Slashdot Mirror
Will the Lack of DX10 on XP Spur OpenGL Dev?
Sparr0 asks: "Microsoft has announcement that DirectX 10 will not be released for Windows XP (which means no Shader Model 4.0 and no Geometry Shaders). I have since been waiting for news of game developers switching to OpenGL, in order to get the best graphics on the best hardware on the most popular gaming OS, however there is nary a whisper of such. Will such a shift occur, even if only in small amounts? When? Why not? It is probably safe to say that Unreal Tournament 3 (AKA UT2007) will have OpenGL as an option in Windows, but that is both unsurprising and also a long way off. Ditto for Quake Wars, and most other games that are planning a native Linux clients. Where are all of the other big names with Windows-only offerings? Why haven't we heard from Valve, Blizzard, Sony, or EA, to name a few?"
In a word, NO.
Unfortunately, most game developers will probably continue writing for DX9.0c until the majority of users are running Vista and have DX10 capable video cards.
The exceptions, as listed in the summary, will be those developers that intend for their games to be cross-platform and run on Linux and OSX as well as Visa.
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Reeeeeaaallly?
Hmmm... Forgive me if I am just a TAD skeptical about claims of DX's superiority from someone named MSFanBoi2.
Of course, you could be just engaging in a little humorous sock-puppetry and I'm not getting it.
Either way, I was under the distinct impression that OpenGL was and has been MUCH more advanced than Direct X for many years, and DX-10 doesn't really up the ante much.
Official Heretic from the "Church of Global Warming". Proven right thanks to whistle blowers. AGW = Flat Earth Theory
I think that a lot of what is going to happen out there is going to be like John Carmack said. I think that overall, you are going to see developers stick with DirectX 9 for the time being. I think this is especially true for Windows only games.
The fact is that if you are developing Windows games, why would you support two APIs when you could support a single one and D9 users would just have to deal with not having the latest bells and whistles? And this doesn't even take into account that D3d is now a more advanced API than OpenGL (which has been mentioned already).
RonB
It is human nature to take shortcuts in thinking.
If game developers started moving towards OpenGL Microsoft might release DX10 for XP. They will do anything to prevent something else from gaining a foothold.
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
OpenGL has outlived it's usefulness for gaming.
It'a tool for programmers, researchers and the CAD industry now.
There's just too many bells and whistles in DX.
The lack of DX10 support for XP will certainly slow the uptake of DX10, however. I bet most development over the next year or two will be in DX9, with a DX10 "bag" hanging off the side.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
DX10 is going to be just like DX9 and DX8 before it. In reality we are mostly concerned with the Direct3D portion of DirectX since the rest is more stagnant. When DX9 libraries and later hardware came out developers simlpy turned on the options now supported or speed up the game. The game would interogate the card to see what features and how well they were supported and went on from there. The same will happen with DX10.
As for OpenGL getting a bump out of this, I doubt developers will suddenly add an OpenGL renderer. They will simply fall back to DX9. Other than a few MS first party games I doubt you will see any games requiring DX10 (Vista) in the next 18 months. Even the ones that do like Halo 2 were designed for a DX8 codepath and P3 733 originally so any machine with a DX9 card and P4 or better could support it. MS is simply restricting it to Vista.
Hoyty
None of the parent comments said DX was better than OpenGL. They said it was /broader/. OpenGL is a 3D programming framework. DirectX is a collection of frameworks: DirectDraw for 2D, Direct3D for 3D, DirectInput for user input, DirectPlay for networking, etc.
Comparing OpenGL and DirectX is like comparing Abiword (just a word processor) and OpenOffice (a word processor, a spreadsheet, a vector graphics editor, a presentation designer, etc).
Comparing OpenGL to Direct3D is an apples-to-apples comparison. That's usually what people mean when they talk about comparing DX and GL (since it's the only comparison that makes sense). But that's intellectual laziness.
It's always a long day... 86400 doesn't fit into a short.
even DirectX 9.x's version of Direct3d features a LOT more functionality than OpenGL's most recent revision contains.
EXCEPT GEOMETRY SHADERS, which was the entire point of the OP.