The release of the Vulkan API is imminent

The release of the Vulkan API is imminent, with version 1.0 coming shortly after the years end.



Read more on the Vulkan API imminent release.

Will be a long time before it even shows up in any game though

NeverBackDown said:

Will be a long time before it even shows up in any game though

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Just curious, are you basing that on anything other than that because we are hearing it now and it usually takes some time before new tech reaches the consumer?

The fact that companies like epic, valve, unity etc have been working on and involved in this and that Gabe N said that it will be "a critical component of SteamOS and future Valve games" i think it'll show up sooner than you might think.

But that's just like my opinion man...

Kleptobot said:

Just curious, are you basing that on anything other than that because we are hearing it now and it usually takes some time before new tech reaches the consumer?

The fact that companies like epic, valve, unity etc have been working on and involved in this and that Gabe N said that it will be "a critical component of SteamOS and future Valve games" i think it'll show up sooner than you might think.

But that's just like my opinion man...

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For a lot of thing like this it is really hard to tell when you are outside of the high game development ecosystem.

Valve has already shown Vulkan working and other developers have already used beta builds of the API.

I think that developers that have already been using Mantle or a different low level API will not have much trouble implementing it, especially Mantle devs given Vulkan's origins.

Intel, Nvidia and AMD have used Vulkan and delivered talks on it and given that fact that it can be used on Linux, Mac OS and Windows it is likely that it will be adopted by developers much faster than DX12, as developers are always looking for ways to expand their market and potential sales.


I remember a Valve software developer, Dan Ginsburg, saying this;

Unless you are aggressive enough to be shipping a DX12 game this year, I would argue that there is really not much reason to ever create a DX12 back end for your game

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I imagine that Oxide games will jump on this as soon as they can and that former Mantle developers will not have much trouble implementing Vulkan support.

Hopefully performance from the Vulkan API will be similar to that of DX12, as that is the only way I see Vulkan gaining less traction than DX12.

I wasn't aware that NVidia was going to play ball.. Nice to know.

Kushiro said:

I wasn't aware that NVidia was going to play ball.. Nice to know.

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I don't think they had much choice really, especially given how popular it has shown to be.

Steam support means Steam machines, and Nvidia have quite a few on offer.

TBH it would have been rather childish to not use it in the first place since it would cost them nothing really... Though I guess they do have a record of it.

Kushiro said:

TBH it would have been rather childish to not use it in the first place since it would cost them nothing really... Though I guess they do have a record of it.

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I wouldn't say they're childish, more arrogant.. But yeah, they really don't have much choice.

Kleptobot said:

Just curious, are you basing that on anything other than that because we are hearing it now and it usually takes some time before new tech reaches the consumer?

The fact that companies like epic, valve, unity etc have been working on and involved in this and that Gabe N said that it will be "a critical component of SteamOS and future Valve games" i think it'll show up sooner than you might think.

But that's just like my opinion man...

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I understand your point, makes sense in a way. However while Steam maybe working on it, it'll be a long while before it even becomes relevant. So yes I am basing it on the fact it'll take a long while before it reaches the consumer, and I mean before it becomes common. One or two games doesn't really count imo for a success. I'm no API engineer or developer(meaning I don't know which is the more powerful etc API) but personally I think Vulkan will probably win out over DX12 simply because it allows for more OS's to be used and a common language across all of them, simplifying the development process some.

Kushiro said:

I wasn't aware that NVidia was going to play ball.. Nice to know.

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Kushiro said:

TBH it would have been rather childish to not use it in the first place since it would cost them nothing really... Though I guess they do have a record of it.

Click to expand...

AlienALX said:

I wouldn't say they're childish, more arrogant.. But yeah, they really don't have much choice.

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Yeah it's a shocker but they would be quite arrogant or even ignorant to ignore it. Not supporting it would be like forgoing support of DX12 on a smaller scale.

Of course nVidia would support it. Its not AMD branded anymore. It'd be the same with AMD if PhysX became 'freeX' or whatever.