in GTA4 and red dead redemption aswell as a few open source projects and movies.

With the exception of Havok they all have publically available bindings to be used in several languages so whatever language you program in one of the above should be available to you.

Personally I would look into either Bullet or PhysX
I really don't understand why people enjoy spreading false informations on the internet.

PhysX and Havok are both free.

Stefano Casillo
TWITTER: [twitter]KunosStefano[/twitter]
AssettoCorsa - netKar PRO - Kunos Simulazioni


I just need to point out that PhysX works perfectly with AMD cards... so ditching it is not really a smart move.


Yes and no.

Yes in that you can use PhysX on any compute which has an x86/x64 CPU in it.

No in that hardware PhysX support doesn't work on AMD hardware as it is based on CUDA.

Personally speaking I'd take Bullet over the others; I mostly wouldn't touch PhysX due to NV's anti-consumer stance on it (if any non-NV GPU is in use in your system you can not use PhysX on an NV card you might have brought) and I'd rather not support that.

This topic is closed to new replies.

Advertisement