New chip aims to shake up video games

A Silicon Valley start-up hopes to introduce a lot of bounce, rattle and roll into the video-game industry with a new microchip that makes virtual worlds behave as realistically as they look.

For years, video games have been getting prettier thanks to sophisticated graphics processors. But crates that donีt budge, planks that donีt splinter and windows that donีt break are a constant complaint of gamers who crave more than just skin-deep realism.

Ageia Technologies wants to change that with its new PhysX processor, which simulates the physical properties of everything from smoke to rocks.

าPhysics makes games feel real, the way graphics makes games look real,ำ said Manju Hegde, AgeHiaีs chief executive in a recent interview.

Ageia faces a number of obstacles, however, from sceptical gamers grumbling at the prospect of opening their wallets for yet more hardware, to competitors that are putting physics in games using existing chips like a graphics processor.

The chips will go on sale in retail stores in May for about US$300 (Bt14,250), but the price tag is already raising eyebrows.

During a demonstration the chipีs power was obvious as a maelstrom of debris whirled about, piling up against walls and scattering across the arena.

But before starting the demonstration, Hegde had to lower the resolution of the game.

The reason? The chip can generate so many objects that even the twin graphics processors in Hegdeีs top-end PC have trouble tracking them at the highest image quality.

Still, Hegde is betting that gamers will happily sacrifice some graphical fidelity in exchange for greater interactivity.

Buildings will blow up spectacularly, football tackles will become more bone-crunching, and cloth will flutter and crumple, lending a dramatic flair to online role-playing games.