Will the Lack of DX10 on XP Spur OpenGL Dev? 168
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?"
Will the Lack of DX10 on XP Spur OpenGL Dev? (Score:4, Insightful)
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.
Re:How many times does it need to be said... (Score:4, Insightful)
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.
Nope. (Score:5, Insightful)
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
well (Score:4, Insightful)
No (Score:1, Insightful)
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.
Multiple Render Paths (Score:2, Insightful)
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.
Re:How many times does it need to be said... (Score:5, Insightful)
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.
Re:How many times does it need to be said... (Score:3, Insightful)
EXCEPT GEOMETRY SHADERS, which was the entire point of the OP.