Valve's Dan Ginsburg: "Not much reason to ever create a DX12 back end for your game", Praises Vulkan

At this year’s SIGGRAPH event, Valve’s Dan Ginsburg talked a bit about the new upcoming APIs that will offer low-level access to the GPU and CPU, thus improving performance in games, DirectX 12 and Vulkan.

[parentsbasement]

I think I get it...

[LifeInNZ]

I have no time for Valve's antics or opinion. They spent much of last gen slagging off the PS3 till they realised they could make money off of it. Their SteamBox has yielded nothing but a niche cottage industry which fails to offer PC gaming anything new...maybe if they had pushed it a lot harder but now that Windows 10 is out the majority couldnt care less.

They need to shut up and earn the respect of the gaming community again by releasing games that push boundaries once again. There is only so long you can cling on to the Half Life, and to a lesser extent, the Portal legacy.

[r2oB]

I don't think Windows 10 is going to impact Steam any different than Origin and uPlay did. Valve as a service provider are in a different boat than as a publisher/developer/manufactur er.

[mixelon]

Umm.. Steam? I think they've earned the respect of the gaming community well enough. The PS3 thing was a blip to them, and it really wasn't worth their time in the early years when the devkits and documentation were a confusing mess.

[solar]

"They spent much of last gen slagging off the PS3 till they realised they could make money off of it."

so you are going to cry because Valve didnt like a platform? i wish i had such trivial crap to be angry at when i was a kid.

[LifeInNZ]

I hate people that make assumptions like the one you did. Assuming I'm a kid because my dislike for Valve over their lack of support for PS3. I didn't even have a PS3 until later on but I did not appreciate how Valve behaved towards Sony or the PS3. I'm a gamer first and foremost and I welcome objective criticism or discussion from anyone in the industry or from a fellow gamer...valve gave neither and showed a real lack of professionalism.

[solar]

Kids get upset about what you are upset about. I'm sure you are a good mate, but is that issue really worth being upset over?

I have a ps3, launch 60gb I'm fearful will break. The PS3 launch was a disaster. It was way too expensive, low install base, a new way to program with the CELL, so Valve wasnt fond of it. Why do people believe just because a console exists EVERY developer has to make games for it? Fuck people grow up.

[138]

"i wish i had such trivial crap to be angry at when i was a kid."

My time on the internet in a nut shell.

[Truthandreason]

The Steam Box push hasn't even started yet...

[LifeInNZ]

@solar:

So, attacking the person rather than discussing the comment makes you more of an adult. Really?

[KurtRussell]

They have done more for gaming than any other developer, so i think u are the one that needs to shut up. They have respect of everybody except whiny people like you. And i don't think they miss it.

[uth11]

I'm sure the thought gives MS heartburn, but API competition is good for the rest of us.

[rainslacker]

A single unified API accessible across all platforms would be much better for the consumers, or at least the developers, than two competing API's which do pretty much the same thing, particularly when one of those platforms is tied to a single operating environment. DX12, while a great API, does lock developers into the Windows environment. OpenGL, and it's variants, are adaptable to a wide range of devices and environments, and is actually much more common than DX. For the devs that want to go cross platform, having competing API's means more work, which means more money.

[TheCommentator]

I thought MS was trying to run Win10 across all types of devices, so by extension, wouldn't DX12 also be on those devices as well?

[rainslacker]

They are, and DX12 will run across all Windows enabled devices that are current enough. Not sure which versions of WinRT will get it, although it's being renamed Win10 as well except it's stripped down for the devices application.

However, OpenGL, or variants of it, are used on everything that isn't a Windows platform like iOS or Droid, or custom solutions. OpenGL is much more common, and not restricted to the MS platform. Since MS is actually the odd man out on many of those devices, it means they don't get quite as much support on them. Surface hasn't been bad, but their windows phone support from outside devs is abysmal. They get PC support for games due to Windows being the more common OS, which will trickle down to Xbox, and likely other devices, but overall, if MS weren't dividing the back end with their own API, it would be much easier for developers so they wouldn't have to convert as much code.

