2016 was a really interesting year, as we got ourselves the first games running on Microsoft’s new API, DirectX 12. DirectX 12 was meant to give developers lower-level access to the graphics cards, which would supposedly make a lot of games run faster/better. After all, a number of developers were asking for low-level access similar to the one the already had on consoles.
However, as it turns out, things did not go as well as most PC gamers anticipated back in 2015. Like it or not, DX12 – in its current state – is not up to what we were expecting from a low-level API. In fact, DX12 is slower than DX11 in almost every game, without adding any new graphical effects (something that was happening in previous versions of DirectX that could somehow justify the performance differences).
We’ve re-tested every DX12 title that was released in 2016 in order to see how they perform on the PC platform. And in pretty much all cases, DX11 performs better than DX12, while also looking exactly the same.
Rise of the Tomb Raider runs faster under DX11, although there are some scenes in which DX12 performs better. Still, overall performance is better under DX11. The same applies to HITMAN. While there were some scenes in which HITMAN ran better under DX12, its overall performance was better in DX11. Not only that, but we’re still noticing some crashing issues under DX12. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided’s DX12 path still suffers from major slowdowns in Prague and runs significantly worse than DX11. Quantum Break’s Windows Store version (DX12-only) runs noticeably worse than its Steam version (DX11-only).
What really surprised us was Battlefield 1’s underwhelming performance in DX12. DICE was the team responsible for Mantle, so we kind of expected truly awesome things from it. After all, the team know how to “write to the metal” and get amazing results from current-gen graphics cards (from both vendors). Instead, Battlefield 1’s DX12 mode runs worse than DX11 on both NVIDIA’s and AMD’s graphics cards. And for the record, Battlefield 4 ran better in Mantle than in DX11.
What also puzzled us was the disappointing performance of two strategy games that supported DX12. Both Sid Meier’s Civilization VI and Total War: WARHAMMER did not benefit from DX12. DX12 is meant to – among other things – offer better multi-tasking capabilities, however both of these titles did not take advantage of that feature.
And then we have the DX12-only titles that were released by Microsoft. From them, only Gears of War 4 runs great, however we don’t have a DX11 version in order to compare it with. Forza Horizon 3 still has major performance issues, and Gears of War: Ultimate Edition’s performance is not up to what we were expecting from a Remaster.
“But why is that happening?” some may ask. And the reason is, quite simple. DX12 is too different from DX11. Without going into a lot of details, developers will have to re-write their whole – or at least major parts of their – engines in order to take advantage of it. But that’s not what is happening these days. Instead, most developers are simply adding DX12 support, relying heavily on features like Async Compute. And while Async Compute comes with some benefits, it’s not the only beneficial feature that DX12 supports.
DX12 is more than Async Compute. DX12 allows for explicit multi-GPU support (a feature that thankfully some games already support), offers better multi-tasking CPU capabilities, reduces CPU overhead and can handle more draw calls than before. DX12 also offers low-level access to the graphics cards, something that – theoretically – should make things easier for experienced developers. And for the time being, only a couple of DX12’s features have been utilized.
It’s also worth addressing the DX12 performance “differences” between NVIDIA and AMD. Architecture-wise, AMD’s GPUs benefit greatly from Async Compute. However, that’s not the only reason why AMD sees some performance benefits in a couple of DX12 titles. AMD’s DX11 drivers are not as optimized as NVIDIA’s drivers. As a result of that, AMD’s GPUs benefit from the lack of a software layer under DX12. In NVIDIA’s case, however, there is no performance gain at all as its DX11 software layer is highly optimized (which makes us wonder whether a low-level access API is actually worth it when NVIDIA’s drivers are doing such an incredible work already).
DirectX 12 is an interesting low-level API, no doubt about that. However, it’s quite obvious that its current implementations in today’s games are really, really awful. These current implementations also prove that DX12 won’t magically improve performance. On the contrary. As it’s been proven, it can actually decrease performance.
In order to take proper advantage of it, developers will have to re-write their engines and built them around it. Whether developers will do such a thing in 2017 remains to be seen!
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
Contact: Email
Amiga ?
Insert some variation of;
“Don’t worry, it’ll be better next year, once developers get more used to working with it.”
Insert my response;
“In order to take proper advantage of it, developers will have to re-write their engines and built them around it. Whether developers will do such a thing in 2017 remains to be seen!”
Who, the “we know better than you what you want, so shut up & take it!” people who were too lazy to even adopt DX11 until consoles finally got support for it in Fall 2013?
Yeah, no.
P.S. Kudos for writing this, DSOG, especially since it’ll probably net you some serious backslash.
You mean they’ve rushed it out of the door?
I’m shocked! :O
No kidding. When your new Shader Language is almost 2 years late, that’s a hell of a rush job.
DX12 might be good… might be, but Micro$oft just had to kill it by making it exclusive to Windows 10 and their crappy Windows Store games, which are already just sloppy ports for a quick buck and no API in the world can save them. I mean, DX12 shows huge performance gains… in Dolphin. That freaking emulator that was already good to begin with…
So yeah, screw Micro$oft. Vulkan is the way to go… if it ever catches on…
“exclusive to Windows 10 and their crappy Windows Store games”
— it’s exclusive to just Win10, not the Windows Store.
“Vulkan is the way to go… if it ever catches on…”
— It probably won’t and you’ll eventually be playing on DX12. Inconvenient truth.
“It probably won’t and you’ll eventually be playing on DX12. Inconvenient truth.”
Says who? DX12 is struggling to take off, Windows 10 is struggling to take off, it’s more likely we’ll be moving on to DX13 & Windows “We’re Sorry” long before DX12 becomes industry standard.
