A look at PowerVR’s Ray Tracing GR6500 GPU
Last week, Imagination Technologies announced that its GR6500 ray tracing GPU taped out on a test chip, a major milestone on its way into a mobile product. The GR6500 is unique, as this is Imagination’s first ray tracing GPU based on its latest PowerVR Wizard architecture. A series of articles released this week explain exactly what’s behind this technology, so let’s delve into the key points.
Ray tracing, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a method of modelling lighting in a virtual 3D space, which aims to closely mimic the actual physics of light. The method is in the name, the technique “traces” the path of light rays through the 3D space to simulate the effects of its encounters with virtual objects and collects this data for the pixels displayed on screen. It can produce highly realistic looking lighting, shadows, reflection and refraction effects, and is sometimes used in 3D animated movies.
As you can probably imagine, there can be a ton of different light sources to calculate using this method, and figuring them all about is extremely computationally and memory expensive, so games developers opt for cheaper simulations like rasterized rendering. However, you can severely cut down on ray tracing processing time by using dedicated hardware, which is what Imagination Technologies has done with its PowerVR Wizard GPU.
The GR6500 features a dedicated Ray Tracing Unit (RTU), which calculates and keeps track of all the data. As for what the RTU actually does, it first creates a database representation of the 3D space and tracks where the rays intersect with the geometry.
“We approached the problem differently. While others in the industry were focused on solving ray tracing using GPU compute, we came up with a new approach leveraging on our prior expertise in rasterized graphics”– Luke Peterson, Imagination’s director of research for PowerVR Ray Tracing
When running the shader for each pixel, the RTU searches the databased to find the closest intersecting triangle in order to figure out the color of the pixel. This process can also cast additional rays to simulate reflective properties, which in turn will affect the color of other pixels. Keeping track of the secondary rays is hugely important too and it’s all kept in the RTU to improve performance.
Ok, so what does this actually mean in terms of performance, graphics and games?
Ultimately, reaching closer to photorealistic graphics is the aim of the game, but this can take a number of forms, from accurate reflections to lighting and shadows. Compared with GPU compute or software based ray tracing approaches, the use of dedicated hardware makes the GR6500 up to 100 times more efficient. Hence why traditional GPUs depend on different approaches. This huge reduction in processing costs opens up new avenues for optimized ray tracing based graphics effects in mobile titles.
Imagination Technologies gives an example comparison of ray traced vs traditional cascaded shadow maps. You can read all about the technical details in the official blog post, but the short of it is that the ray tracing and penumbra simulation method produces much more accurate shadows than the rougher approximation technique of cascaded shadow maps. This is essentially because of the way ray tracing simulates light passages accurately regardless of the distance, while shadow mapping is limited to a more finite resolution and distance scaling to maintain performance.
Furthermore, using the hardware based technique reduces memory traffic compared with cascaded shadows. In one test, a single scene used up 233MB of memory for cascaded shadows compared with 164MB for ray tracing. Subtract the “G Buffer” setup cost of the scene and ray tracing can result in a 50 percent reduction in memory traffic. Given that memory bandwidth is a limiting factor in mobile GPUs, especially when compared with desktop GPUs, this reduction can give quite a nice boost to performance as well.
In terms of frame time, Imagination Technologies’ example shows an average reduction of close to 50 percent. So not only do ray traced shadows look better, but they can also be implemented with a higher frame rate than cascaded shadows, thanks to the use of dedicated hardware.
There is one point worth noting though and that is that it’s up to developers to implement these type of effects in their games. With only a small selection of compatible hardware heading to the market any time soon, we probably won’t see the benefits for a while yet.
However, someone has to take the first step, and Imagination Technologies GR6500 GPU may be the starting point for some much more visually impressive mobile graphics a little way down the line.
‘Half-Life’ barely runs on a smartwatch
We were getting a little tired of playing Doom on every household appliance known to man, office printers and even inside the game itself. That’s why it’s a nice change to see that it’s now possible to play Half-Life on your Android smartwatch, thanks to software modder extraordinaire Dave Bennett. He’s been able to squeeze SDLash3D, an open-source emulator for some of Valve’s early titles, onto the LG’s first generation G Watch. Unfortunately, playing the title from your wrist is problematic, since the frame rate can dip down pretty low and the small screen doesn’t leave you a lot of room to use the soft controls. Still, anything’s better than having to bum around Knee-Deep in the Dead for the millionth time when we’re bored on a bus.
