Borderlands 2 – Nvidia’s Phsyx Tears Flags and Pools of Blood

The current generation of consoles are at the end of their life span. Game developers are running out of tricks to make the games look better and incorporate the latest tech. While the consoles continue to dip, PC games are rising to fill the gap. This is evident by the use of Nvidia’s Physx tech in Borderlands 2.

From the start it’s clear that Borderlands 2 is just a better looking game when played on PC. Better looking textures, quicker load times and further draw distance are some of the first things you will notice depending on the build of your machine. What really makes the game stand out on PC is the use of Physx. It adds a lot of breathtaking effects to Borderlands 2 and playing the game without it feels like playing a much older game.

To test out their Physx systems, Nvidia sent us a GTX 660Ti, the Goldilocks of their Kepler line– the price for performance is ‘just right’.

After I got some guns, the first thing I did was start shooting things to see what they looked like. Particles and chunks of the environment fly out of everything your gun can shoot. Throwing your bullets at wood textures will cause splinters to fly out and land on the ground. These splinters will move around with the player or NPCs walk over them.

Its not just the particles physics which are impressive, but its also jaw dropping to see how flags interact with bullets.

On the console version of the game, you shoot a flag, which is kind of blowing in the wind, but nothing happens. The projectiles seemingly pass right through without any environmental reaction. When you shoot a flag on PC with the Physx setting enabled, the fabric of the flag reacts to the bullets. It will jumble up and even tear where the bullets entered. If you continue to shoot a flag, like I do all the time, then you can even get segments of the flag to separate, fall to the ground and blow away in the wind. Another example of the cloth physics was seen when I jumped onto a canopy from the building above. My character tore a huge hole in it and pieces were flying away in the breeze.

The final, most noticeable addition to the  Physx arsenal in Bordlerlands 2 is the way that liquids are treated.

When you unload a clip into a foe, their blood pours out like you turned on a hose. It then pools on the ground and hangs out there for a while, just interacting with the environment before it sinks into the ground. During this time it acts similarly to how the splinters do. Wind, explosions, NPCs and the player can all interact with the blood.

It doesn’t stop with the enemies, all liquids in the game are treated the same way. All barrels of random, dangerous chemicals have the similar effect when Physx is enabled.

Reading about the cool tech is one thing, but seeing is believing so here is a video from Nvidia showing side by side comparison of Borderlands 2 with and without the use of Physx:

The use of Nvidia’s Physx doesn’t inherently make Borderlands 2 play better on the PC, but it sure does make reeking havoc destruction and chaos a lot more enjoyable.

These types of added player interaction excite me, because while these systems are merely for show right now,  it won’t be long before we see the use of this technology impacting the gameplay. If you are interested in playing more games with the GPU  acceleration technology that is Phsyx, be sure to check out all the particles and visual awesomeness included with the free-to-play mech game, Hawken, later this year.