As for Vulkan – could yet go either way, let’s wait & see what Nvidia does in 2017 first, for one thing.
Says me. Take that as you will. Vulkan will never overtake DX12 or even have any significant marketshare. If DX12 isn’t worth the investment developers will stick to DX11 and move to 13 when that comes out. The Vulkan cheerleading squad isn’t enough to sustain a separate API for game development.
I’m with you there (said pretty much the same myself in another post), except for how you’re assuming Vulkan won’t gain traction because it won’t gain any backing by any of the major players, for example, say, a certain green GPU manufacturer that’s getting pounded by DX12….
Regardless, as you said yourself, it’s more likely developers will stick with DX11 & then jump straight to 13 than learn to adapt to DX12 – assuming nobody bribes them into Vulkan. Time will tell either way, but no matter what, DX12 isn’t becoming industry standard any time soon, & that’s my guarantee, take that as you will.
My point is that you’re bound to see DX12 take off much faster than Vulkan. As for industry standards, DX11 will continue to dominate for at least the next 5 years.
By which point we’ll be staring at DX13, if not 14, no?
“By which point we’ll be staring down DX13”
Next big version of DirectX will is planed for April 2017 (GDC). MS said that they will show new DirectX for Shader Model 6. Only 4 months to wait. Can’t wait for new DX and Xbox Scorpio. Next year will be great 🙂
Perhaps, depending on MS’s plans with the update cycle of Win10. Developer uptake of new API versions is usually much slower in comparison to their releases.
Indeed, especially when consoles don’t support them….. >.< Though to be fair, it does seem as if we won't be running into that particular hurdle any time soon, which is nice.
“The only problem is getting devs to adopt it.”
That, as usual. They barely got on board with the official DX11.1 (Windows 8 DirectX 11), & DX11.3 (Windows 10 DirectX 11) has, like, 0 adopters…..
Pretty much, at least until they figure out what Volta is going to be. I mean, it sucks, sure, but I don’t really see any alternatives regardless of if they go for Vulkan or DX12 (until Volta), & either way it does mean upgrading from the near-decade-old DX11 coding, at the very least, so in the end it is better than nothing, no?
Nvidia’s run by a bunch of morons, nothing new there.
Either way, it doesn’t matter what they think. They tried to push DX12 onto us knowing it would run like sh*t on their cards, & exactly what anyone with half a brain cell could have told them was going to happen, happened; it backfired epically. As such, in the short-term their only available option to counter AMD’s ever-expanding DX12 dominion is getting on board with Vulkan, partial support or not.
Either that, or keep pushing DX11 like a bunch of idiots, I suppose, but honestly, even a moron can tell that “11” > 12″, & I think even Nvidia can figure that out, & nobody’s buying into their DX12 marketing anymore, not with those oh-so-hilarious DX12 benchmarks that keep getting published.
Interesting, though in theory, Nvidia could spin that to their advantage with their little GimpWorks bribes, regardless of their archaic sequential workloads, no?
Granted, either way we’re talking short-term, just until Volta shows up, as already mentioned, etc.
So far almost all DX12 supported games are also games available via Windows Store… There are some exceptions (Rise of The Tomb Raider, the new Hitman game… I may be missing out on some games here…), but the point is, all that hype for DX12 was used for sloppy PC ports.
It might run better on AMD hardware, but those DX12 games are still rather sloppy ports. And I’m not touching the Windows Store with a 10 foot pole. Seriously, I couldn’t play games on that Store, even free to play games, because they wouldn’t launch. And guess what was the fix… uninstall Avast. I think this is a sign… Or that time half a year ago when I couldn’t even launch the freaking store until Microsoft finally fixed via a Windows update… after 1 month.. Yeah, I won’t be buying any game on that thing.
And no, I’m no Nvidia fanboy, this is the harsh reality. That’s why I said, DX12 might be good. But nobody will know because Microsoft screwed royally.
“but the point is, all that hype for DX12 was used for sloppy PC ports.”
I don’t think that’s an inherent problem of the API as much as it is a problem with the games themselves and driver implementations.
It isn’t… but because there are so many of them using DX12, most people might assume the API is at fault, especially those who aren’t that tech savvy.
Try thinking this from the perspective of an average Joe and you will see why DX12 didn’t set the world on fire.
Yet these “average joes” always seem to make the most noise without being analytical, don’t you think? Hurr DX12 suxxxorz, screw evil M$$$$. Etc. etc. I believe the right thing to do would be to treat each game on a case by case basis and evaluate the DX12 implementation for that particular title accordingly.
Agreed, I still believe that if implemented properly, DX12 can boost performance for games. My reason for believing this is that freaking emuator I mentioned earlier, Dolphin. The devs behind Dolphin actually bothered to implement DX12 properly and it shows.
Now if only PCSX2 would have a DX12 or hell, even a Vulakn backend… OpenGL kind of helps in PCSX2 for Nvidia GPU’s, but for AMD GPU’s it’s horrible, like really horrible. CEMU uses OpenGL too and it runs good on AMD GPU’s as well… huh. I know OpenGL and AMD GPU’s don’t mix well, so that’s a nice surprise. 🙂
You have to admit one thing, though. Microsoft dun f***ed up.
Huh.
Interesting, good point….. O.o
The only f*ckup on MS’s part was that they still restrict the DX12 audience to Win10. I think the best thing for MS to do would be to release DX12 for Win7 like they did with Vista and DX11 now that the free upgrade period is over. That would see a wider adoption of DX12 and be beneficial for the industry in general.
