Years in the making Rainbow Six Extraction is one of the latest games with Vulkan support. With more games arriving on more devices than ever before, the benefit of Vulkan is clear: It allows developers to build games for more platforms, and usually with a performance improvement over closed-source APIs. Vulkan is likely a big reason why we have Doom and Doom Eternalports on Switch, and it’s why Hades went to PC and Switch before moving to other consoles. It works on Google Stadia, for example, and it even supports consoles with the Nintendo Switch. There are other operating systems and mobile devices, but Vulkan has applications elsewhere. Trevett also pointed out that Vulkan is the only modern API that’s both cross-platform and open-source. And of course, Vulkan being the API of choice for new generation titles on Android (the largest platform in the largest gaming market segment) doesn’t hurt either,” Trevett said. Using layered Vulkan over Metal on iOS and MacOS is now proven to give great performance. Enabling game streaming services to host games on Linux in the cloud is another. Being the primary API on innovative devices such as Valve’s Steam Deck is certainly one. “There are many industry trends that are driving broader Vulkan support. When I pointed this out to Trevett, he agreed but pointed to several larger industry trends that are driving Vulkan adoption. Valve recommends developers use Vulkan as the primary API for Steam Deck because the Steam Deck uses Linux. And other platforms are becoming a lot more important. As a developer building a game with DirectX, you have to take into account porting the game to other platforms. Performance is king, but Vulkan is really important because it has cross-platform support. Cross-platform support, Steam Deck, and cloud gaming The good news for PC gamers is that Vulkan is gaining steam, and it has nothing to do with performance. But they’re enough to get the wheels turning about what could be in the massive swath of titles that only support DirectX. These four games are hardly a full representation of the games people play. Vulkan handles multi-core CPU workloads much better than older versions of DirectX - DirectX 12 is better on this front - and that can make a world of difference when running at lower resolutions. It made a huge difference at 1080p in World War Z, increasing my average frame rate by nearly 21%. For example, Crysis Remastered uses DirectX as the main rendering engine, but it uses Vulkan for ray tracing (see the full list of Vulkan games). Note that a lot of games use one or the other, and some games use both for different things. I tested four games that support Vulkan and DirectX to measure the differences in performance. In one-for-one matchups, Vulkan simply outperforms DirectX. The David and Goliath battle between the multi-billion dollar closed-sourced corporation and the non-profit open-source consortium is a tale for the ages, but there are more tangible reasons to support Vulkan in PC games. For gamers, Khronos Group President Neil Trevett says the benefits are clear: “The result for consumers is that games will be able to ship using more advanced functionality, sooner.” Vulkan is faster than DirectX This recent update is a tipping point for the API, adding much-requested features to the core specification. In fact, the recent Vulkan 1.3 update was mostly an exercise in adding functionality to the core of Vulkan, contributed by both The Khronos Group and developers. Unlike DirectX, developers are free to modify and expand Vulkan to meet their needs. There are dozens of technical differences between DirectX and Vulkan, but this is what you need to know: DirectX comes from Microsoft and only works on Windows, while Vulkan comes from a group comprised of industry executives and works across operating systems.Īnd it’s open-source. PC gamers are likely more familiar with DirectX, Microsoft’s own API that works exclusively with Windows. It’s a middle-man that carries instructions. In legible terms, it’s a piece of kit that works on all three major operating systems - Linux, MacOS, and Windows - that allows games to communicate with the operating system. Vulkan is a cross-platform application programming interface (API) from The Khronos Group. What is Vulkan? The Talos Principle was one of the earliest games to receive Vulkan support. The surprising reason your powerful PC still can’t handle the latest games I tested Nvidia’s new RTX feature, and it fixed the worst part of PC gamingĬonsoles still have one big advantage, and it’s hurting PC gaming
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