X-bit labs

The Second Encounter: DirectX 10 Games vs. Contemporary Graphics Accelerators (page 4)

Category: Video

by Alexey Stepin , Yaroslav Lyssenko, Anton Shilov

[ 10/26/2007 | 02:20 PM ]

PT Boats: Knights of the Sea demo

This is a rare representative of the simulator genre. PT Boat means a patrol torpedo boat, so we’re dealing with sea warfare here.

This project is being developed by the Russia-based Akella and the developer claims to be very meticulous about the realism of the gameplay. It is largely achieved by implementing DirectX 10 capabilities into the modified Storm 2.5 engine. Particularly, the game will use:

• Realistic rendering of underwater scenes;
• Improved physical model;
• Photorealistic water with dynamic physical model;
• Complex materials with BRDF;
• Improved HDR lighting;
• Improved effects using particle systems;
• High level of detail of distanced landscapes.

No wonder the rendering of water calls for more developer’s attention here than in BioShock considering the genre. Even though we’re talking about a demo version, PT Boats looks very promising visually.

The recently released demo is not interactive, but offers integrated benchmarking options, so we can test modern graphics card with more accuracy than if we used Fraps. Unfortunately, the results of tests in a non-interactive demo can hardly be indicative of the graphics cards’ performance in the final version of the game.