Indeed, but Microsoft can’t do that, it would be tandem to admitting Windows 10 is a joke 🙁
because mantle was tailored specifically for GCN hardware. but DX12 was made so they can be compatible with any other IHV hardware. you want to go low level (architecture specific) and yet you want it to work on many different architecture. that surely going to be a mess. vulkan fare a bit more better in this low level API stuff because of extension function that the API inherit mainly from OGL.
corect
If only MS had cared for us instead of trying to turn PC into a closed console garden that they could padlock forever. If only they actually read the PC market, read Valve’s book of lessons learned over the years, and just stayed open with 10 and DX 12, then none of this crap would have happened as bad as it is right now.
Oh! You bet. I’ve never forgotten it exists.. absolutely, just like I never forgot abt the existence of dx10. Man What game changers these are.
DX10 was the biggest milestone of the modern gaming. Period.
Considering Microsoft, I bet they’d go straight to DX14, just like they did with Windows 8 to Windows 10.
Because 7 8 9, derp.
they only did that because windows 10 is service and keeps getting updated because microsoft figured out they are hurting themselves more than benefiting from spliting pc market into multiple OSs
Fuc* the DX 12 and go on Vulkan!
lel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_with_Vulkan_support
no
100% with you on that. After what Doom accomplished. The smoothness can’t be forgotten 🙁
It didn’t work out for Dishonored 2, so I might be more about the developer than the engine.
currently it doesn’t have vulkan support
Okay, that’s exactly what i thought.
Yeah, just to confirm; VOID is a DX11 Engine. No DX12, no Vulkan, no OpenGL.
Are you sure Dishonored 2 has vulkan support right now ?
It didnt work for many games!
Uh, Dishonored 2 is running a very modified by Arkane ID Tech 5 running VOID, not ID Tech 6, which was used in DOOM.
Yup!
DOOM’s implementation of Vulkan truly demonstrated its real power/potential when properly implemented. I mean the performance gains were mind-boggling on both Nvidia and even more on AMD…
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Not on my machine I get 5 fps more maybe.
Yes. Anything else is completely unacceptable after the DOOM guys demonstrated how things should be done.
NO.
“Deus Ex: Mankind Divided’s DX12 path still suffers from major slowdowns in Prague and runs significantly worse than DX11.”
It makes a 390X perform the same as a GTX 1080 (at 1080p) or GTX 1070 (at 1440p). Sounds damn good to me.
This.I have Rx 470 and Deus Ex: MD runs better on DX12.Nvidia GPUs still have problems with DX12.
The problem here is that DX12 is absolutely pointless unless you have Radeon, for which it was specifically made (XBox1), because DX11 versions look exactly the same compared to their DX12 counterparts but run faster or just as well on equal NVidia cards under DX11 vs. AMD at DX12. Meaning DX12 brings absolutely nothing useful to the table. Low-level API? OK, what exactly makes it better than driver-dependent DX11 for a GeForce owner?
Granted, the 390X is still a beast of a GPU. Huh, guess DX12 has its fair shair of games used well too.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b14877a7a02505761ebd429a1fb7f040c56bfcf5e7ce9ef635851467f14e0710.jpg
Note how the DX12 cake has no new tasty ingredients, but causes one to salivate slower
Oh man, this is gonna be sooooo good. Waiting for Amiga4000…
Lmao wait is this guy serious there were so many games he mentioned that actually run so much better on AMD but he talked as if they all ran bad on both companies of cards…
this is an nvidia exclusive website not a pc gaming website, don’t be mad at them
They run better on AMD, but still most of them run kind of crappy regardless, with some exceptions.
It’s like comparing a dog turd to manure. They both stink. But at least you can use manure as fertilizier… I don’t know where I’m going with this…
Dude what are you talking about old Gen amd cards are competitive with new Gen nvidia cards like the 390x and fury x fury etc I’m not even a fanboy I have a gtx 1070 and 970 before that and even I can see how good dx 12 is
I said most of them… that’s why I made the comparison. I know there are games that implemented DX12 better.
Though I do admit AMD is the clear winner when it comes to DX12 and Vulkan. Glad they give Nvidia a run for their money now. 🙂
Also I myself own an old HD 7870 and it still holds up pretty well for newer games… provided they aren’t crappy ports. Might upgrade to an RX 470, since it seems like the best value GPU right about now.
“In order to take proper advantage of it, developers will have to
re-write their engines and built them around it. Whether developers will
do such a thing in 2017 remains to be seen!”
Who, the “we know better than you what you want, so shut up & take it!” people who were too lazy to adopt DX11 until consoles finally got support for it in Fall 2013?
Yeah, no.
Vulkan actually allows hardware to run games better rather than run worse. Vulkan is compatible with Windows 10, 7, 8, Linux and OS X where DX12 is Windows 10 only. Outside of Microsoft bribery why would any developer in their right mind choose DX12 ?
While I agree in full, there’s always the standing time-old issue of developers being lazy pr*cks; Vulkan is an OpenGL successor, & they’ve spent the last several decades in a Direct3D-dominated haze, so most of them would rather persist with DX11 until Microsoft “repents” with DX13 than switch to OpenGL, unless some major industry player starts backing (read: bribing them into) Vulkan, like Nvidia.
Because their games and engines are build on DirectX and it’s cheaper + it won’t affect sales badly as Windows 7 users can still run it in dx11
DX12 works… if it only works… but it doesn’t work most of the time.
The tech is brilliant, it’s the usage of it that leaves a sour taste in the mouth.
The usage, & the requirements to use it in the first place, both…..
“but it doesn’t work most of the time.” Also describes my employment history.
Let’s hope Vulkan kills off DX12. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0cebad7b1a1eda65a33ee712b198cc566013e2f62bfb4f221e55793b978eea28.png
I get it.
