Game physics have taken a more prominent role in modern games as developers strive for greater realism to create more immersive environments. Features like rag doll physics and deformable terrain have gradually become part and parcel of game development now and they all require physics in some form or another. Usually, the CPU has done most of this work. However, the general-purpose nature of the CPU means that it is not the best candidate for a specialized task like physics calculations, which requires extensive floating-point capabilities and memory bandwidth. Simulating collision detection for potentially tens of thousands of particles and objects does not come natively to the CPU..



Link: HardwareZone