That's all I was getting at, and realistically, if MS allowed it, there is not much reason that DX12 couldn't be used on devices that aren't built on Windows...but I don't see them doing that as it kind of goes against their interests to support non windows applications.

My bigger point was that a single API is actually more beneficial to the developer, thus being better for the consumer. Not who made which API, or which one was better. Wasn't actually trying to knock MS or the OGL group.

[freshslicepizza]

why would the people at valve praise windows 10 when they are trying to elevate steamboxes and promote linux?

[Truthandreason]

They aren't praising Win 10 they are praising Vulcan which essentially brings "to the metal programming" but is not locked to one OS.

[mozzie]

except windows 10 is not "one OS" it's PCs, Xbox One, Tablets, Phones, HoloLens...

[wellard]

Mozzie I think you will find that windows 10 is in actual fact one OS the other things you mentioned are not actually operating systems. They are different types of hardware.

[mixelon]

Itll be interesting to see how this plays out in terms of performance, and also how well Metal holds up on the same hardware (dual booting macs I guess..) out of curiosity. it's nice that MS aren't just walking away with the low level pie, it's good to have more hardware agnostic options, and more programmers dealing with a variety of libraries.

[KingKionic]

Its a done deal. But how is he bragging about vulcan for 2015 and at the same time saying dx12 for 2015 isnt worth it?

Wheres the vulcan games? At least pc users get fable legends from Microsoft running dx12 this year.

O___O

Talk about a spin.

[Razayn]

What he's trying to get across is that, as a developer it makes very little sense to develop for DX12 since it ties you down to the Windows 10 ecosystem. By using the Vulcan API you would be able to deploy code to other platforms without rewriting it completely.

Since Vulcan is the a Khronos Group project, It has the backing of many software and hardware firms, like Nintendo, Sony, Intel, AMD and Nvidia which makes it very promising.

Since Sony and Nintendo are both contributors we may see Vulcan on the PS4 and the NX, only time will tell.

[jdaboss]

I really dont give af about what valve does or says anymore as im a console only guy.. HL3 or Portal3 or stfu. tired of their bs.

[XanderZane]

Valve should be concentrating more on HL3, instead of having this yokel promoting an unproven API. Just another click bait article I guess.

[Spyroo]

Meh screw HL3. Half Life is overated.

Rather they make Portal 3 instead.

[XanderZane]

I'd take Portal 3 as well. What games does Valve have in development right now? Anyone know?

[Bobafret]

And here we go, now we will have API fanboys.

[OneAboveAll]

How the fuck would anyone from Valve know? They don't even make games anymore. lmao

[Mystogan]

Yeah why don't you shut the f*ck up Valve. Your steamboxes suck, your controller sucks, your OS sucks. You don't make games anymore so nobody wants to hear your opinion on anything game development related anymore. So shut the f*ck up and get us another round of steam sales. You're just the walmart of videogames now.

[Rimeskeem]

Because the competitor is obviously going to promote what the other competitors are doing. /S

[DragonDDark]

Only 5% people here have read the article .

[Roccetarius]

Yeah, and only 5% seems to see the bigger picture as well, because if Vulkan is kept up to date and easy to use, DX12 will most definitely fall behind. Judging from most of the comments, people either have a limited viewpoint or a console bias.

[whitesoxfalife1976]

I came here to read comments.

[ScorpiusX]

He comes off just as bitter as his boss does to everything MS.

[Gwiz]

Valve,SteamOS,Linux,yeah why am i not surprised about them not praising Microsoft's proprietary API.Then again i'm not even using Windows 10 ATM so DirectX 12 is not even of my concern.

[FreakyFox]

I dont know why people would have a problem with Valve at this moment in time, as they are trying with others to get control and flexibility into developers hands with a low-level API.(Vulkan)

Devs were askings MS years ago for this, since the first retail milticore cpu's which was about 2006 and we have had 3 operating system's with embedded Direct X since then (Vista , 7 and 8) and they still didnt deliver, and they always had the money and spec to do it, and now some other company has came in with low-level solutions , they are waving the DX12 flag around like its the second coming.

Just give some Vulkan already!