So? What, you want a cookie or something?
Go away, kid ;P
Want vodka-martini and a long island ice tea… and a cookie.
This article is only for NVIDIA owners 🙁
are you new to this website?
Great read, thanks for this.
Why pick the inferior DX12 when Vulkan is more efficient and platform agnostic? If devs/publishers were really sincere about their support of the PC platform they would use Vulkan to get rid of DX11 drawcalls limitations, not half baked DX12 support as an extra layer of bloatware…
“OpenGL vs. Direct3D.”
And of course, the most important thing to keep in mind;
“Lazy.”
🙁
Its all about the cost of game development. DirectX 12 use HLSL as its shader language. This language is shared by DX11, DX12, Mantle and have cross compiler with PlayStation 4 (extension to VS2010 created by Sony in 2013). Developers can write single code and use it on PC, Xbox, PlayStation.
Vulcan doesn’t work on any console. It use own shader language SPIR shared only with OpenGL. Only game developers who already use OpenGL can share code between OpenGL and Vulkan.
Thanks for your reply mate. Very interesting info!
So basically, Vulkan can’t take off, even if it’s open source, because consoles… and devs that aren’t willing to learn it…
And DX12 is used in sloppy PC ports… because Microsoft… and consoles…
Gee, what a time to be alive. 🙂
This is not story of one year. This is story of nearly 20 years of game development. MS works on shader languages since late 90. First with Nvidia they create Nvidia Cg language which was first shader language for GeForce 3/4. Next in 2001 as part of DirectX 9c they created HLSL which was first language that works on both gpu’s from Nvidia and ATI (now AMD).
After release of HLSL nearly all game developers drop OpenGL because DX9c was only chance to create single code between Nvidia and ATI. Khronos create first version of OpenGL Shader Language in 2004 but it was too late. Few months later in 2005 MS introduced Xbox360 as first game console with support of shaders. After big success of Xbox 360 and Windows XP (DX9c) their language HLSL become “industry standard” for game development.
Last 10 years was also good for HLSL. In 2006 MS created ‘shader model 4’ with universal shaders (pixel, vertex and new geometry). In 2009 as part of DX11 they create ‘shader model 5’ for HLSL with new compute shader and tesselation shader. Next year they plan release ‘shader model 6’ with new HLSL partial compilers.
Its very hard to change “industry standards”. This is reason why Mantle used HLSL instead of SPIR from OpenGL. Also Sony supports HLSL for PlayStation 4 SDK with own cross compiler to PlayStation Shader Language. Developers always wanted single API between different hardware.
Well that’s all fine and dandy, but this begs these questions… what was the point of Vulkan in the first place? What is the point of OpenGL for that matter? Why Microsoft decided to restrict DX12 to Windows 10 and for mosttly sloppy PC ports?
Also I like to mention the fact that as soon as the Xbox 360 became popular, most PC ports also became more shittier and devs more lazier… So much for “industry standard”, huh.
OpenGL used to be Direct3D for Linux & OS X until quite recently, basically. Also, it used to be relatively viable before DirectX 11 left it in the dust. Now Apple has Metal (not sure how well it compares, though, since there’s no direct benchmarks), though.
As for Vulkan, well, I’m assuming this order of events occurred, though there’s no way to know for sure either way, honestly; AMD makes & launches Mantle, Nvidia tells Mantle to f*ck off, so AMD gives Mantle to the Khronos Group, & the Group decides to make an OpenGL successor using it. In response, Microsoft rips off Mantle & includes it in DirectX 12, which otherwise would have basically just been the DirectX 11.3 features.
As a result, we now have two “Mantle successor projects”, one courtesy of AMD & the Khronos Group, & one courtesy of Micro$h*t. As for restricting it; to be fair, they’ve been doing that for ages. I hoped-expected them to do otherwise this time around due to how badly Windows 8 & 8.1 were doing, but yeah, no. They’ve sometimes back-ported some features from the new Direct3D version to the older one (DX11 -> Vista for example), but it’s not a rule with them.
They see it as a means to boost adoption numbers, regardless of how the OS itself is perceived. Remember how they were really pushing DX11.1 adoption back when Windows 8 first came out, before they abandoned the entire thing for 8.1 & (secretly) 10? The same will happen here. Once they drop Win 10, they’ll drop the push for DX12 as well, since they’ll stop caring. It’s similar to how they never pushed DX11, because the X360 was a DX9 conslow.
That’s a yes & a no. The industry as a whole switched from a “PC-first with an occasional console port” focus to a “consoles first, with sh*tty PC ports” mindset focus once the PS3/X360 generation proved its financial worth to publishers, & kickstarted the “Platform Trinity” age, as well as the “PC Gaming is Dead” propaganda campaign (not to mention the “mainstreaming of gameplay” thing that continues even to this day) so these things are all interlocked, to be fair, but yeah, it all started with the X360 & the PS3, & ironically, as I like to point out, it’s all because Epic Games pushed them to double the RAM on the X360…….
If it weren’t for that particular billion-dollar maneuver, Microsoft’s Sh*tbox would have been left in the dust 12 months later once the PS3 came along, & it would have been a PC-PS3 dominated industry for a handful of years, until Microsoft responded with something that didn’t equal the Wii in terms of hardware strength. LOL.
Granted, the Wii outsold both the PS3 and Xbox360 for some time, because motion controls were the all the rage back then… Heck, Sony and Microsfot made their own versions of motion control… until people realized it was mostly a gimmick and the glitter wore off.
Nintendo took the wrong memo with the Wii sales and made the Wii U. That didn’t turn out too well… Some Nintendo games are awesome, don’t get me wrong, they are at least making “games” even if some of them are recycled… looking at you Mario…, but they still made a gimmicky console.
