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New DirectX 11 details emerge
Not many MMOs take advantage of the DirectX 10 API and its instruction sets but that's not stopping progress on DirectX 11. The new DirectX version will work on Vista and future versions of the Windows operating system dubbed Windows 7. Yesterday, at Gamefest -- Microsft's XNA conference, the conglomerate disclosed some upcoming key components that the new technology will possess. There's full support, and compatibility with DirectX 10 and 10.1 hardware, and this support extends too new DirectX 11 hardware. A new compute shader technology will open a GPU's capabilities to coincide as a parallel processor. More optimized power as multi-threaded resource handling will increase performance on multi-core machines. That's great since 8-core processors are not far-off from market sale. The last technical DirectX 11 feat announced is support for tessellation, a big fancy term that more or less makes your graphics smoother and prettier when viewed close-up. It could be a year or more before a MMOG takes full advantage of DirectX 11's capabilities. For example early DX10 adopters that play MMOGs are still waiting for Age of Conan's DX10 client.
DirectX 11 detailed; Vista and DX 10 / 10.1 hardware supported
At its GamesFest event in Redmond today, Microsoft shared the first details of DirectX 11 – the numerically superior successor to DirectX 10.1 – which will feature full support for Windows Vista, as well as future versions of the popular operating system. Worried about hardware? DirectX 11 won't just ignore your fancy DirectX 10 or 10.1 cards – nope, it offers support for both of those standards, as well as for new DirectX 11 hardware. But what's new and exciting about DirectX 11, you ask incredulously. How about a "new compute shader technology" that gets your GPU ready to do more than just boring old 3D graphics – instead "developers can take advantage of the graphics card as a parallel processor"? Not doing it for you? How about "multi-threaded resource handling that will allow games to better take advantage of multi-core machines" since, y'know, most every computer nowadays has multiple cores? Or "support for tessellation" which allows "developers to refine models to be smoother and more attractive when seen up close"? Something in there has to tickle your fancy. What it probably means for most of you is this: as hardware manufacturers develop new chipsets to take advantage of DirectX 11's new features, you should be able to snag some of that older 10.1 gear for a song.
Is your DirectX up to date?
Did you wake up this morning, anxious about something you could not describe? Some nagging worry you couldn't shake? A little paranoia? Have you looked at your computer and felt it was wanting something from you? And you just didn't know what?It's the new update to DirectX 9.0c. That's what your computer has been wanting, assuming it runs Windows versions later than Windows 98 and earlier than Windows Vista. This latest version contains all the bug fixes and performance enhancements they've ever published, so if you want to make sure your graphics engine is at its best, fire up Internet Explorer and head on over to the DirectX download page. You'll have to validate your copy of Windows is genuine, and if you're lucky, you may be invited into an exclusive beta just for visiting the page. Microsoft is revamping their website to use their new Silverlight technology (an alternative to Flash for Windows and OS/X computers), and you may be invited to give Silverlight a test drive.[Via Pumping Irony]
Current and future gaming on the Mac
MacNewsWorld has a pretty good in-depth overview up about Mac gaming: where it's at and where it's headed. The basic story is that the three things that have historically held Mac gaming back behind PCs (the technology differences, the OS, and the smaller installed base) are slowly disappearing. With Apple's switch from PowerPC to Intel, the introduction of Boot Camp and increasingly easy development in OS X, and the growing popularity of the platform, gaming is actually bigger on the Mac than it's ever been.But there is still a huge obstacle, and that is DirectX. Though there are ways around it (Freeverse actually mentions the Unity engine in the article), many developers are stuck developing in DirectX, and that leaves the Mac platform out of the loop. And there really isn't anything comparable to it in OS X, either. Graphics hardware remains a problem, but that just harkens back to the biggest problem of getting games on the Mac: support from Apple. Some developers say that there aren't games on the Mac because Steve doesn't want them there, and until Apple shows evidence to the contrary, PC will always be the gamers' platform of choice.[Via IMG]
Winners picked for final week of Turbine's DX10 screenshot contest
Turbine's DirectX 10 screenshot contest for the LotRO community has finally come to an end. Three winners and one runner-up have been selected for the final week.Airak and Eoheryn of Landroval, and forum member Fatty_Lumpkin were the three winners. The honorably mentioned screenshot (included above) was taken by Rendo Gnollen. Why did Turbine pick three winners and one honorable mention instead of just saying there are four winners, since there are no prizes anyway? Who knows.Turbine also assured everyone that there will be another screenshot contest next year, and that DirectX 9 users will also be eligible.