Filed under: Gaming, Wearables, Software
Via: Kotaku
Source: Dave Bennett
Beloved London arcade rescued by gamer donations after burglary
Earlier this week, the independent London arcade Heart of Gaming was burgled. Thieves took over £5,000 worth of consoles, games and accessories, leaving the owners understandably crestfallen. The arcade is best-known for its retro cabinets, but those responsible were interested in the latest hardware and software instead. Police are now investigating, but instead of dwelling on their misfortune staff have been asking the community for help. And boy, are they helping. A GoFundMe campaign looking to raise the lost £5,000 has already smashed its target after a single day. In an age where UK arcades are a rarity, it’s nice to see players banding together to help one during its time of need.
[Image Credit: Will Ireland/Edge Magazine via Getty Images]
Filed under: Gaming
Via: Motherboard
Source: GoFundMe
‘Pixels’ is somehow even worse than I thought it could be
When the first trailer for Pixels hit I was worried that the movie was going to be a “steaming pile of cinematic garbage.” Now that I’ve actually seen the Adam Sandler and Kevin James vehicle, I can say that was still far too generous a prediction; it’s actually much, much worse. Pixels‘ real villains aren’t the admittedly gorgeous renderings of giant-sized Pac-Man and Donkey Kong hell-bent on destroying Earth — they’re the toxic tropes that Hollywood keeps perpetuating.
The number of negative stereotypes Sandler and his cronies fit into the movie’s 105-minute runtime would be impressive if they weren’t so damaging. First up we have Sandler’s character Sam Brenner. He’s a self-described “loser who’s just good at old video games” — who works as an A/V installer after being beaten at the 1982 Worldwide Video Arcade Championships as a kid. Then there’s the grandma’s-basement-dwelling, socially awkward man-child, Ludlow Lamonsoff (Josh Gad). Oh, and Peter Dinklage’s Eddie Plant rocks a mullet, talks like the Kool-Aid Man (“Oh yeah!”) and asks for a threesome with Martha Stewart and Serena Williams in the White House’s Lincoln Bedroom in exchange for helping save the world.
If none of that sounds bad enough, rest assured that it gets worse. One lazy joke involves the president of the United States (Kevin James) visiting the United Kingdom’s prime minister and not being able to decipher her Britishisms. They’re English words, but they aren’t! Ignorance is funny! Get it?! At almost every turn, women are condescended to or ignored, especially Michelle Monaghan’s DARPA scientist Violet van Patten. What do they know about end-of-the-world scenarios or classic arcade games anyway, am I right, boys?
And despite Brenner treating van Patten like crap for half the movie because she rebuffed him when he tried taking advantage of her vulnerability, she falls for him at the end anyway. See, even if you totally insult a lady repeatedly, it doesn’t matter so long as you’re good at video games. Brenner also twice reminds us that he’s an amazing kisser (as all nerds are) because he appreciates it more. Sure.
This is an Adam Sandler movie so of course not even Q-bert is safe from being reduced to the butt of an excrement joke.
Oh, and how do we know that Ludlow really plays video games? He’s a chubby virgin who’s lusting after a pixel vixen, wears a T-shirt with an 8-bit Mario on it, spends time on 4chan and spouts crackpot conspiracy theories at every turn. He also takes a lot of pleasure slapping troops on the ass and calling them “little girl maggots” at one point.
Amid the insipid dialog and boring action sequences — a real-life game of Centipede set unironically to “Workin’ for the Weekend” is an early offender — there’s a lone bright spot. It’s roughly three feet tall, stands on two legs, is orange and has a trumpet’s bell for a mouth. Of course, I’m talking about Q-bert. For every game that the humans beat the aliens at, they get a trophy. One is the dog from Duck Hunt; the other is our orange pal.