Take it from me, I come from a 3rd world country… you can still find used PS3’s and Xbox360’s even used if you know where too look . Got an Xbox 360 with a 120 GB for 25 euros in working condition complete with Saints Row 2 and a gamepad, Bayonetta here I come :D… too bad my PS3 YLOD on me just recently… I think I might fix it, there are some services specializing in these sort of things so I’ll still keep my PS3 around (got the 40 GB fat model for 20 euros and intend to pay the same price or less just to fix it). But almost nobody in my country sells a Wii or even a Wii U, or very, very few of them are sold compared to the PS3’s and Xbox360’s. And the prices for them are rather high too. Barely anyone even acknowleges that Nintendo even makes consoles or if they do, they think of them as “children” consoles. As if any other console wasn’t intended for children…
I don’t know where I am going with this comment BTW. :))
Well that’s a shame, as the Wii does have some legendary games of its own – the Metroid Prime Trilogy, for example.
Other than that, yeah. Nintendo’s strong focus on handhelds & their associated brands, like Pokemon, has resulted in Nintendo retaining a public image of a “children-oriented” gaming company, which, it both is, & isn’t.
I still remember, for example about…. 8-ish years ago, when here in my country they tried to advertise the DS to adults by showcasing how it wasn’t just about playing Pokemon, Nintendogs & whatnot.
Good point on sales, last I checked the Wii had still outsold the PS3 & X360 respectively at a 2-1 ratio (100 million vs. 50 million), but that was years ago. Now they’ve almost caught up, at a healthy, respectable 85+ million each (lifetime sales figures).
Well, the Metroid Prime Trilogy was actually on Gamecube, then ported to the Wii (I mean, I guess the Wiimote is better for the game than the gamepad). Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2 are awesome… too bad you kinda need a wiimote for that… and their expensive where I am. Xeboblade Chronichles I heard is awesome. There is a Klonoa remake there and also Donkey Kong Country Returns. Also Sonic Colors is awesome too (more so with the 60 FPS hack) and I even 100% that game with all the red rings collected… all of them. There are probably more awesome games on the Wii, these are just from the top of my head.
I actually made it possible to play Super Mario Galaxy with an Xbox controller on Dolphin … at least if we aren’t talking about minigames, in which case, you need to readjust the controls. What is it with Nintendo and shoving gimmicky controllers as of late?
Nice!
Well, they got it right with the Wii (somewhat), so ever since they’ve basically been trying to do it again, I think. That old saying about thunder hitting the same place twice & whatnot?
That, & the 3rd party controllers market for phones, tablets, etc, I think. After all, the Switch seems to be aimed at both the mobile & console markets.
All of last gen and most other gens just tell me one thing, it’s that console manufacturers only care about what sells the most, not what progresses gaming and benefits technology more, and that’s why we’re still stuck in the past.
Nice rundown Amiga…
Good point, I forgot about the Nintentard Switch.
Why isn’t Vulkan being used on PS4? I know the PS3 used OpenGL… At least then it would be even with DX12 being used on the XBOX ONE…
Sony was actually ready for its new console, they made two brand-new APIs for the PS4, one using the high-level hardware access, & one using low-level access; GNMX & GNM respectively.
Those two utterly replaced the PS3’s PSGL API, so there’s seemingly no reason for Sony to adopt Vulkan, though to be fair, we’ve no actual benchmarks of how well the two compete with each other, just Sony’s call on the matter.
because vulkan still not exist when PS4 hit the market. and sony own API most likely even more low level than vulkan can ever be.
No, nvidia is pushing what they lead in and that is DX11/OGL. Nvidia is the last company that would want to fast implementation of low level APIs.
Nvidia has enough fanboys that they don’t have to worry about anything.
HLSL is reasonably usable in Vulkan today. See the README here: https://github.com/KhronosGroup/glslang/ and the current status of the project here: https://github.com/KhronosGroup/glslang/issues/362
A bigger current limitation of Vulkan is its almost complete lack of support for using multiple GPUs simultaneously. But that too will be addressed eventually.
Because it’s easier and faster and cheaper to impliment it. And because Microsoft is corp. with enough money to carry on their transition to WASS world.
I’m sorry my friend, this battle is over. Developers don’t want use Vulcan, they love DirectX because single code works on PC and Xbox One. Vulcan doesn’t work on game consoles.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ac1244319b453d4bd93f9abe3709f65f7fddd2f1cf08b5130f06b1d04ca884b7.jpg
Yeah, it’s all about the “single code” thing…..
/Facepalm.
P.S. Do I really have to whip out the “Vulkan is 8 months old, DX12 is more than 1.5 years old already” thing AGAIN?
P.P.S. Half of the listed games are Microsoft IP’s……..
/EPIC FACEPALM
Please whip it out 😉
DirectX 12 works on Windows 10, Xbox One, future Xbox Scorpio. All shaders use HLSL which is shared between DirectX 11, DirectX 12. Sony PlayStation 4 use cross-compiler from HLSL. In 2013 Sony released extension to MS Visual Studio so developers can use HLSL for PC, Xbox and PS4. Even Mantle used HLSL 🙂
Vulcan is not compatible with any game console. It use own shader language SPIR shared only with OpenGL. Only game developers who already used OpenGL have benefits of shared code between OpenGL and Vulkan.
