Vulkan adoption chances?

[seitur]

Vulkan came recently and significantly later than DX12 and does not have weight of MS pushing it heavily behind it.

What do you think are the chances of Vulkan getting adoption in game industry?

There are some rumors Nintendo may use it in it's upcoming console, Valve seems commited to it (not a surprise here), Samsung did some marketing with Vulkan on smartphones too but what about chances of various game producing 3rd parties choosing to go Vulkan instead of DX12 on Windows when they need to use low level API?

 

[greatnoob]

Vulkan came recently and significantly later than DX12 and does not have weight of MS pushing it heavily behind it.

What do you think are the chances of Vulkan getting adoption in game industry?

There are some rumors Nintendo may use it in it's upcoming console, Valve seems commited to it (not a surprise here), Samsung did some marketing with Vulkan on smartphones too but what about chances of various game producing 3rd parties choosing to go Vulkan instead of DX12 on Windows when they need to use low level API?

Game developers do not care about fancy advertising and marketing when it comes to things like this. Depending on the developer, most would want to use a library that fits their needs.

If they are developing purely for Windows AND they are able to achieve what they have planned they will choose, DirectX12 is what they'll use.

If they are going for multi-platform releases AND they are able to achieve what they have planned they will choose Vulkan.

AAA developers don't really care about Linux or Mac and are confident with DX which is why they will always Windows + DX. OpenGL wasn't adopted because of poor driver support especially on Linux (IIRC). That most likely wont be the case for Vulkan though.

 

[Tuna-Fish]

Now that I have had some experience with both, I can honestly say: It doesn't matter.

Vulkan shares enough with DX12 through the Mantle connection that in practice they are almost identical. You can generally take any codebase built for DX12 and convert it into Vulkan by doing only local changes. Once there is a good HLSL -> SPIR-V compiler, any game built for DX12 can very easily be ported to Vulkan.

 

[greatnoob]

Once there is a good HLSL -> SPIR-V compiler, any game built for DX12 can very easily be ported to Vulkan.

Does that really matter? If you can refactor your code base to work with Vulkan wouldnt it be trivial to port over your shaders from HLSL to GLSL (if that is what Vulkan uses)

 

[Tuna-Fish]

Does that really matter? If you can refactor your code base to work with Vulkan wouldnt it be trivial to port over your shaders from HLSL to GLSL (if that is what Vulkan uses)

The job of refactoring your codebase from DX12 to vulkan consists of changing a few type signatures and the names of a few function calls. There are almost no structural changes to code. Porting over even a single shader is much more work.

 

[PingSpike]

Isn't DX12 only available on Windows 10 whereas Vulkan can run on anything?

 

[poofyhairguy]

Vulkan will see the largest adoption on Android. As phones reach the power of the Xbone eventually we will see more "console" games ported to that platform. That is way way out through.

 

[Bacon1]

Vulkan will end up being a fallback for machines that can't handle DX12 (older GPU, non Win10 OS) assuming that DX12 is easier to develop for (Visual Studio and other tools) and keeps its performance edge.

If Vulkan ends up faster and gets better tooling, then it might replace DX12 all together.

 

[airfathaaaaa]

given how the same team managed to destroy opengl i wont have my hopes up at all

 

[xthetenth]

Vulkan would be an excellent choice for devs working on DX12 games to add platform compatibility.

That way they can get the technical advantages of going pure DX12 without the limits of DX11 and still hit users on Win 7.

 

[Game_dev]

Vulkan is just a fancy name for OpenGL. It will stay on the same path as OpenGL. Most PC games will continue to use DirectX. In fact most games over the next 3+ years will still be directx 11 or older.

 

[airfathaaaaa]

Vulkan is just a fancy name for OpenGL. It will stay on the same path as OpenGL. Most PC games will continue to use DirectX. In fact most games over the next 3+ years will still be directx 11 or older.

how many games you saw on 2015 that had a backwards dx compartibility?
also yeah i can already see the devs that are coding for native dx12 will spend more time and money for dx11

because this happens quite a lot on history of games...NOT

 

[therealnickdanger]

Isn't DX12 only available on Windows 10 whereas Vulkan can run on anything?

