future of games w/ multi-core support

[Nailezs]

hey guys. does anyone have any theories on how soon games will start to take full advantage of multi-core(4, 6, 8, etc) cpus?

 

[erocker]

Some already do.

 

[Kreij]

I think you will see more and more games fully utilizing multi-cores (not just function specific threads) as the tools to create the games get better. As always, time is a factor in the development cycle and when the tools allow for easy and rapid multi-core development you will see almost all of the game studios jump on the bandwagon.

 

[Nailezs]

Some already do.

i know but i thought that for the most part they didnt use any more than 2 cores, due to dual-core cpu's still being so popular.

I think you will see more and more games fully utilizing multi-cores (not just function specific threads) as the tools to create the games get better. As always, time is a factor in the development cycle and when the tools allow for easy and rapid multi-core development you will see almost all of the game studios jump on the bandwagon.

so really it depends on the next generatin of games, so like ~2 years?

 

[Kreij]

You will see more and more coming down the pike, but I think it will depend more on the next generation of tools for game creation, not the next generation of games.

 

[AphexDreamer]

=================Quad Core=====================================
Bioshock (Unreal Engine 3) - Quad core support.
Call Of Duty 4 - Ground up quad core support.
Company of Heroes - Ground up quad core support
Crysis - MP Beta Dual Core support, full game ground up Quad Core support.
DiRT - Ground up quad core support (up to 8 cores reported).
Flight Simulator X - Quad core support with patch.
Lost Planet - Ground up quad core support. (octa core support as well).
MOH: Airborn (Unreal Engine 3) - Ground up quad core support.
Supreme Commander - Ground up quad core support.
The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion - Quad core ground up, can use 5 threads.
World in Conflict - Ground up quad core support.
Unreal Tournament 3 (Unreal Engine 3) - Ground up quad core support.
http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,...rks-75-percent-boost-for-quad-cores/Practice/
==================Dual Core=====================================
Age of Empires 3 - Dual core support.
Call of Duty 2 with 1.01 smp patch - Dual Core support
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars - Native dual core support (possible quad, need confirmation).
EVE online - Dual core (possible quad core, need confirmation)
Falcon 4.0 - Some Support, extent unknown.
Galactic Civilizations II - Dual core support.
Gothic 3 - Dual core support.
HL2: Orangebox - Dual core support
Stalker - Dual core support with 1.0004 patch.
Quake 4 - Dual Core with patch.
Titan quest + Titan quest Immortal Throne - Dual core with patch.
World of Warcraft - Dual Core with patch.

Old list taken from http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=213165


More official list http://www.grandtheftpc.com/2010/03/list-of-quad-core-optimized-games.html

Plenty more games out there. I'd say most if not all modern day valve games are also make use of Quads.

 

[Nokiacrazi]

The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion - Quad core ground up, can use 5 threads.

Got to install Oblivion when I upgrade!

 

[Swamp Monster]

Witcher 2 will use multi core:
http://tw2.thewitcher.com/#video/0_1
Dev diary 3 Video says:
Rendering thread that asynchronously gathers tasks for graphic card
Thread, streaming game resources in the background, allowing to eliminate loading screens

 

[Nailezs]

You will see more and more coming down the pike, but I think it will depend more on the next generation of tools for game creation, not the next generation of games.