In an effort to stop the slight misinformation spread, vulkan doesn’t have a standard higher level language. Spir-v is a bytecode language, not a traditional shader language (which is higher level, hence hlsl, which stands for higher level shading language) spir-v is only comparable to dxbc (direct x bytecode, only on direct x), and as such higher level languages like hlsl or glsl have to be compiled into it. Spir-v is designed to be a lower level bytecode language that can be compiled from any higer level shading language, and there is in fact a working hlsl compiler for vulkan through glslang (a shader language compiler to spir v bytecode, comparable to the direct x shader compiler that gets hlsl and turns it into dxbc for direct x)
due to this, HLSL is a temporary setback, but ultimately it can be used with vulkan, and due to that shader language won’t be a functional reason as the compiler completes.
(And sony never released an extention for pc to use hlsl, as that was the standard higher level lang for dx. And ps4 uses a hlsl based language, but it isn’t the exact same)
Is this why it’s easier to port from Vulkan to DX12?
Or is that completely separate from this?
Regardless, thanks for the information, interesting read ^^
that isn’t necessarily the main why its easier to port from vulkan to dx12, but it does help in that regard. The biggest reason why it’s much easier compared to dx11 and ogl, is simply because both dx12 and vulkan share their main design concepts, as both are lower level graphics api’s in the same vein as mantle. Hlsl being shared will become a stronger reason later on as the hlsl to spir-v compiler gets better
That’s why there’s only one game that uses it and that’s Doom because those game already ran on opengl..
People are so dumb, they think developers will do what’s best for them, instead of what’s easiest and cheapest to do…
Battlefield, Tomb Raider, Civ, Deus Ex, Hitman, Watch Dogs, Caffene, Ashes are NOT microsoft’s games.
FACEPALM
You do know the definition of the word “half”, right?
As, in, “halfwit”, for example?
B*TCHSLAP.
didnt know 6/16=0.5
What?
– Forza Motorsport 6 (Microsoft-owned)
– Forza Horizon 3 (Microsoft-owned)
– Gears of War 4 (Microsoft-owned)
– Gears of War Ultimate (Microsoft-owned)
– Quantum Break (Microsoft-funded, timed exclusivity agreement)
– Halo 5: Forge (Microsoft-owned)
– Halo Wars 2 (Microsoft-owned)
– Halo Wars Definitive (Microsoft-owned)
– State of Decay 2 (Microsoft-funded, most likely timed exclusive)
– Crackdown 3 (Microsoft-funded, most likely timed exclusive)
– Sea of Thieves (Microsoft-funded, most likely timed exclusive)
– Forza Motorsport 7 ((Microsoft-owned)
I don’t know about you, but I count 12/24. I.E. 6/12 I.E. 3/6 I.E. 1/2, otherwise known as 0.5.
you are mentioning unreleased games
i can probably come up with at least 10 games that will very likely support dx12 and are coming out in 2017
….. Great?
On the other hand, we haven’t a collective clue how many games will be picking up Vulkan in 2017 at all, especially if Nvidia starts pushing it alongside GimpWorks.
If you think big developers will leave DirectX, sorry but you’re just huge optimist
No indeed, DX will continue to be the primary focus for most of the industry (DX11, specifically, for the foreseeable future, with shoddy DX12 ports piggybacking on that, unless people add in Vulkan support & somehow get better DX12 support from it, /shrug), but if Nvidia pushes (read: bribes) developers into adopting Vulkan all because it runs better on their cards than DX12, then it’ll at least give Vulkan a minority stake in the API market, which will regardless equate to a considerable market share increase over the one OpenGL had for oh-so-long, anyway.
That won’t happen
And here I thought I was the pessimistic one…..
Any specific bit in particular, or just the whole thing in general?
I don’t believe anything until I see games coming out. And there’s only 1 (major) worth mentioning game that uses that thing, and even that one had it released post release.
Yeah, good point – if only it had released a few months later, then they’d have been able to get it in by launch…..
Once again I feel the need to insert a reminder here that Vulkan is barely 8 months old, whereas DirectX 12 has been out for 15.
And all of them run like crap in dx12
but they have it, quantum break has dx12 and runs poorly too
so whats your point?
“Developers don’t want use Vulcan,”
90% of the games on the right are microsofts, just saying.
MS know how to promote own API as “industry standards”. They done this with HLSL introduced in DX9c and have benefits to this day.
Currently all big game developers use HLSL and everyone is waiting for next year GDC where MS will show new generation of HLSL with Shader Model 6. First big change in shader language since 2009 when MS introduced Tesselation Shader and Computer Shader. This API will be heart of Xbox Scorpio SDK
“MS know how to promote own API as “industry standards””
PFFFFT
You mean monopolize?
What, you’re saying it’s not blatantly obvious that Microsoft most definitely only added the “pedal to the metal” portion of DX12 because of AMD’s Mantle? 😛
Just look at how minor Windows 7’s DX11 successor was; Windows 8, coming in a whole 3 years later (the gap between Vista & 7 was only so much shorter, by comparison), featured nothing more than a minor update which was so irrelevant, it was even referred to as “DX11.1.” Hell, the core of DX12 is the “pedal to the metal” portion of it. If it weren’t for that, it wouldn’t be anything more than the very same DX11.3 version that currently exists on Windows 10 without it.
Microsoft was completely unprepared for both the console refresh, & the Windows 10 launch, & it shows in a ridiculous amount of ways, honestly….. The One was probably in response to Sony deciding it was time to push the PS4, & 10 was just an attempt to shore up 8’s horrifyingly bad reputation, all slammed together in the typical clunky, arrogant-as-hell Microsoft fashion (not to mention UWP).
Unfortunately, they seem to be coming around with the S & the Scorpio, whereas Sony seems to be dead-set on a path that will end with them having a full-frontal confrontation with a serious uppercut. Ugh.
Not really, but I’m not saying companies like EA weren’t maybe paid to push DX12.
great lower frames 4 all!!!!!
