Pre-baked Physics
Pre-baked physics is a game development and simulation technique where complex physics calculations are precomputed and stored as data (e.g., animations, textures, or lookup tables) rather than computed in real-time. This approach offloads computational work from the runtime engine to a preprocessing stage, allowing for detailed and realistic physics effects without performance overhead during execution. It is commonly used for static or predictable interactions, such as destructible environments, cloth simulation, or fluid dynamics in games and visual effects.
Developers should use pre-baked physics when real-time physics calculations are too computationally expensive for the target platform, such as in mobile games, VR applications, or large-scale simulations where frame rate stability is critical. It is ideal for scenarios where physics interactions are deterministic and do not require dynamic user input, such as pre-scripted destruction sequences, environmental animations, or offline rendering for films. This technique helps optimize performance by reducing CPU/GPU load during gameplay, enabling more complex visual effects on hardware with limited resources.