Turbine announces fourth pair of DX10 screenshot contest winners
Week four of Turbine's screenshot contest for The Lord of the Rings Online has come and gone, and the fourth pair of winners has been selected.This time the winners are players Morreion and Brisbanoch. Their entries have been posted on the official LotRO forums. Morreion's screenshot is pictured here. It shows off the dynamic tree shadow effects you can enable if you're playing with a DirectX 10-ready video card in Windows Vista.Turbine's been hosting this contest to celebrate LotRO's place as the first MMO to fully support DX10 features. It's not too late to send in an entry yourself if you've got the high-end hardware needed to support DX10 -- and if you run Windows Vista. That's a big if at this point.
LotRO DirectX 10 screenshot contest crowns week 3 winners
Week 3 of the Lord of the Rings Online DirectX 10 screenshot contest has rolled around, and there are two more winning snaps to share (full-sized versions available from the forum post). Both of the winners this week have shots that show off some nice tree shadows, and the reflection of the castle in the above shot is good too. Incidentally, an upcoming patch to the game will improve performance of DX10 with shadows in particular.If you missed the other winners so far, here is our coverage of Week 1 and Week 2. There should be two more weeks of entries still ahead, and we'll be sure to report them when they come through. It's also not too late to enter, if you have a ridiculous machine to back you up, so check out the contest rules if you want to get a chance at having a featured screenshot.
EVE Trinity: New graphics engine calls for a video card checkup
Traders, Smugglers, Pirates, Miners, Capusuleers from every walk of life! Today marks a momentous occasion in the EVE Online universe. At approximately 6PM PST the EVE servers will be brought down and fitted for the new EVE: Trinity expansion. The downtime is estimated to last 24 hours, which means this is probably our last heads up beforehand to train a time appropriate skill in advance. The amount of new content is intense as Trinity is EVE's biggest expansion ever: New ships, tweaks, tutorials, new everything, and of course, the grand-daddy of Trinity's enhancements: The long-awaited graphical overhaul featuring EVE's new graphic engine dubbed Trinity 2. Confused yet? All that matters is that every ship, stargate, and station remodeled to sweet perfection. There is a downside, and that is not everyone will be able to enjoy the new radical graphics. Players who do not have a Shader Model 3.0 or DirectX9c compliant video card will be left in the space dust with the classic client. EVE players with DirectX9c and video cards that support Shader Model 3.0 will be able to use the shiny new doodad client. The important thing is everyone can still play EVE Online regardless or not your rig meets the requirements to run the new graphics. What is SM 3.0 and how the hell do you know your video card supports it? To answer that, with the help of the EVE forums, I have compiled the necessary information to help you find out.
Turbine picks DX10 Screenshot Contest winners for Week 2
As if people with GeForce 8800 GT video cards weren't lucky enough, Turbine has been hosting a screenshot contest just for them on the official The Lord of the Rings Online website. Players submit screenshots of the game running in DirectX 10 and Turbine posts the best screenshots each week.The water effects in LotRO are jaw-droppingly gorgeous; last week's winners both focused on those. Now this week's winners have been selected, and water still plays a part in one of the screenshots (pictured above), but it's not the sole focus. It's too bad none of the winning screenshots are presented in a variety of wallpaper resolutions. They would make excellent desktop backgrounds.Still, they're nice to look at. Enter the contest yourself if you think you have l33t virtual photography skillz!