Q-bert is adorable. When Brenner takes some downtime between missions and checks out The Last of Us: Remastered, he’s shocked by how violent it is. The camera cuts to Q-bert trembling and distressed watching the Sony TV screen (it’s a Sony movie, hence the free product placement). It’s okay, though, because a few minutes later the creature’s bouncing and laughing on a trampoline. In another scene, it’s wearing a tuxedo and ohmygosh it’s the cutest thing ever.
The humans and Q-bert, moments before the alien soils itself.
But this is an Adam Sandler movie so of course not even Q-bert is safe from being reduced to the butt of an excrement joke. And just when I thought the filmmakers couldn’t degrade the little bugger any further, ‘Bert sacrifices itself to become a trophy of a different kind. When the humans defeat the aliens once and for all (spoiler alert), the pixelated Paperboy, Frogger and other attackers wreaking havoc on the streets of Washington, DC, start disappearing. Even the buxom blonde — the one Ludlow has a multi-decade crush on; who inexplicably turns from pixel to flesh mid-battle and starts fighting alongside the humans — fades away.
A tearful Ludlow asks why Q-bert gets to stay and not Lady Lisa. “Q-bert is a trophy,” van Patten says. “We get to keep trophies.” That’s when the little orange alien turns itself into the platinum-coiffed object of Ludlow’s affection. His dream girl is now a trophy he owns forever. Seriously. The prologue is a shot of a crib full of little Q-berts. I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried.
Pixels is in an abusive relationship with its audience from the word “go.”
And that’s the problem here: Pixels is in an abusive relationship with its audience from the word “go.” There are jokes made at the expense of modern games in an effort to win over the fans who grew up in the arcades. At the same time, classic songs familiar with that same group, like Tears for Fears’ “Everybody Wants to Rule the World,” are destroyed so Ludlow’s character can sing a horrific karaoke set that ends with him drunkenly humping the floor and crying. Practically every negative stereotype about video-game fans is repeated ad nauseam for more than 90 minutes.
Unlike Disney’s cute Wreck-It Ralph, Pixels isn’t using nostalgia in an attempt to charm its audience and tell a heartwarming story. No, Pixels is holding a distorted mirror up to the crowd and laughing at them instead of with them. This is what Hollywood thinks geeks are.
Filed under: Misc, Gaming, Home Entertainment, HD, Sony
‘Doom’ multiplayer test run starts ‘in the coming months’
It’s time to put that Doom alpha code from your PlayStation 4, Xbox One or PC copy of Wolfenstein: The New Order to use if you already haven’t redeemed it. Publisher Bethesda’s announced that access to the Hell-bound shooter’s first multiplayer test will open up “in the coming months.” The post on Bethblog says that if you bought the game digitally there’s no need to hassle with redeeming keys as you’re automagically entered into the selection pool, too. Let’s say you didn’t buy the latest Wolfenstein though and only pre-ordered Doom after witnessing its big reveal at E3 last month. Well, in that case you have to wait for Doom‘s beta and that won’t happen until next year ahead of the game’s scheduled when it’s done spring release window. Folks attending id’s Quakecon in Texas this weekend, however, get a leg up on everyone else and have access to a pre-alpha build of the multiplayer mode.
Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment, HD
Source: Bethblog
NVIDIA Shield update trades ‘Sonic The Hedgehog’ for Google Cast
Wish the original NVIDIA Shield Portable had Android 5.1 and Google Cast support? Now it does, but it comes at a price. A new, optional update for the Shield bestows the handheld with latest version of Lollipop, the ability to be a Chromecast / Google Cast source device and fixes a glitch that made Google Play Books unusable — but in trade, it takes away Miracast support and permanently removes a handful of apps. Specifically, the update uninstalls Sonic 4: Episode II, Expendable: Rearmed and the original Android browser for compatibility reasons. Bummer.
The update is optional — but if you want the latest Android features on the aging device, you don’t really have a choice. Check out the official update at the source link below.
Via: Android Beat
Source: NVIDIA
JXE Streams: talking family with Batgirl in ‘Arkham Knight’
Even if your only exposure to the Batman mythos is through the excellent Arkham series of games by developer Rocksteady, (especially the latest, Arkham Knight) you’re pretty familiar with Commissioner Gordon’s daughter, Barbara. She’s one of the constant voices in The Dark Knight’s ear, and with the recent release of Knight‘s first downloadable episode we finally get to step into her shoes as Batgirl as she goes up against The Joker. How’s it all play out? Your guess is as good as mine because I’m going in totally blind on PlayStation 4 starting at 6 pm Eastern / 3 pm Pacific.
