We have added a set of comparison PhysX screenshots for Batman: Arkham City, which in pair with previously released comparison video are completing our GPU PhysX Profile for this title.

You can view comparison screenhots, video and additional info at Batman: Arkham City – GPU PhysX Profile page .

Batman: Arkham City tests the patience of PC gamers with several release delays, but will try to wheedle them with DX 11 Graphics and PhysX Technology.

Update: GPU PhysX in Batman: Arkham City - review and comparison video.

Recent comparison trailer gave us a glimpse of extra physics effects, and now we want to provide you with some additional details on what to expect from GPU PhysX content. In addition, new comparison PhysX video was released as well.

As usually, it will be possible to adjust level of in-game physics via “Hardware Accelerated PhysX” option in game’s launcher. There will be three settings:

PhysX Off: all GPU accelerated effects are disabled, only standart CPU physics (like ragdolls) is used.

PhysX Normal: enables additional particles effects (debris, volumetric smoke and steam, etc) and destructible environments.

PhysX High: includes all effects enabled withing “Normal” settings as well as realtime cloth and clothing simulation.

PhysX particle effects, most widely used type of content in GPU PhysX titles, will find their place in new Batman game. Scattered across Arkham City, they will consist of:

• Interactive SPH-smoke from fire extinguishers and smoke pellets, dynamic steam and fog.
• Ice particles for Freeze Gun and Freeze Grenade.
• Interactive debris from destructible thrown objects, like stools and vases.
• Environmental specific particles: molten and electrical sparks, coal debris, chunks, etc.
• Extra particles jutting from destructible objects like breakable glass, tiles and walls.
• Forcefields for explosions that will push particles away.

Interactive smoke and debris from Batman’s explosive gel

In addition, PhysX cloth effects are emulating the behaviour of fabric and clothing to make Batman and his enemies more realistic, as well as lend realism to environments. They will include:

• Simulated clothing on characters: coats and hoodies for Penguin, Two Face, and Joker’s thugs; Bruce Wayne’s jacket, pants, and tie.
• Dynamic paper: eviction and office papers, posters, x-ray sheets, museum tickets, etc.
• Money littering the floor of the vault (Sewer level).
• Leaves on the ground.
• Various interactive cloth objects throughout the game: rugs, banners, curtains, flags, ropes, bunting.

Banknotes are simulated as invidial cloth pieces, affected by character and weapon movement

But beauty comes with a burden, performance wise – GPU PhysX effects, especially coupled with DX 11 features like tesselation or HBAO, can bring frame rate to its knees if your GPU is not fast enough.

Various tesselation settings

Following table (based on NVIDIA testing) provides recommended baseline settings for specific GPUs to ensure the comfortable combination of playability and features (average frame rate of 40-55 frames per second and minimum 35 fps).

Batman: Arkham City is set for launch on November 22 in US and November 25 in EU.

Don’t forget to visit PhysXInfo.com soon after game’s release for comparison PhysX video, screenshots and detailed overview.

Recently, we got a chance to lay our hands on a bunch of high-resolution, never-seen-before screenhots from Art Gallery demo – it was used by NVIDIA to demonstrate APEX Destruction capabilities at GDC 2011.

For you viewing pleasure.

Art Gallery demo is featuring full-scale hardware acceleration of Rigid Body physics simulation (GPU Rigid Bodies, GRB) – we are hoping to see it live in APEX 1.1 and November/December UDK.

At Gamescom 2011,  Rocksteady Studios have released a new set of screenshots, featuring new “Mr. Freeze” foe, for higly-anticipated Batman: Arkham City. Previous game, Batman: Arkham Asylum, was one of the best titles with GPU PhysX support, and sequel is promised to support PhysX feature too, as well as DX11 and tesselation.

However, attentive user may notice that some of those screenshots are already containing GPU PhysX effects. Let’s take a closer look:

Description for this screenshot at GeForce.com states “Broken shards of ice will really pop out with PhysX enabled”. Looks similar to APEX Destruction effects we saw in other GPU PhysX games.

This screenshot is showcasing dynamic volumetric smoke – effect, extensively used in previous Batman game.

And finally, you can notice small debris and ice shards on the floor behind Mr. Freeze – those are physically simulated particles, than can be found almost in every single title with hardware PhysX effects. When used properly, they can add a lot of immersion and fidelity to the game.

