Cell Factor Revolution
Graphics, Sound, Physics and the rest
Published: 30th May 2007 | Source: Ageia | Price: |
Graphics in the game look good (if your PC can get near what mine can), but not great. Per-pixel motion blur looked amazing but I am not even going to try and show you this as turning this feature on made the game totally unplayable.
The HDR implementation in the game is actually pretty nice and the character rendering is about average for today's standard of games.
Now I say the HDR looks good...well it does look good when there is anything for it to look good on. Mostly the maps are drab and grey, with the exception of Fuelling Station where everything is an orange-brown colour. That's not to say a game with less colour cannot be good: Gears of War lacks a huge amount of colour but is visually stunning and gritty at the same time.
Sadly, Cell Factor is not Gears of War and generally the graphics leave you wanting more.
The Physics in the game could make up for that though.
Physics
The Physics in Cell Factor are very impressive - in that they are on such a grand scale. You can lift a whole row of boxes and send them shooting forward, or divert a flow of liquid hot "Mag-Ma" (stop the Austin Powers - Ed) onto an opponent.
Sadly, Cell Factor is not Gears of War and generally the graphics leave you wanting more.
The Physics in the game could make up for that though.
Physics
The Physics in Cell Factor are very impressive - in that they are on such a grand scale. You can lift a whole row of boxes and send them shooting forward, or divert a flow of liquid hot "Mag-Ma" (stop the Austin Powers - Ed) onto an opponent.
This makes for an impressive array of graphical delight where boxes bounce across the screen, "Mag-Ma" flows over and kills enemies and bridges are destroyed. Nothing on this scale has been seen before in games and it's a great step forward. Having said that, some of the physics feel a little too much like a Hollywood set. Boxes and huge pipes DO bounce across a room or arena like they are made of rubber, and steel bridges get destroyed and bounce all over the place like they are styrofoam.
Cloth effects are pretty cool and I felt myself fairly convinced by the movements against the wind or the odd gun blast.
Again, as I said in my PhysX review, the physics ARE a great move on and really the game would be very very bad had it not been for their inclusion, hence why I didn't even bother with the game without PhysX.
Sound
Well there isn't much to say about sound. I set it to maximum and played from there.
I have to say that the music was at best ignorable and at worst downright annoying, especially as loading times aren't the best so you can be listening to it for a period of time.
The in-game sound is ok with some decent effects, but nothing really immersive in all honesty. Explosions sounded pretty good though so it's not all bad.
Everything Else
Well I felt I had better mention the HUD first of all. It feels like the game designers have really taken a "futuristic" scheme and gone to town. The information is crowded and hard to read whilst gaming. At least when you're close to dying the screen blinks red and emits a beeping sound which gives an indication of your untimely demise before you expire. Also there are arrows that give you a visual indication of where you're being attacked from, although as enemies tend to be above you as well as in front, behind and side to side it's pretty hard to figure where exactly they are coming from.
Cloth effects are pretty cool and I felt myself fairly convinced by the movements against the wind or the odd gun blast.
Again, as I said in my PhysX review, the physics ARE a great move on and really the game would be very very bad had it not been for their inclusion, hence why I didn't even bother with the game without PhysX.
Sound
Well there isn't much to say about sound. I set it to maximum and played from there.
I have to say that the music was at best ignorable and at worst downright annoying, especially as loading times aren't the best so you can be listening to it for a period of time.
The in-game sound is ok with some decent effects, but nothing really immersive in all honesty. Explosions sounded pretty good though so it's not all bad.
Everything Else
Well I felt I had better mention the HUD first of all. It feels like the game designers have really taken a "futuristic" scheme and gone to town. The information is crowded and hard to read whilst gaming. At least when you're close to dying the screen blinks red and emits a beeping sound which gives an indication of your untimely demise before you expire. Also there are arrows that give you a visual indication of where you're being attacked from, although as enemies tend to be above you as well as in front, behind and side to side it's pretty hard to figure where exactly they are coming from.
Another visual plus is that the enemies health level is shown when you hover over them, though you can become a little wrapped up in this.
The game menu is pretty drab and feels like it's trying to be futuristic, while only managing awkward.
The game menu is pretty drab and feels like it's trying to be futuristic, while only managing awkward.
Hovering over one of the menu items brings a whole new meaning to the word "sliding menu's", and confusion tends to ensue. A pretty cool feature is that video is going on behind the menu items. A not-so-cool feature is that if you're in single player mode and you press escape (perhaps to turn the wonderful music down), the game continues without you, tending to lead onto death.
All in all the game shows that it is an extended demo. Lots of things are wrong but it feels like the game has a good foundation but fails to deliver overall.
All in all the game shows that it is an extended demo. Lots of things are wrong but it feels like the game has a good foundation but fails to deliver overall.
Most Recent Comments
bleh phys processors shoved on a PCi bus are fricking pointless
with multi Core systems becoming the norm these will be made redundant , and quickly.
Even If a game engine is not programmed in Parallel/Smp there could easily be a seperate physics engine running on another core and it and the game engine could talk using a 'software bus'
but nice review ... i may get it (even @ 58% i want a nice looking shooter to play )
with multi Core systems becoming the norm these will be made redundant , and quickly.
Even If a game engine is not programmed in Parallel/Smp there could easily be a seperate physics engine running on another core and it and the game engine could talk using a 'software bus'
but nice review ... i may get it (even @ 58% i want a nice looking shooter to play )
And hey - it's free 
Tech showcase imo, not a game.
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Originally Posted by name='Ham'
Tech showcase imo, not a game.
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Awesome review Kempez - was a good read 
Nice to see they are trying to offer real-life physics, where everything is destructible & movable. Do you think newer graphics cards / dual core systems, will be able to cover what the PhysX card is supposed to do?
Nice to see they are trying to offer real-life physics, where everything is destructible & movable. Do you think newer graphics cards / dual core systems, will be able to cover what the PhysX card is supposed to do?
I don't think so actually. The operations done on the PhysX are pretty complicated and are better suited to either the PhysX card itself or a GPU, rather than a Multi-Purpose CPU with brute force
ATI have shown some pretty tech demo's on this done on the GPU, but nothing solid like a game as of yet
ATI have shown some pretty tech demo's on this done on the GPU, but nothing solid like a game as of yet
I did always wonder where the responsibility for physics lie in a system - CPU or GPU. Seems the Phys card can take care of it all. Would be great if games utilised these cards and similar cards were brought out to compete, drive down prices and further develop physics engines.
I'd love a game like DOD:S with a totally destructable enviroment. It would stop some players camping in the same spot (boring) and force them to assess the battlefield in it's current state to find a new spot. You could also make new routes to flank the enemy/objectives. No game would be played the same again!
I'd love a game like DOD:S with a totally destructable enviroment. It would stop some players camping in the same spot (boring) and force them to assess the battlefield in it's current state to find a new spot. You could also make new routes to flank the enemy/objectives. No game would be played the same again!
Agreed mate, would be great
I think a CPU could cope with some Physics, but not on the scale that PhysX/ATI's tech demo's have shown
I think a CPU could cope with some Physics, but not on the scale that PhysX/ATI's tech demo's have shown
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Originally Posted by name='Kempez'
Agreed mate, would be great
I think a CPU could cope with some Physics, but not on the scale that PhysX/ATI's tech demo's have shown |
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Originally Posted by name='Joe'
you say that now but wait until intel have 8 cores in ur box ... only 1 being used for the actual game engine / A.I.
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Plus a GPU has like 128 pipelines or whatever - which is where GPU architecture (and physx) come out on top with physics
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