Tune in right here, at Engadget.com/gaming and on Twitch.tv/Joystiq to catch two straight hours of Batgirl shenanigans and my poor attempt at reconciling my crush on Mark Hamill’s iconic Crown Prince of Crime despite the awful things he’s done to the Gordon family.
http://www.twitch.tv/joystiq/embedWatch live video from Joystiq on www.twitch.tv
Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment, HD
Bethesda’s ‘Fallout Anthology’ collection comes in a mini nuke case
If you’re a big fan of Bethesda’s Fallout franchise, or you just like collecting things, you’ll soon be able to nab a nuke. Not a real one, of course, but a miniature bomb case (complete with sound!) that houses all of the Fallout titles for PC that have been released to date. This means that you’ll get Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout Tactics, Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas. You may have noticed that the upcoming Fallout 4 isn’t on that list, which you’ll have to purchase separately when it arrives in November. The Fallout Anthology collection actually arrives before the new title — September 29th in North American and October 2nd in Europe. There’s an empty slot for the new game to join the rest, though, and the set offers a refresher before Fallout 4 is released with a few extras of its own. Bethesda didn’t mention a price in its blog post, but Best Buy has a pre-order page up with the set listed for $50.
Filed under: Gaming
Source: Bethesda
‘Life is Strange’ episode 4 enters a ‘Dark Room’ next week
Life is Strange is about to get dark. Well, darker than all of the surreal time travel, stormy nightmares, missing-person mysteries and straight-up death contained in the first three episodes. Episode four, Dark Room, hits Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Steam on July 28, next Tuesday. Life is Strange is partly a cinematic coming-of-age tale featuring Max — a young girl who returns to her hometown to find her best friend vastly changed — and partly a sci-fi mystery as Max realizes she can control time. She uses her power to get out of increasingly dangerous jams and in the search for a missing girl, Rachel Amber. According to the trailer for Dark Room, this one is going to be tense (spoiler warning for all three previous episodes).
“Max realizes that changing the past can lead to painful consequences and that time is not a great healer,” the video’s description reads. “Her investigation into the disappearance of Rachel Amber begins to reach a thrilling conclusion as she finds the Dark Room.”
Developer Dontnod (of Remember Me infamy) and publisher Square Enix announced today that they’ve sold more than 1 million copies of Life is Strange. Dark Room is the penultimate episode, setting up for what is sure to be a dramatic finale. We’ve been playing through Life is Strange live on JXE Streams, and you can find those videos here: episode 1, 2 and 3.
Via: @LifeIsStrange
Source: Square Enix
‘Rise of the Tomb Raider’ hits PlayStation 4 and PC in 2016
When Square Enix announced Rise of the Tomb Raider at Gamescom last year, it dropped a bomb: The game would be exclusive to Xbox platforms, meaning PlayStation 4 and PC players wouldn’t get to touch it. At least, not for a certain amount of time. Square Enix today confirmed that Rise of the Tomb Raider will indeed hit PC and PS4 after a period of Xbox exclusivity: It will launch on Windows 10 and Steam in early 2016, and PS4 in late 2016. Rise of the Tomb Raider is slated to hit Xbox One and Xbox 360 this year on November 10th.
“The game will be a console exclusive to Xbox One and Xbox 360 for one year after its initial launch, coming to PlayStation 4 (PS4) in Holiday 2016,” Square Enix says. “Renowned developer Crystal Dynamics, a Square Enix studio, is leading development in the latest entry in the iconic series for additional platforms.”
After the announcement of Rise of the Tomb Raider‘s Xbox exclusivity, a vocal set of fans took to the internet to express distaste at the decision. For months after the game’s reveal, Microsoft and Square Enix had to clarify the definition of an “exclusive,” eventually noting that the companies’ partnership had “a duration,” giving a sliver of hope to Sony and PC fans everywhere. Turns out, “a duration” translates to “about a year.”
Source: Square Enix
AIVAnet 