Microsoft fanboys are the most pathetic beings to exist on this planet. I can’t believe you guys even exist. At least Apple fanboys have some justification because Apple actually makes high quality product, but MSFT’s farmed out to mumbai development? No.
It’s so easy to trigger you, everyone who is realistic and can think clearly and understands that Microsoft’s DirectX will continue to dominate is fanboy for you.
YOU ARE PATHETIC.
ok a half NO and here are the reasons why:
1.using more of the gpu less of the cpu and better use of cores:only on amd cpu mostly making cpu like the fx8350 on par with an i7 3770 in DX11 a second gen i5 is blowing the fx8350 away. but in some “DX12” like the forza games only 2 cores are being used so this promise was a hit and miss mostly.
2.better performance:again only on amd because of the fact dx12 is built on mantle and rely heavily on amd cgn and async compute,and also because amd driver in dx11 are not eliminating the bottleneck from using mid to low range cpu with an amd gpu(what was said in n.1)
3.using multiple gpu’s is easier and even different gpu can be used(680gtx+750TI) even from other brand(nvidia+amd) or even use the cpu graphic processor as additional graphical power: well apart ashes of the singularity doing that(and very badly using a 980ti with another gpu makes the performance even worser than just using the 980ti alone) no other DX12 games does that and many DX12 does not support sli/crossfire properly or had to be patched to get there just like DX11.
4.using all the vram available from all the gpu installed in the system:never happened yet,not a single DX12 games does that.
conclusion:in other words if you are someone with an amd gpu you are getting some gains with DX12 and if you have low end intel cpu or a multicore amd cpu DX12 is even better for you.
but having a high end intel cpu and an nvidia cpu,then DX12 is no better than DX11 and in most case DX11 run better on those kind of system.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/861311d8a61d818428dfbd0a13faf2a29b2448cc60b1b4d316f82544902d64c4.gif
“You were the chosen one!”
So far it’s been way worse then dx10, all the promised features are MIA and performance has actually been worse or identical in most cases.
“Was it worth the hype?”
Still not yet,you know,nVidia its not prepared.Wait for Volta or whatever series will come.
Vulkan will not prevail,because of M$$$ and Windows Spy-agent 10.
To be fair, this year’s game releases were developed primarily for DX11, with optional DX12 support. Most of the current DX12 games have little or no graphical difference than DX11.
I think it’s too early to judge either DX12 (or Vulkan) until we see native DX12 games
Gears of War 4 vs Vulkan DOOM?
Gears 4 runs pretty well but DOOM w/ Vulkan smashes it into the ground followed by a swift boot to the head
Correct, those games were developed with a DX11 engine and ported to DX12 and Vulkan
Vulkan is great, although it won’t take off because nobody’s making games with it in mind.
Here’s a peculiar thing. My laptop has a GTX760M, not any powerful GPU today – but when running Doom under OpenGL4.5 I was getting horrible stuttering and FPS drops, but switching to Vulkan (a Mantle successor of all things) – the FPS was smooth as a butter, with no drops and no HDD thrashing, I even was able to increase graphics settings. Especially in the light of DX11 vs DX12 situation when it comes to GeForces (and this is a Kepler GPU)
yes it is dx 12 is still in its early stages and you can see dx12 getting a boost over dx 11 at least for amd.when more and more games adopt dx12 as standard over dx11 it will get een better.
yes!! I was waiting for worse performance.
F#*K DX12, All developers should support Vulkan instead.
I think we both know that is opposite of what will/is happening
You forgot The Division (though it is still in PTS). I actually had higher frame rates using DX12 in the Division (using Intel 6700k and 980 Ti).
They should drop the whole DX 12 idea and go with Vulkan, especially since that API supports everyone and benefits all of us rather than just MS.
They care about money not benefits of dying generation = users of Windows 7 and 8
And it’s cheaper to use directx 11 mode and directx 12 mode than to waste time changing everything.
And yet their ship is sinking in general for them.
Nice read john, thanks.
Guy… you will never have everything with one box. Gaming has always been like this. Either get over it and buy a PS4 for exclusives or dont and stop crying.
I’m not crying though.
Conslows also won’t be around forever either, last gen and this gen have already shown them casting off the pieces that made them conslows in the first place.
One word…VULKAN!!!
LEL enjoy that 1-2 AAA games that use it.
Nope. F$%k Windows 10. F$%k DX12, F$%k the WIndows Store. F$%k UWP and f$%k sycophantic Microsoft fanboys. It’s pathetic you even exist in the first place.
Long live Vulkan.
It will be even more pathetic when you’ll have to use Windows 10 because developers will not bother supporting Windows 7.
Oh wow a true believer!
Windows 7: 47.17%.
Yes I’ll bet they drop support any day now!
global stats don’t mean ****
because there are tons of facebook kids, and outlook/word/excel users who dont give a f about videogames on desktop at all
Lolololol. MSFT fan boys rejecting stats now. Hilarious.
im not fanboy of company that removed an option to pin stuff to left side of UI, and company who forced lock screen, and company who removed various advanced settings to set defaults via UWAs, and company…
i could go all day, i know windows 10 better than most
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Just really glad I never switched to Windows10.
I’ll have to eventually, not soon, but one day Winodws 7 market share will not be relevant to developers, just like 32 bit market is dead to them.
By then something else will be there besides 10. There is always something else
Notice me Sensai-san!
Jesus we haven’t even seen the game yet you are already condemning it. But okay, I get it, pc gamers of this community automatically hates everything console related sigh
You condemning those who you think condemning everything.
Also generalizations.
Yeah I know it’s a bit of a generalization but seriously though, I think it’s a highly flawed mindset to condemn a game when we haven’t seen anything besides some trailers.