=================Quad Core=====================================
Bioshock (Unreal Engine 3) - Quad core support.
Call Of Duty 4 - Ground up quad core support.
Company of Heroes - Ground up quad core support
Crysis - MP Beta Dual Core support, full game ground up Quad Core support.
DiRT - Ground up quad core support (up to 8 cores reported).
Flight Simulator X - Quad core support with patch.
Lost Planet - Ground up quad core support. (octa core support as well).
MOH: Airborn (Unreal Engine 3) - Ground up quad core support.
Supreme Commander - Ground up quad core support.
The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion - Quad core ground up, can use 5 threads.
World in Conflict - Ground up quad core support.
Unreal Tournament 3 (Unreal Engine 3) - Ground up quad core support.
http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,...rks-75-percent-boost-for-quad-cores/Practice/
==================Dual Core=====================================
Age of Empires 3 - Dual core support.
Call of Duty 2 with 1.01 smp patch - Dual Core support
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars - Native dual core support (possible quad, need confirmation).
EVE online - Dual core (possible quad core, need confirmation)
Falcon 4.0 - Some Support, extent unknown.
Galactic Civilizations II - Dual core support.
Gothic 3 - Dual core support.
HL2: Orangebox - Dual core support
Stalker - Dual core support with 1.0004 patch.
Quake 4 - Dual Core with patch.
Titan quest + Titan quest Immortal Throne - Dual core with patch.
World of Warcraft - Dual Core with patch.

Old list taken from http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=213165


More official list http://www.grandtheftpc.com/2010/03/list-of-quad-core-optimized-games.html

Plenty more games out there. I'd say most if not all modern day valve games are also make use of Quads.

that pretty much answers my question lol


course, in the wanderings of my mind(and wikipedia) i have had another questin pop up. as far as software goes, what the difference between cores and threads? does software(games, os, etc) treat a 4 core, 8 thread cpu as basically a 8core cpu?

 

[Crap Daddy]

I don't really think we will see major development in utilizing more than 2 cores until next gen consoles are out. Very few developers think in terms of PC when making a game. Sure there are games that properly utilize 4 cores but most of them run very well on fast 2 cores. I can think on just one major game that clearly favors quads and that is GTA4 which we all now was horribly ported to the PC and extensively patched to get it working. Sure you can get 20-30 FPS more with a quad but who cares when you already have 60+ and you vsync.

 

[streetfighter 2]

To elaborate slightly on what AphexDreamer said...

I recently installed F1 2010 (which uses the DiRT 2 engine) and I was poking around trying to improve the graphics quality. In one of the files called, "hardware_settings_config.xml", I found this very neat little bit:

<cpu>
     <threadStrategy parallelUpdateRender="true" workerMapFile="system/workerMap4Core.xml" forceFeedbackProcessor="3" dvdStorageProcessor="3" dataSetMonitorProcessor="1" renderProcessor="0" updateProcessor="2" fileStreamProcessor="3" />
</cpu>

Pretty cool that I can change the threading strategy for the game!

On the other hand, the usefulness of an n-core processor diminishes very quickly as n>>1 in most games. Game developers are clearly working on new ways to utilize the high core count in modern processors, but we'll have to wait and see how that turns out.

 

[crazyeyesreaper]

that list above is wrong they say they support quads but after a fast dual core to quad they make no difference

almost everyone of those games up there is marketed as quad core support but they dont do squat the few games i know of that TRULY support quadcores

Dragon Age Origins

Battlefield Bad Company 2

there pretty much it in the you need a quad to play this department

with BC2 showing a near 90% increase in average frame rate going from 2 to 4 cores
and Dragon Age shows a 40% improvement going from an i5 650 to an i5 750 2c 4t to 4c 4t shows a 40% increase thats 100fps vs 140fps with the same gpu

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/CPU/60

http://www.overclock.net/pc-games/659536-contagion-review-dual-core-vs-quad.html

theres basically only 2 games out there that TRULY use a quad out of box

Supreme commander needs a community developed tool to proper utilize extra threads so that it will utilize a multi core cpu thus out of box its not really quad core ready

 

[PVTCaboose1337]

If you code you will learn quickly that it is tough to have the computer do two things at once. In addition, there are no modern languages that lots use to program in parallel. Parallel computing has been a fun theory for a while, but we are just getting into it. Until a true parallel language comes about, we won't have games that can do this, let alone programs or operating systems. We won't have GOOD parallel coding for another 5 years, trust me.

