Khronos unveils Vulkan: OpenGL built for modern systems

arstechnica.com writes: "The new API was created to make it a better fit for modern hardware: GPUs are complex, highly programmable devices, and CPUs have abundant cores and multithreading support.

It represents the fourth graphics API aiming to offer this kind of control and the performance gains that come with it. AMD's Mantle, Microsoft's DirectX 12, and Apple's Metal were all developed with similar goals in mind. However, these are all platform limited in one way or another; Mantle only works with AMD GPUs, DirectX 12 only works in Windows, and Metal only works in iOS. Vulkan will span both GPU and operating system vendors, continuing in the footsteps of the cross-platform, vendor-neutral OpenGL before it."

[Fireseed]

I'm just slightly annoyed that Khronos named their graphics language Vulkan...

[mkis007]

Star trek blasphemy?

[Fireseed]

LIKE SERIOUSLY! I understand that putting out a graphics API named Klingon isn't exactly as sleek as tech sounding as Vulkan but like it really bothers me lol

[Sir_Simba]

I like it sounds like a villain.

[Mikeyy]

Obviously a play on the word Vulcan. Vulcans are far from villians. Even their cousins the Romulan Star Empire aren't necessarily "evil".

[Anonagrog]

That or 'Vulcan' from Greco-Roman mythology, just as 'Khronos' appears to be.

[Mikeyy]

Great news all around. No no matter what api things are going to be streamlined! The future is bright as hell for PC's!

[mkis007]

Just purchased an i7 4790k and 16gb 1866 ram to go along with my gtx680...excited for progress.

[Roccetarius]

AMD is supporting current Mantle development still, but for the future they recommend supporting either DirectX12 or Vulkan.

[mysteryraz11]

who cares I wanna hear about the ps4s new api, pc is irrelevant to me

[tee_bag242]

You mean the API designed on a PC? How about that, Slideshow.

[sorceror171]

This will be very important for the Steam Machines. It might actually make them viable.

Game devs already have to make their engines target at least PS4, Xbox One, and PC. And for PC, they usually have to do multiple tweaks for AMD and Nvidia. An engine that can target Vulkan can be easily ported to other systems.

In particular, Linux. And Valve has already announced the Source 2 engine will support Vulkan and work well on Linux. At that point, a Linux port becomes pretty close to a simple recompile. So native SteamOS games become a lot more practical.

The Vulkan API already looks a lot like Mantle, and so engine support won't take long at all - it's mostly done if the engine has a Mantle back end.