I dunno, I find it hypocritical when someone says no one can condemn a game, but then they condemn when it doesn’t fit their view and they go against it, like you telling me I can’t cross the road because it’s not safe, but then you proceeded to cross the road when you want to and of your own accord, wrong or right, you still chose.
We know it’s currently tied to PS4, a low end system and we know it’s also tied to an engine that currently isn’t running on PC with any PC games, meaning that the engine is limited to only what the PS4 can do.
Kojima isn’t some objective writer who has zero plot holes or flaws. People in the past have taken shots at his writing before and I don’t see why that should ever stop. It’s far better to notice and acknowledge flaws and inconsistency than to willingly excuse/ignore it.
Don’t complicate what I’m saying. I never said you cannot condemn a game. I’m merely pointing out that you ARE condemning a game that we have virtually no clue what the story’s about, no idea about any of the gameplay, nothing, literally nothing. Can you honestly say you are even being objective at all? It’s highly flawed and I don’t get why you can’t see that. It’s basically just hating for the sake of hating and for sake of going against the “hype”.
I get what you are saying about the PS4 issue but I don’t see it as an issue. Sure it might not look as great as a game running on a high end PC but Kojima’s games are either way known to focus on the story and gameplay. And I’m sure the game should look good, at least on the pro.
Nobody’s riding Kojima’s d*ck. He’s not some god like some d*ckriders do believe.He has his flaws yes but there’s no denying he has helped push the medium forward.
It’s not complicating it if you understand what is going on, if you don’t then you’re aware that you cannot keep up.
What you say about me condemning a game currently can easily be applied on day 1 or years after release. This has been done by fans of all sorts of media/products for decades.
You seem to think that the small canvas=large canvas as a fact, I don’t see the logic in that at all for a prime example.
“I get what you are saying about the PS4 issue but I don’t see it as an issue.”
And that is where we split off and go down different roads.
“Nobody’s riding Kojima’s d*ck. He’s not some god like some d*ckriders do believe.He has his flaws yes but there’s no denying he has helped push the medium forward.”
You’ve been where I’ve been around the net?, you’ve seen through my eyes?, or are my eyes objectively lying to me?.
Others have pushed the medium forward more so than he himself, no one on this rock is equal, so lets not try pulling a “yeah but”. There are others that have pushed to where he is or what got him to push in the first place.
As of now no
Honestly as long as game runs well I don’t give a f what it runs on. What matters to me is that I can enjoy game that’s it.
This is what happens when you code for DX11 and then add DX12 support to an engine which is created with single-threading from the ground up.
DX12 benefits should be feasible only when DX11 is out of the picture or when developers start coding games with DX12 multi-threading in mind. And unfortunately it will only happen when nVIDIA fixes it’s DX12 support….
Why DX 12 is garbage. It is not on anything but Windows 10. Why this sucks. Slows adoption, slows use, the modders (reshade/sweetFX) want nothing to do with it. Why MS is more than happy with that as far as PC Gamers. Slow adoption means their POS console with GCN/Async benefits.
Why we are stuck with DX 12 over Vulkan and always will be outside Id games. Because MS has a stupid console they lose billions on. They do not want modding on their closed down system. They do not want injected SMAA and neither do the POS video card companies who do not want well optimized AA. They want us to supersample or run things at increasingly absurd resolutions when these POS games need a GTX 1070/1080 to do 1080p 60 and anything close to Ultra.
Want Vulkan to win? Hope the entire Triple A industry and consoles collapse. If they keep pushing this LBGTQ/SJW crap in every game? It just might. I hope it does. Sony and MS can both leave gaming as far as I am concerned and take EA, Activision with them. Sony f’d up hard on the CPU on PS4 Pro. Their VR will be a bust. Hopefully Scorpio will as well with no games pushing sales other than “strong female character”, with a supporting cast of transgender landwhale otherkins. (see Lenni in Watch Dogs 2).
And you are objective and don’t have any negative bias what so ever?. I find that very, very hard to believe.
See you’re already displaying it with:
” If someone prefers playing on a console what is the issue? And PC gamers really need to chill with the whole “consoles are ruining gaming”. ”
THen you go on to say that we should blame “kids” instead, as if that was the objectively better solution.
“But about Kojima, my point still stands. He has his issues but there’s no denying he helped pushed the medium forward. Helped pioneer the stealth genre, has always redefined gameplay with his releases, crafted great stories with really well thought out characters etc. I get that it’s hip to go against the crowd but to deny the man has talent? Nah.”
It’s hip to go against Kojima now?.
I’m speechless man. You take digs at me for “negative bias”, yet you’re willing to display your own. You aren’t free from bias nor criticism either.
As I said before, others have pushed genres greater than Kojima and more, but I guess we’ll ignore all that and just put Kojima on the highest pedestal and call everyone else “haters”.
I like his stuff, but I’m not a fanboy who’s willing to excuse him at every turn.
Dude, you carried this on from 3 days ago, are you lost or something?.
You really do have something to gain from all this after all.
ugh
13 hrs later and we’re still at it lol.
Mate I got all the time in the world and I have nowt to gain except entertainment from your vain attempts at “winning” at something that is ultimately futile and pointless.
Frame-time stability needs to improve before even the boosted frame-rate averages of AMD cards are worthwhile. After all, whats the point of a few extra frames if you’re experience micro-stuttering? I had the same issue with Mantle, where higher frame-rates resulted in a worse experience because it wasn’t as smooth as DX11.
Does anything ever just work in this day and age? All the money for new GPUs, all the new APIs, everything under-performing, underwhelming and a complete disappointment. The future is mediocrity.