 

[Kreij]

I agree. The hardware is here, but the tools (development environments) have not quite caught up, although new APIs for parallel programming are coming out now.
It used to be a laborious task to create a UI for a windows program, now it is trivial and one of the easiest parts of creating an application.
When APIs come out to make massive parallelism a trivial task you will see almost all new applications (including games) making use of the technology.
You will probably also see programs use excessive threading when they don't really need it (Why is Solitaire launching 43 threads?!? )

 

[hat]

course, in the wanderings of my mind(and wikipedia) i have had another questin pop up. as far as software goes, what the difference between cores and threads? does software(games, os, etc) treat a 4 core, 8 thread cpu as basically a 8core cpu?

Yes, it will see it as an 8 core cpu.

 

[Kreij]

Uhh... no offense hat, but that not right.
A progrqam can launch any number of threads and it is up to the OS to dish them out unless the program explicity states what core they should run on at the time. Hyperthreading is an OS layer not an application layer.
A well written program can determine the available number of cores and load balance based on that if the developers want to put that effort into their code.
We will be seeing more programs written for N numbers of cores in the near future, and the code will self optimize for the available processing power. We are not quite there yet, but it's getting really close.

 

[PVTCaboose1337]

We are not quite there yet, but it's getting really close.

Really close, meaning we don't have a language to support this, let alone sound logic. People have different ways they want to implement this, and the problem is a standard has to be made. Really close should mean 1-2 years, but in reality, 5 years.

 

[Kreij]

You are right PVT, but I think we are looking at 3 years for major API adoption with (quasi) standards.

I could be wrong, but watching the gaming market and reading between the lines shows a push for a more timely adoption of parallelism.

Just my 2 cents.

 

[PVTCaboose1337]

You are right PVT, but I think we are looking at 3 years for major API adoption with (quasi) standards.

I could be wrong, but watching the gaming market and reading between the lines shows a push for a more timely adoption of parallelism.

Just my 2 cents.

Parallel computing is a growing field now that we have multicore processors, but think of how long we have had them. Pentium-D's were released in 2005. 5 years, 5 years to get things right and create a language and whatnot. Has much been done? No. Will it become important? Yes. Intel said that it was unable to make a more powerful chip, that was the purpose of the Pentium-D's! More cores is clearly the future, until we reach the ability to produce biological computers or something. I think once developers realize that they need to program differently, programming is going to evolve to a whole different level, and at that point, games will become multi-core supporting on a much larger scale than we currently see. I think 3 years sounds about right Kreij, I can't wait to see what happens.

 

[TAViX]

Ok, here are some test with an AMD Phenom II using 2, 4 or 6 cores. The results are very interesting. I hope this helps:

http://www.overclockers.com.au/article.php?id=910126

Example:

 

[avatar_raq]

I think games will use 4 cores when quad cores CPUs become the norm and 8+ cores become the 'high end' (in other words PC hardware will always be ahead of software), by then directX 9 and 10 should be forgotten and all games will use a threaded DX (11, 12..), lets hope this leap will happen soon after the introduction of new xbox/ps.

 

[rossfrom]

when the new Consoles arrive (PS4, Xbox 3D) the games will have better Graphic so they required more resource.

 

[TAViX]

Than, we should all have dual cores until 2013??? hahaha

 

[T3kl0rd]

BFBC2 is a beast and needs a quad, no doubt. I was playing that and the fully destructible environment taxes systems to the max, even my PC. AAx4 is the max I can run if I want 60 FPS locked @ max settings. When I ran WoW, I looked in task manager and 4 cores were being used, so they may have patched in quad support with the Catalyst patch. There are more games than BFBC2 and DA:O that benefit from a quad right now, so only go at least quad if you are upgrading CPUs from now on.

 

[TAViX]

The thing is that if you have Win 7, in task manager you will ALWAYS see the 4 cores being used, since they are use by Windows anyways. I agree, there are games that use all the 4 cores, like Dragon Age, GRiD, F1-2010, etc, but heck, even when I play Solitaire, surfing web and listening to music, I can see all 4 cores working, so...