SEGA, Capcom join NVIDIA PhysX cause
Physics engine gains momentum.
NVIDIA PhysX has announced serious support from big-name publishers Capcom and SEGA.
The latter has licensed the engine as the development platform for all SEGA studios, while Capcom will feature the technology in Dark Void, the upcoming third-person jetpack-based shooter (more on that later today).
NVIDIA PhysX tools work across iPhone, PC, PS3, Wii and Xbox 360 platforms.
PhysX was a low-key venture for a number of years, comprising of a novel and separate physics card for PC and associated physics engine. But things soon changed when graphics giant NVIDIA bought PhysX owner Ageia in February 2008. So we went to see an optimistic NVIDIA presentation about the future of PhysX last summer.
Unsurprisingly, NVIDIA cards with CUDA support can accelerate PhysX processing. NVIDIA released drivers for GeForce series eight cards last year to the same effect.
That, interestingly, may give PlayStation 3 the upper-hand going forward, as the system uses an NVIDIA-based graphics card.
Xbox 360, of course, uses a graphics card by rival ATI. AMD owns ATI, incidentally, and posted significant losses for the first quarter of Q1 2009. But AMD plans to launch its flashy six-core processor chip next month, so the tides could turn.