Summary
- Nvidia has quietly cut support for 32-bit PhysX with its new RTX 50 graphics cards.
- This means that several games from 2005 to 2013 will look significantly worse, unless you run the PhysX engine via your CPU, which is known to tank performance.
- Among the games that will lose notable features like dynamic fog, improved particle effects, cloth physics, and even destructible environments, are Borderlands 2, Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag, Arkham City, and Mirror’s Edge.
The Nvidia RTX 50 series is dropping support for 32-bit PhysX. As a result, some games that launched as recently as 2013, like Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag, will look and feel far less dynamic.
As reported by PCGamesN, PhysX is a physics engine that several developers used to implement more realistic debris, cloth, and particles. Borderlands 2 was a tentpole showcase for the technology in 2012, showing just how much depth it could bring to a game.
You can see a side-by-side breakdown below to get a clearer idea of what losing PhysX support will look like.
What Games Will Be Affected?
ResetEra user RandomlyRandom67 put together an extensive list breaking down every game that uses the 32-bit PhysX engine. We won’t detail them all here, but the following are some of the most notable games that will be impacted:
- Mirror’s Edge
- Batman: Arkham Asylum
- Batman: Arkham City
- Batman: Arkham Origins
- Metro 2033
- Metro: last Light
- Mafia 2
- Alice: Madness Returns
- Borderlands 2
- Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag
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PhysX in several of these games allows for cloth simulation, improved particle effects, realistic smoke, dynamic fog, destructible environments, spark effects, fluid simulation, and more. So, while games won’t ‘break’ on the RTX 50 series (most games allow you to simply toggle PhysX off), they will look fundamentally worse.
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It’s worth noting that you can still run these games with PhysX using your CPU, but it will likely tank performance. Some games, like Arkham Origins, also don’t support the highest PhysX settings on CPU, so with an RTX 50 series, you can’t play it at maximum quality.
However, Nvidia will continue to support PhysX for older graphics cards, so if you have an RTX 30 or 40 series, you’ll still be able to play these games on max settings for the foreseeable future. Or, as PC Gamer points out, you can always plug in a secondary PhysX-supported card, though with the 50 series varying from $500 to $2,000, that’s an expensive workaround.
Nvidia
- Date Founded
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April 1, 1993
- CEO
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Jensen Huang
- Subsidiaries
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Mellanox Technologies, Cumulus Networks, NVIDIA Advanced Rendering Center
- Headquarters
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Santa Clara, California, United States