Yup.

Just like DX9 vs OGL on XP.
Just like DX10 vs OGL on Vista.
Just like DX11 vs OGL on 7.
Just like DX11.1 vs OGL on 8.

Doesn't matter, DX always wins. :|

 

[MajinCry]

Well, OpenGL was pretty much broken, from what I've read, and according to what Zlatan said as well. Vulkan is a completely new beast.

Ya'd think devs would be all over it; pretty much the same as Direct3D 12 due to mantle being the code foundation and all that.

Though it might be an issue of ecosystems; DirectX involves audio and stuff, whereas Vulkan is just a rendering API ta compete with Direct3D.

 

[Dribble]

A lot will come down to the effort that goes into making Vulcan easy to implement. MS has always been good at writing development tools, so if it's just easier to code in DX12 most will use that (this was the case for all previous DX from 9 onward really).

If Vulcan is just Mantle and then left to flounder with no effort going into the debuggers and sdk's and the rest of it then adoption is not surprisingly going to be limited to the "we have no other choice" cases.

 

[Headfoot]

Vulkan is the OpenGL rewrite devs have wanted for over a decade. It is not the same, the circumstances of its creation are not the same, its future outlook is not the same.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Yup.

Just like DX9 vs OGL on XP.
Just like DX10 vs OGL on Vista.
Just like DX11 vs OGL on 7.
Just like DX11.1 vs OGL on 8.

Doesn't matter, DX always wins. :|

Meh, pretty soon Windows and Microsoft won't be driving the boat. I bet within 5 years we see AAA games targeting Android:

 

[Despoiler]

Vulkan is the OpenGL rewrite devs have wanted for over a decade. It is not the same, the circumstances of its creation are not the same, its future outlook is not the same.

Also, devs don't like Microsoft's Universal Windows Platform or Windows Store. As long as Vulkan doesn't stagnate in development like it has in the past, it has a good shot. I definitely wouldn't short Vulkan's chances of being the preferred API.

 

[Headfoot]

Im not certain it will be predominant, due to the DX12 first mover advantage, but I think Vulkan will do better than OpenGL has done. At least for PC gaming

 

[Phynaz]

In the PC space? Zip.
Others it will be dominate.

 

[therealnickdanger]

Meh, pretty soon Windows and Microsoft won't be driving the boat. I bet within 5 years we see AAA games targeting Android...

Shipping 1 billion phones per year is not going to bring CoD 2016 or DoW III to Android or Vulkan to PC. FlappyBird 5: The ReFlappening, yes. As long as developers and gamers alike crave cutting edge graphics (no sign of the slowing, thanks to VR) or complex inputs and display technologies, PCs will be the controlling factor in selecting the PC API of choice.

Microsoft has proven, now many times over, that ports from Xbone to UWP are a nightmare. If they keep this up, Vulkan will have a chance, but it will have nothing to do with Android.

 

[LTC8K6]

Meh, pretty soon Windows and Microsoft won't be driving the boat. I bet within 5 years we see AAA games targeting Android:

But the 2015 and 2016 numbers are "forecasts"...

 

[Bacon1]

Also, devs don't like Microsoft's Universal Windows Platform or Windows Store. As long as Vulkan doesn't stagnate in development like it has in the past, it has a good shot. I definitely wouldn't short Vulkan's chances of being the preferred API.

As a developer I like UWP. Having the ability to develop once, publish to multiple devices is great.

 

[Despoiler]

As a developer I like UWP. Having the ability to develop once, publish to multiple devices is great.

Pretty sure Tim Sweeney has more sway.

 

[Bacon1]

Pretty sure Tim Sweeney has more sway.

You mean the same guy that recanted his statements over UWP and admitted he didn't know sideloading was default on?

The same guy that also loves iOS development which is very limiting?

Who has a direct competiting store to Windows Store?

Whose engine doesn't handle UWP yet?

Yeah lots of cred there....


http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/03/tim-sweeney-is-missing-the-point-the-pc-platform-needs-fixing/

You said "Devs don't want it". Not "Tim Sweeny doesn't want it".

I'm a developer and I'm all for it.