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The most satisfying physics in PC gamesOne Off The List
One Off The List
An obscenely rich teenager throws his VR controller across the room in a fit of blind panic while playingHalf-Life: Alyx. It leaves the window of his bedroom at 5m/s. It falls 10m vertically and hits his neighbour’s greenhouse, smashing the glass. How many metres did the controller travel horizontally before coming to a stop in the tomatoes? Use a kinematic formula to determine your answer and show your wor–
UGH, physics. Here are 10 games where physics is not boring, but good.
Grand Theft Auto V
Fromcruel pushestocomical stumbling, Rockstar’s crime ‘em up is a ragdoll paradise, casting you as both nasty minion of tyrannical physics and itsfrequent victim. The physical laws of Los Santos will tolerate silly stunts, but they will not tolerate a head smashed against a sidewalk at speed. The mercurial physics engine also makes cars control suspiciously well, whether they arenovelty bangers or superfast richmobiles. But it went one step further recently, when it transpired Formula 1 racers were generating so much lift, theystuck to the ceilings of tunnels, Rollcage-style.
Kerbal Space Program
Rocket science might be the default metaphor for impenetrable realms of knowledge, butKerbal Space Programhas faith in you to learn. It is easier, granted, when all those stuffy equations are replaced with tiny green men and women with bulbous heads and irrepressible smiles. This spacefaring sim will give you expensive, dangerous rockets and wait until you’re having fun launching schmucks into space, and then it will stealth-teach you orbital mechanics and the laws of motion. It’s a sort of trojan spacehorse with the entire staff of Khan Academy hidden inside, ready to pounce out and kick the definition of Delta-V into your head. An admirable game that challenges you not only to giggle at physics going wrong, but to learn how far we can go when we get it right.
Just Cause 4
Or you could just stick a bunch of tiny rockets toa deer’s arse.
Crayon Physics Deluxe
A puzzle platformer without the clueless protagonist. It must have been a deeply cathartic moment for the makers of this draw-your-own-solution puzzle game when they realised it didn’t need to include a tiny, square-shaped being with a hat or something. All you need to do is get a ball from one place to another, with liberal use of Crayola. Draw a plank. Draw a see-saw. Draw a big crooked robot with swinging arms and a head full of teeth. As long as it gets that red ball where it needs to be, and Mother Physics approves, it’s a perfectly good solution. Shame it being digital means you miss out on the traditional post-drawing activity: eating the crayons.
Totally Accurate Battle Simulator
Shouldbe taughtin military academies.
Besiege
What is physics if not the liberal administering of large rocks? Okay, maybe better suited to an engineering listicle, but still, you cannot deny the brute strength of this simulation. You can make a plane that flaps likea bird and a dragonfly all at onceand manages to stay aloft. You can make a terrifying and laughably inaccuratefireball cannon. You candestroy the world. That’s good physics.
Session
Sublime.
Line Rider
Half-life: Alyx
I haven’t played Half-life: Alyx, because I am not a bazillionaire. But just watch Matthew and Katharinetackle the first couple of hoursand tell me that’s not some good physics. Cor.
Human Fall Flat
400g drunkenness fromGang Beasts200g physics puzzles fromHalf-Life 2½ teaspoon controls fromQWOP2 tablespoons chaos of Transformice7g sadism
Mix thoroughly, knead for as long as arms obey own commands, leave to rise until doubled in idiocy, play for thirty minutes until furious at mate Larry.
Portal
Everyone’s fave teleporty puzzler might not seem special physics-wise. You fling yourself across rooms, and sure, that’s neat. But the box-moving and fluid-sliding could just be a set of Half-Life 2 puzzles substantially beefed up with glowy spacetime-warping. However, physicistslove Portal. Because these daft dimensional doorways offer some hidden problems. The most famous is the“Portal Paradox”, which basically asks: “what happens if one of the portals is moving?” One experimenter tried finding out, crushing themselves between two portals. And, uh, it all wenta bit 2001: A Space Odyssey.
GIRP
Thebirdis known as Newton’s Pigeon.
One Off The List from…
Last week we stepped gingerly across the lavas ofthe 10 best hells in games. But one of these was not hellish enough for your liking. It’s…Diablo III.
“It’s Diablo III,” said list decimator Germansuplex, “on account of being Diablo III”.
Well, that was easy. See you next week!
