Despite the fact that big-name studios such as Electronic arts have shown their willingness to adopt NVIDIA's PhysX technology, we're still not seeing the major influx of PhysX-enabled titles that many were expecting.
However, in an effort to increase the number of developers opting to to work with PhysX, NVIDIA has today announced its APEX (Adaptive Physics EXtensions) development platform, an addition to its PhysX SDK that it claims will provide developers with "a set of easy-to-use tools that streamline the process of implementing scalable physics across multiple platforms."
For gamers, it sounds like more PhysX jiggery-pokery, but it could finally pave the way for widespread PhysX adoption. According to NVIDIA, APEX will make it easy for game developers to add physics effects to their cross-platform titles easier than ever before.
APEX will be made available free of charge to licensed NVIDIA PhysX developers, and it'll come equipped with support for pre-built examples of physics simulations - dubbed modules. Designed to easily integrate into games, developers will be able to take these modules - such as destruction, clothing and vegetation - and easily customise them to suit their title.
Featuring integrated scaling, one of its key objectives is to ensure that all titles built upon the APEX platform will be able to scale GPU hardware acceleration to meet the capabilities of multiple platforms - including PC, Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii.
Sounds a promising development for PhysX implementation, and game developers can read more at NVIDIA's official APEX website.
Official press release: NEW NVIDIA APEX TECHNOLOGY ACCELERATES PHYSICS CREATION PIPELINE FOR CONTENT DEVELOPERS