NVIDIA GameWorks Integration

[Mike.Skolones]

Ok ... thanks ... and any news about merged version? such as VXGI + HBAO or anything else?

I merged FleX and WaveWorks, and got it to work by changing some device initialization code in WaveWorks. I pushed the fix to the WaveWorks branch, but I haven't pushed the merged branch. Right now I'm updating FleX to a new release ("0.8"), then I'll push that change, and merge it again to the combined branch. I could merge HBAO+ into the FleX/WaveWorks after that, but for VXGI I'm waiting on the team for a new VXGI release and a review of the upgrade to 4.7.3.

[Mike.Skolones]

As far as I know the Shield devices have the strongest GPU at this point (even with DX11 support) and the X1 is going to come out, but then again I only saw its use in a stationary console so far. I doubt that we will see hardware powerful enough anytime soon, manufacturers are not really considering mobile games when creating their devices, except for Nvidia, so most of the times more power is only used to outrun the competition, even if that leads to stupid decisions in so many cases.

I'm happy that we are finally advancing in graphical fidelity after so much time, so please don't ruin this by targeting mobile too

Anyways, I'm really looking forward to see more GameWorks coming out, a lot of the stuff looks so interesting. ^^

Greetings,
Dakraid

Right, we'll be releasing GW support for Shield wherever the use case is appropriate for the platform, but we don't expect non-Shield devices to be able to support GPU goodies soon.

[Nudlegaru]

I merged FleX and WaveWorks, and got it to work by changing some device initialization code in WaveWorks. I pushed the fix to the WaveWorks branch, but I haven't pushed the merged branch. Right now I'm updating FleX to a new release ("0.8"), then I'll push that change, and merge it again to the combined branch. I could merge HBAO+ into the FleX/WaveWorks after that, but for VXGI I'm waiting on the team for a new VXGI release and a review of the upgrade to 4.7.3.

Please wait to merge every feature until 4.7.4 coems this week (the final fix for 4.7). It would be a pity to do all efforts on 4.7.3 when 4.7.4 is coming in few days. Thanks

[Mike.Skolones]

Wow ... Can you merge all features in one package after release the VXGI ?

That's the plan.

[Mike.Skolones]

Please wait to merge every feature until 4.7.4 coems this week (the final fix for 4.7). It would be a pity to do all efforts on 4.7.3 when 4.7.4 is coming in few days. Thanks

Sure. I doubt there will be huge changes from 4.7.3 to 4.7.4 anyways.

[Gandosh]

Not yet, sorry, the Faceworks team has been working on other projects recently.

Oh ok. Do you have a plan to merge hairworks in AIO version? i heard hairworks coming middle of april.

[Semaphore]

Hi Mike,

It would be great if you could inform us about the status of PS4/Xbox One support for currently released GameWorks modules:

HBAO+
Flex
Waveworks
VXGI

Also, any updates on fluid rendering for Flex? That would really be the ultimate (small body) water solution for UE4.

[Melvin Eng]

Sure, sorry for the suspense. As you note, the FleX API offers many things that are not yet exposed through UE4's blueprints, or through any other mechanism. In time we will be adding support for particle state readback, etc, but they aren't the top priority at this point. Surface fluid rendering is still under way. FleX will never support the full range of gameplay hooks that PhysX rigid bodies do, such as contact callbacks, custom constraints, etc., but it may be possible to expose constraint forces in some way. I'll pass the request along to the FleX team and see what they say. Every data synch back to the CPU is costly, so we have to be careful that new features will not degrade performance beyond usefulness.

3D volumetric objects are possible, I suppose we just haven't exposed that at the authoring level yet. A destruction feature based on FleX sounds like an interesting idea to me, but our experience with PhysX rigid body destruction indicates that it will be a lot of work.

--Mike

Hi there Mike,

Many thanks for the insights!
Would it be possible for me contact the Flex team directly? (a contact from someone in the team would be great)
I'm trying real hard to figure out how to implement game-play with UE4 Flex for my educational gaming project, and have quite a few pressing questions that I'm burning to ask!


Cheers,
Melvin Eng.

[order66]

Hi Mike,

It would be great if you could inform us about the status of PS4/Xbox One support for currently released GameWorks modules:

HBAO+
Flex
Waveworks
VXGI

Also, any updates on fluid rendering for Flex? That would really be the ultimate (small body) water solution for UE4.

Would love to hear about this, too!

[Chesire]

A solution that I have got to work to address this was to increase the detail of the mip-map filtering. i.e. at the moment, I believe that the color values are averaged over 2x2x2 voxels. Increasing this filtering to 3x3x3 voxels will make a noticeable improvement to the flickering/stuttering caused by dynamic objects.

Sounds like a plan. Lets hope NVIDIA agrees

[Chesire]

@ Mike
it seems that when the vxgi is on , the sphere reflection capture doesn't work! is true? ( i tested in merged version of galaxyman's build )

Afaik, atm reflection captures only work with Lightmass.

[Netrve]

SO ... **** Realistic glass rendering !!

VXGI comes with specular tracing which should replace the reflection captures, but proper reflections require at least 2 bounces. You can also enable SSR through a simple tweak which was mentioned by gboxentertainment, which might improve the quality.
One more thing is that currently VXGI doesn't fully support translucency and particle rendering, so you might want to consider that. VXGI is still in an early stage, so it might take time until everything is working as it should.

[Mike.Skolones]

Would love to hear about this, too!

FleX fluid rendering is still underway, I hope to have something to share the week of April 13th.

Regarding next-gen consoles: VXGI is too aggressive, so you can rule that out; we are considering a FleX port, but haven't established feasibility or a timeline yet; we have a prototype of WaveWorks internally for PS4/XBoxOne, but the ETA on public release is uncertain; I will check on HBAO+.

Thanks,
Mike

[Mike.Skolones]

r.ssr.quality command? can you share the link of gboxentertainment 's post?

It is post #464

[Mike.Skolones]

VXGI comes with specular tracing which should replace the reflection captures...

I ran this by the VXGI guys, and they said that the main issue delaying the support of reflection captures with VXGI is deciding how to combine the effects. "The way the engine does it for SSR & reflection captures is by lerping the SSR & captures like this: SpecularLighting.rgb = SpecularLighting.rgb * (1 - SSR.a) + SSR.rgb; where SSR.a is roughly the % of SSR samples that were valid. In the case of VXGI specular tracing, we could try and lerp the original SSR/probe solution with the VXGI Specular solution based on the material roughness."

So the plan as I see it is to get a patch pushed out with support along those lines, then people can try other techniques in the shaders and find ways to improve it. No ETA yet, I'm afraid.

--Mike