Comparing Physics in Video Games and In Real Life

Comparing Physics in Video Games and In Real Life
By: Lucas Siftar, Physics 211X, Professor Newman 11/28/13

This Website talks about comparisons and differences between physics in video games and physics in real life. I will be talking about games in which have recently been released on video game consoles and will analyze realistic physical aspects and more non-realistic aspects of the computer simulation. These games I usually play on the daily, just to make sure people don't doubt me. Video games have their different looks and feels, but I will be tending more toward the more war-like and violet video games such as Battlefield 4 and Grand Theft Auto V to portray how true the physics reveal to be in split-second situations.

                Grand Theft Auto V is a video game that cost 230 million to make and make 800 million after the first couple days of release. The sales surpassed the lifetime sales of the previous game according to Forbes. But how realistic is the engine that runs GTA 5 ? Lets find out! Rockstar used a physics engine for grand theft auto five called Euphoria.

            Euphoria is a game animation system created by NaturalMotion based on Dynamic Motion Synthesis, NaturalMotion's primary technology for assembling animated charactors"based on a full simulation of the 3D character, including body, muscles and motor nervous system."This makes sure that the reactions and physical movements of the 3D character are different every time, even in the same situation in the game. It's common for the developers to use "ragdoll" physics for bodies, where the bodies don't have many reactions to physical objects except gravity. Euphoria take each physical object and enables more physics of each object when interacted with. For example, one time I was running away from the police, scurrying for survival as I had a sliver of health and I accidentally jumped into a pole as I was running away on foot. The engine recognized the pole as a dynamic object and I ended up dying by running into the pole. As I drive frantically down a street in my Bugatti, I notice that friction is less because of how light the car is and I ride curbs with speed and ease.

            Some differences between the physics in real life and the physics in grand theft auto are that there are virtual glitches that can appear in the game. For example certain gravity glitches can occur in which a 3D character in a car can go flying in air compared to distance they should actually be traveling.

       Battlefield 4 is the sequel to Battlefield 3's first person shooter and is made by the Swedish developer DICE. The game takes a more realistic approach to war-like video games by having a more destructible environment . While destructive environments have always been apart of the Battlefield franchise, especially in the Bad Company series, player actions can now change the layout of a map. A once dry map could soon turn into an amphibious map when someone destroys a dam and the dynamic 3D water rushes into the map. Having personally played the game, the physics seem very top notch. The law of gravity is felt in the game through bullet drop, in which you have to aim above your enemies to eliminate them. Another similarity is buoyancy in water. When water comes into the map, you have to wade through it and you can feel the displacement that your 3D character has while in the water. It's slower while moving through water than on land because of the density that water has compared to air. Explosions also seem top notch and physically accurate, with fragments and debris scattering everywhere after a various cause of an explosion.

        What I find most unique about the similarities between Battlefield 4 and real life is the concept of external ballistics. When a bullet is in motion the forces that are acting upon the bullet are drag, gravity, and wind(if there is any). Gravity causes the bullet to have a downward acceleration while traveling. Drag, or the air resistance, decelerates the projectile with a force proportional to the square of the velocity. Wind makes the bullet stray from the trajectory path. Battlefield 4 incorporates programing of drag to simulate the bullet drop.





                In conclusion, video games seem to be becoming more and more physically realistic. Battlefield 4's portrayal of destructible environments and realistic physics like bullet drop show that game developers want to immerse players into a dynamic 3D world. Grand Theft Auto V has 3D models which interact with an open world differently every time the game plays, causing physics in the game to be dynamic and fully dependent on how the player interacts with the environment.

Bibliography: http://www.webpronews.com/the-frostbite-3-engine-brings-beautiful-destruction-to-battlefield-4-2013-09 ,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/External_ballistics, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphoria_(software),
http://www.techradar.com/us/news/gaming/the-tech-that-built-an-empire-how-rockstar-created-the-world-of-gta-5-1181281 , The book Motion In Games, by Arjan Egges

Images are based on games that I am not affiliated with and I do not own. Here are the links to the images:
http://cooltwitterbackgrounds.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Sky_Grass_1920x1200_cool_twitter_backgrounds.jpg
http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Battlefield-4-3.jpg
http://static.cdn.ea.com/battlelog/prod/61d099d23fe104fe673091d470c96970/en_US/blog/en/files/2013/06/E3_MP_03_WM.jpg?v=1377040017.82
http://www.digitaltrends.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Grand-Theft-Auto-V-rocket-launcher.jpg