Update: more details can be found on Batman: Arkham City page at GeForce.com

Headlining the feature list is a number of PhysX-powered visual effects that add extra immersion and physicality to scenes. As seen in our screenshots, areas are enhanced with destructible surfaces, making it appear that the attacks of Batman and his foes are physically affecting the environments; extra particles are generated when characters strike surfaces with force; dense fog and smoke moves and parts realistically as characters and objects interact with it; cloth, rugs and other scene elements react similarly; glass, debris and other destructible objects deform accurately and with added detail; and in general there are more particles and more objects on the ground, in the air, and on characters, all of which can be interacted with in some way.

Batman: Arkham City is scheduled to be released on October 18 (North America) and October 21 (Europe) 2011.

In recent days, some websites have revealed new visual content from Mafia II title, and suprisingly, certain amount of screenhots is from PC version, with additional APEX/PhysX effects enabled.

We formed a gallery from most demonstrable of them, and here is the result:

(screenshots are showcasing dynamic particles mostly, as cloth simulation is hardly noticable on static image)

Source: Eurogamer.cz, GameReactor.eu, Sector.sk, PCGamesHardware.de

GPU PhysX support in Mafia II, highly anticipated mobster crime drama from 2K Czech, is not a secret for certain time, and recently official press-release, along with three new screenhots, were revealed.

The integration of PhysX and NVIDIA APEX technology, including the APEX Clothing and Particle modules, enable the city and personalities of Empire Bay to truly come alive on Windows PC. The NVIDIA APEX Clothing module allows for more dynamic movement in clothing, making in-game characters even more realistic and reactive to environmental conditions.

With the implementation of NVIDIA APEX Particles, players are engulfed in lifelike explosions that are bigger and brighter, including weapon fragments, in-game debris and destructible environments that are amplified in both quantity and realism through the integration of APEX Particles. For example, a pistol fired into a glass pane will emit hundreds of glass shards; a shotgun blasted through a wooden landing will splinter the wood; and a Tommy Gun will chip into a brick or stone wall to methodically fracture and break it into pieces.

An addition to hardware accelerated PhysX content, PC version of Mafia II will feature 3D Vision support. Mafia II will be available in North America on August 24, 2010, and internationally on August 27, 2010.

P.S. We are pleased to see that APEX is finding it’s way to more and more games. In case you’re not familar with it, Nvidia APEX is physics effects creation and management system, build on top of PhysX SDK.

Idea behind APEX is simple -  it gives developers free tools to create complex physics content, like character clothing (bonus for developers), and has ability to scale such content through different platforms easily (read – add more details on PC, bonus for Nvidia). In theory – everybody wins. However, until APEX will be released to public (now it’s available for certains devs only), we won’t see if it works fully as intended.

Dark Void page at nzone.com was updated with new screenshots, demonstrating GPU PhysX effects in action. Most impressive are new APEX turbulence based smoke and dynamic particles for Jetpack and Disentegrator Gun accordingly.

In addition, other weapons are augmented with more “standart” particles effects – impact debris from bullet hits, physically simulated sparks and chunks.

As always, we’ll prepare long and boring comparison PhysX video after game release Until then you can watch Dark Void PhysX trailer

Update: comparison PhysX video available

Update #2: PhysX patch and benchmark available

We’ve finally (better late than never) uploaded our PhysX comparison screenshots pack for Batman Arkham Asylum. Like screenshots for Darkest of Days title, these are triple-screens, covering differences between High, Normal and Off PhysX in-game settings.

While inequality between High and Off PhysX settings is obvious, High vs Normal difference is not so evident: comparing to High PhysX settings, there is less dynamic smoke and spider webs, ground fog is missing, some cloth banners are unavailable, only like 1/3 amount of leaves is present on Normal PhysX settings.

You can view all screens at Batman Arkham Asylum GPU PhysX info mini-site

or watch our PhysX comparison video

PCgames.de has revealed 5 new screenshots for Batman Arkham Asylum, showing difference between lowest and highest PhysX settings. Sample effects include smoke, ground fog, leaves and cloth.

You can view PhysX screenshots here

We’ve updated our Darkest of Days profile with PhysX comparison screenshots, but this time they differ a little from other comparison screens we make, as they cover all three PhysX settings types in Darkest of Days - PhysX High vs PhysX Medium vs PhysX Low.

Sample preview

You can see the rest of PhysX comparison screenshots at our Darkest of Days info mini-site