How does a physics engine work?

fassbendersbum

fassbendersbum

23
Polyphony have created what I think is a pretty good physics engine for GT6.

What I'm wondering is... when they've finished developing their physics engine, is it just a case of putting the values for a car (like bhp, weight, measurements etc.) into the physics engine and letting it automatically calculate what that car would handle like? Or does it not work that way?

Also, some people say that some cars are accurate in terms of their driving model while others are not. Why do these inconsistencies exist if they're in the same physics engine?
 
There's a lot more than just a couple of values. You need to get the power curves down, the aerodynamics and possible active wings and stuff, the suspension, the weight distribution, gear ratios and so on...
I think that those inconsistencies are related to either bad inputs of the car's values or just points the physics engine can't get right at all, or both.
 
The simple answer is that a physics engine takes an input and provides an output. If X, then Y.

Input comes from the player through the controller and goes to the physics engine. The engine then uses these inputs in equations, which provides an output that is represented on screen graphically.
 
And the whole point of a "physics engine" in a simulation is to reproduce the equivalent output for a given input, should those things be taking place in real life.

So those equations contained in the physics engine will be "models" of certain physical things - like torque from an engine, downforce from a wing, drag from a tyre etc. and they will all be interacting in specially designed ways that mimic the real world interactions, to some accuracy, for some fraction of the actual complexity (computational cost).
 

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