Turbine selects the first DirectX 10 screenshot contest winners
Last week we reported that the LotRO crew at Turbine would be having a screenshot contest to promote how awesome they are for making LotRO the first MMO to support DirectX 10. Each Monday, the best shots from the previous week's submissions would be featured at the official website.Well, the first Monday (plus two days) has arrived, and two winners have been selected, which is a surprise since the original announcement said there would be three winners each week. They're both very good screenshots that feature very pretty water effects; one of them -- which we think is a view of the lake in Evendim -- appears above.You can look at the other one in the official forum post. The contest will continue until December 17th, so if you have a GPU that supports DX10 and if you're running Windows Vista, send in a submission!
Parallels Desktop 3 officially released
After teasing us by announcing a release candidate for beta testers (and a sale that is now over) and posting videos of Quake 4 - a very resource-intensive game - running impressively well in Parallels, this powerful new v3.0 of the leading virtualization suite for Mac OS X has been released. Offering significant new features like we already mentioned, such as the highly-anticipated 3D acceleration (XP for now, Vista to come) and SmartSelect for specifying files types to open in apps across virtualized OSes, this could easily be called the most significant release of Parallels since the advent of Coherence Mode. Parallels Desktop 3.0 sells for $79.99 and is ready for download now, with 15-day trial keys are available to those who already used trial keys for previous versions.
Today's most comparative game videos: Crysis DirectX
If you can geek out to API advancements, we salute you. Today's video picks compare DirectX 9 and the messiah DirectX 10 with Crysis footage. Yes, we can actually see a difference in the clips, and GameTrailers provides big, non-embedable HD files on its site.Will Crysis be the best-looking game ever, and will it require a DX10 system -- and, of course, Vista -- to earn that title? We've seen "best-looking game ever" mugs at a mall kiosk and will set one aside for the game's release later this year. (Don't let us down, Crysis. We could end up taunting you by giving it to the Wii.)See the videos after the break.
It's official: Lost Planet finds PC gamers
Capcom signaled its self-described return to more frequent PC releases by officially announcing a PC version of Lost Planet: Extreme Condition for June. The Windows XP and Vista game will support DirectX 10 for gamers with those shiny video cards, but DirectX 9 players are also invited into the snowy world.The PC version will run at resolutions up to 2,560x1600, making the console war's "True HD" sound like a tired marketing slogan. (Oh wait, it already did.) While the graphic effects beyond resolution will also be improved, little else is certain to change.Capcom told us at its Gamer's Day event that the PC game may include new multiplayer maps and even increase its 16-player online cap, but both updates are still pending. However, multiplayer matches between Xbox 360 gamers and PC players will not be supported.%Gallery-2562%
Famitsu reports Lost Planet coming to PC, rocking DirectX 10
According to a Famitsu report released earlier this morning (translation), Capcom and Nvidia are jointly announcing that the platinum-selling Xbox 360 title Lost Planet: Extreme Condition is coming to the PC. Visuals have been improved and the title will utilize DirectX 10 (with resolutions up to 2560x1600). The report cites a June 2007 release in North America and Europe with no date listed for a Japanese release.We're left wondering if Lost Planet PC is going to be Vista-exclusive, and if there are similar PC plans for Capcom's other Xbox 360 "exclusive."[Thanks, Rob]
Crytek shows CrysisENGINE2, innocent trees shot
Crytek occupies a medium-sized booth space at this year's GDC show floor. The company, showing its CryENGINE2 to developers, announced that it found its first customer in Avatar Reality, Inc. Hoping to land more interest, the company is hosting a series of rotating presentations about its level editor, sound system, character animation, engine, and other features.Harald Seeley, Development Director for Crytek briefly spoke with us about the engine and its outlook, saying that it's at alpha now for the PC, and they'll ship the SDK to AVI in four to six weeks. Seeley said that Crytek is working to bring CryENGINE2 to the PS3 and Xbox 360, but those plans don't mean that Crysis will be released on those platforms.Modders and indie designers should look for a PC version of the development environment bundled with Crysis. Seeley said that the consumer tools offer nearly all of the features of the fully licensed engine, and that modders may be able to work out terms to release commercial software created with the free editor.Seeley thinks that the commercial version of CryENGINE2 will lead other middleware engines because it was developed for DirectX 10 instead of being prettied up from an older version of the API. He said, "This will become the standard. ... [Gamers] won't be willing to settle for titanium trees any longer. If it looks breakable, if it looks like you should be able to pick it up, [you will.]"%Gallery-1976%
