Havok 2

OMFG!!!

I just finished watching the Half Life 2 demo video from E3. HL2 uses Havok 2 for its physics engine.

Is this the level of physics we can look forward to at some point in the future??

Holy cow!!

Me, I'm holdin out for the migration to havok 3

bbc

Don't think so Grim. But maybe, I can't be totally sure. I remember asking someone about Havok 2 and what it would do to the game, and I was told that it's actually just a server-side change and that SL clients wouldn't even have to be patched. That it's just a bunch of algorithms that the physics in the game follows, so really what would happen is SL gets less lag, and much more realistic physics. You know that buffer between 2 physical objects that shows a crack between them? That's the one thing that I hope Havok 2 gets rid of! If SL could ever look like HL2, it would be a graphical upgrade, not a physics engine upgrade.

Actually, the great thing about SL is that it COULD look like HL2. Get enough good builders, good texturers and good scripters together and they can work wonders.

But I do agree with Dave in that I REALLY hope they get rid of that darn ~.1 meter buffer. I also really hope they up the prim limit on linked physical objects.

Yes, SL will be moving to Havok 2.x, probably before the end of this year. Although Half Life 2 is currently using Havok 2.x, due to the dynamic and versatile content that is possible in Second Life Havok 2.x is not quite feature complete for us. They're working on the final necessary features as we post to these forums.

Not only is Havok 2.x up to 10 times faster than 1.x for many operations, but it will enable us to solve our "deep think" problem that I've mentioned in previous forum threads ==> hollow, cut, physical torii will cease to be my personal #1 pet peeve. Yay!

Actually I was about to post exactly what Casval said, with a little addition. So go read his post and come back and....

...

If you like the destruction element of HL2 (and let's face it, who doesn't think it looks awesome?!) I suggest you come over to the Gibson sim and check out the dock area in the South-West corner. The boxes and barbell things are setup and ready for your destructive mind. It's actually a lot of fun to play there, so please, come visit and check it out!

As for the annoying "collision tolerance" between objects (currently set at 0.1 meter), Havok 2.x also has this "feature". However, since it is a faster engine we should be able to reduce the scale of the tolerance to about 0.05 meters or smaller.

There are ways to work around the tolerance and make it appear that objects are actually touching. HL2 probably does this, however it breaks down when objects start to approach the same scale as the tolerance. The smallest interactive objects in HL2 are probably at least two multiples of the collision tolerance they're using. We'll also hide as much of the collision tolerance as possible when we move to Havok 2.x, but a few effects of it will probably still show up for objects whose sizes are on the order of twice the collision tolerance.

Also, waaaay back in mid beta it was possible to break primitives in SL. Unfortunately, due to the resulting increase of primitives it caused problems with the object economy, so we disabled it. We may re-enable it someday as a script effect where the resulting pieces are owned by the original owner, or we'll have to let the pieces go public and implement a variable public-deletion-reward scheme to prevent money exploits. It was a fun feature but...

Will we get cloth and water effects, too?

Shoot, this means I have to think up a new sig before the end of the year.

BBC, have you seen the video from the Havok 3 demo? I love the bit where the guy falls backwards in to the pool with all the floating styrofoam packing peanuts!

Yah weds - its a cool demo. I like how they have improved on the rag-doll stuff - like shooting the zombie in the leg, and his femur snaps, and the tendons are springs, so his leg folds back on itself at the break.

Pure art.

bbc

Could someone please direct me to this "Havok 3" demo, or is it just a joke?

In quake games you apply a texture called "caulk" to the sides that are together. That caulk texture gets rid of those little specklies. Definatly need a caulking texture in SL

dave, try this link.

Gotcha, thanks.

ROFL, he's not the only one

I wanna see the guys at havok wondering why they are getting all these hits to a non-existant page, check out our forums, and say "you know, that WOULD be cool in Havok 3"

bbc

By the way BBC, it looks like you're being sued by the RIAA for using file sharing programs...

Here

Naw - I hate Kazaa - its broke my computer more than thrice. I am convinced that Kazaa is owned by sony and is purposely bad software that will corrupt your OS if you try and use it. Makes sense!

bbc