DirectX 10 support?

(jaybird) #21

I remember reading DX10 is not backwards compatible with DX9…

(Redh3lix) #22

DirectX10 (Or Direct3D10 I think it will be called) is a huge leap from DX9, thus it will require dedicated DX10 graphics cards (plus Vista) to run it…is what i heard.

(Sauron|EFG) #23

They may change the API (again), but I’m sure Vista will include all old DX versions as well. Programs written for old versions will just use the API they were written for (that’s how it works today if you run e.g. a DX3 program on W2K/XP).

(Lanz) #24

Cut out Win XP so people have to change OS. Damn gready bastards, as if they couldn’t just release DX10 for XP too, bah!

They should have called it Microsoft Resource Hog, instead of Microsoft Vista. Can anyone tell me exactly what I gain by changing to that OS? And I really don’t care about glass windows.

(mortis) #25

Look! It’s MacWindows OS X!

(Hakuryu) #26

I still know people using Win 2k, and I bet it will be 2+ years before the majority uses Vista. Since all games now require the latest DirectX, will that mean less sales of PC games that require Vista (in effect for DX10)? Since many will not have or even want Vista, this move by MS seems to only screw developers- either offer two versions (9+10- more dev time) or hope the lost sales due to people not having DX10 will not be that bad.

(Lanz) #27

No sane game developer will limit their market to DX10 only, just as no game developer limits their market to DX9 only. They will of course release products supporting older hardware too. Perhaps we will even see better support for OGL by game developers again? Probably not but who knows.

(chr0nicles) #28

Cut out Win XP so people have to change OS. Damn gready bastards, as if they couldn’t just release DX10 for XP too, bah!

The reason why you won’t be able to use DX10 on WinXP is a bit more technical/complicated than that. You can find more info Here
With your current DX9 card you will be able to run Vista just perfectly using DX9.0L

(Lanz) #29

Sounds familiar somehow… hmm… can it be the same trick they did with IE to force Netscape out of business? Nah, they couldn’t do anything like that, I mean M$ isn’t a gready company after all…

It’s deepely embedded because they wanted it to be that, so they could say sorry you need to upgrade.

(Nail) #30

pretty good read on ATI’s take on DirectX 10
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTA0NSwxLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

(ouroboro) #31

As far as FPS gaming for the PC goes, nearly every “innovation” since Q1 has been useless graphical masturbatory fluff. Q1 gave us freelook and jumping, the last two noticeable improvements to the genre.

As GPU horsepower has increased, game developers have become drunk with the power at their disposal. “Look what we can do now! Wheeeeeee! Let the revelry begin!” Meanwhile, the rotting carcass called “gameplay” has been kicked aside. Until RtCW it was beginning to look like CTF was as good as it would ever get. Someone must have noticed the stench and decided to hose down the gameplay corpse and give it a spritz of perfume…

As for SP, the peak was HL1. Everything since has been the same old puzzle-solving tripe filled with linear upgrades and predictable bosses. I’m an id Software guy, but D3 and Q4 both sucked. They epitomize the above. Breathtaking, innovative graphics, which at the end of the day do nothing to hide their laughably stagnant gameplay.

I don’t see any reason for these upgrades. Does DX10 and/or Vista have something to assist gameplay innovation and development? No, it’s just another coat of paint. I’ve felt burned on every MP game purchase since RtCW. As I’ve watched my hardware go from great to good to fair to poor, I’ve kept resisting upgrades and kept overclocking and tweaking every last frame out of what I’ve got because I shouldn’t need new hardware. Graphics shouldn’t be the main focus of game development. A great game is great in spite of it’s graphics.

At the end of the day none of this matters of course, because all MP games get hacked to hell and back anyway. That’s another unforgivable case of neglect. So what if the integrity of the game is utterly compromised, as long as it looks good! Wheeeeeee!

(Isabel Lucas) #32

Personally I like eye candy but not at the expense of gameplay.

As you rightly pointed out, graphics without gameplay are nothing - BF2 being a prime example.

Get both the gameplay and the graphics right though and you have a surefire winner.