VMWare video hints at full DirectX virtualization in OS X
Mac users, listen up: a video has appeared on YouTube that shows an internal beta version of VMWare running Windows games at full speed from within Mac OS X. Accompanying this intriguing video is a blog post from Regis Duchesne, a developer at VMWare, who confirms that there are internal beta builds of the program that support DirectX 8.1 virtualization. Regis notes that VMWare is currently working on DirectX 9 support and therefore, compatibility with Windows Vista's Aero interface technology. As nice as compatibility with Aero sounds, the main appeal for the first version of VMWare to support DirectX will be convenience: instead of having to boot into a Windows XP partition or deal with other flakier programs, Mac users will be able to run Windows games at full speed from within Mac OS X. Since VMWare's primary competitor -- Parallels -- has also promised to implement DirectX virtualization into Parallels Desktop, it's still up in the air as to which company will be the first to include this feature in a retail offering. So, PC gaming fanboys, what are you going to do all day now that your favorite phrase -- "Mac gaming is an oxymoron" -- doesn't cut it on the Mac gaming forums anymore?[Via TUAW]
Crysis will run on ye olde gaming rig
As Crysis looms, anxiety levels are high. The perceived demands of Crytek's DirectX 10 showcase present a financial burden to those with dated PCs. Speaking to Next-Gen, Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli assured gamers that Crysis will be playable on 2- to 3-year-old gaming rigs, but warned that if you do plan to rely on aging hardware, avoid those who have the game running on DX10 -- it might be hard to go back to your scaled-down DX9 experience.Yerli also seemed to express Crytek's approval of Vista, telling Next-Gen, "Most likely we will upgrade all dev stations to Vista and move to Vista-only titles". This apparent commitment to the new operating system stands in stark contrast to comments issued by id Software's John Carmack, who isn't pleased that Microsoft has "artificially" tethered DX10 to Vista.
Vista security too tight on casual games, claims WildTangent
DirectX creator Alex St. John says Windows Vista "breaks" casual games. The WildTangent CEO recently described the arduous process of patching his company's network of games to ensure Vista compatibility. The effort reportedly took a year of working closely with "nearly every major casual game developer.""Parents who choose to use Vista's parental controls are likely to accidentally block access to hundreds of very popular family friendly games that happen not to have ESRB ratings," explained St. John. Casual game networks hosted by Yahoo, AOL, RealArcade, and even Microsoft (MSN Games) could all be affected, according to St. John. Microsoft has yet to comment on the allegations.It should be noted that WildTangent's software is often denoted as spyware by antispyware applications. While the software is generally regarded as harmless, it's often installed without express consent (and remains self-updating); WildTangent also reserves the right to collect personal information for use in tuning its products.
EA denies Crysis game on Xbox 360
EA has shot down recent claims that a version of Crysis is headed to Xbox 360. The publisher described 1UP's discussion of the game (via podcast) as a "miscommunication." The gaming site claimed to have spoken with Crytek developers who confirmed an Xbox 360 title was in the works. Miscommunication? Color us suspicious.EA might not be ready to make an announcement, but the hype surrounding this to-be franchise demands that Crysis games appear on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Wait for it.
Rumorang: Crysis game for Xbox 360, not PC port
Xboxic reports that an unnamed developer, speaking to 1UP, has revealed details about a Crysis game headed to Xbox 360. Allegedly, the console version will not be a direct port of the PC title that's currently in development. Like Far Cry before it, Crysis will be stripped down for its console debut.The Xbox 360 version will supposedly incorporate similar story elements to its PC brethren, but will feature different gameplay aspects (physics, environments, etc.) that better utilize 360's DirectX 9 technology (the PC version is being built using DirectX 10). Expect full details if and when Crytek finally (and officially) announces this much-anticipated console installment of its high-profile franchise.See also: Crytek says 360 and PS3 can't handle Crysis Crytek revises claim: Crysis could be ported