(Nail) #33

Does DX10 and/or Vista have something to assist gameplay innovation and development? No, it’s just another coat of paint

Read the article I posted link too earlier, gives an indication of what WILL be capable with dx10, but without it and some games it’ll be a while before an honest opinion can be formed, but I wouldn’t call it a “coat of paint”

(ouroboro) #34

“Does DX10 and/or Vista have something to assist gameplay innovation and development?”

The question was tongue in cheek. Graphics APIs render graphics. I don’t want or need graphics beyond what is necessary to distinguish friend from foe. I want fun games for pubbing and need well-designed games for competing. Graphical bells and whistles are completely off the radar. When they do show up, it’s only as a threat to performance and thus to playability.

(datoo) #35

Unforunately those snazzy graphics are the main selling point for games these days, but I agree with just about everything you’ve said. However, I think there are uses for increased graphical capability in gameplay, there just hasn’t been that much innovation in multiplayer yet because of the state of the industry.

(Isabel Lucas) #36

One of the advantages of DX10 or more specifically Shader model 4.0 is it uses a new and more efficient way of rendering. Think of it like SD’s megatexture technology. The result is more complex effects can be rendered. However, if you don’t stretch its capabilities by using all the extra rendering power thats freed up, then I’d imagine you’d probably get better frame rates as its freeing up some resources.

However, I can’t give any guarantees on this as the no-one except possibly at Microsoft or ATI / Nvidia has tried it as the hardware isn’t publically available. Even developers (look at the SDK kit) are having to use software simulation at the moment.

Make no mistake though, DX10’s aiim is to give better effects. Some of these such as the soft shadows, 3D volumetric clouds and foliage that pushes out of the way as you walk through it may enhance gameplay, however eye candy is its main feature.

DX10 showcase for those who haven’t seen it:

http://files.filefront.com/crytektechdemowmv/;4765000;;/fileinfo.html

Al.

(The Dawg) #37

In COD2, DX9 BARELY works on most cards- I have a X850XT, OC’d 3.2, 2gigs of Geil - hardly a slouch card, online and DX9 means fps in the teens dipping into single digits in heavy action. Thanks fully theres an option in the setup to run the game in Dx7 or 8. Which winds up being a cheat- you dont get the whirls of snow swirling around your head so you see better without the eye candy enabled.
(dx10) be careful what you wish for.

(Shanks) #38

You can’t blame poor implementation or lack of optimization on DX9. There are many titles out there that utilize DX9 with great eye candy and good fps.

(Isabel Lucas) #39

In COD2, DX9 BARELY works on most cards- I have a X850XT, OC’d 3.2, 2gigs of Geil - hardly a slouch card, online and DX9 means fps in the teens dipping into single digits in heavy action. Thanks fully theres an option in the setup to run the game in Dx7 or 8. Which winds up being a cheat- you dont get the whirls of snow swirling around your head so you see better without the eye candy enabled.
(dx10) be careful what you wish for.

Yeah I hear COD 2 is hard on cards.

The problem generally is I think we’ve hit a CPU ceiling at the moment.

Info from the GPU is also processed by the CPU and on some games even an FX57 will act as a bottleneck. Same with SLI, most games (1 or 2 exceptions on games with low CPU requirements) only show around a 10% gain with 2 Cards in SLI, this again is due to the CPU.

2 good things that are happening are:

  1. DX 10 Implements a completely new way of rendering (hence the need for new hardware). This is more efficient so should tax the system less whilst allowing more complex graphics.

  2. With DX 10, more of the graphics processing is to be done on the graphics card thus shifting some of the load off the CPU. Ths in turn should help remove the bottlenecks.

Finally, with the advent of “proper” multicore programming on the horizon (I think its far from optimised at the moment), games should run much better anyway as I foreseee the day when different aspects of the game are each sent to their own CPU to be processed eg. Graphics to core 1, Physics to Core 2 etc etc.

Only problem with all of this, is the big leap from DX 9 to DX 10 is going to cost everyonea fortune as is the jump to the new multicore platforms.