Quoting: subThe reason that Direct3D (mostly) works out of the box, is that hardware vendors put lots and lots of money in the development of their drivers. The hardware vendor (NVidia, AMD) implement the important bits in the driver not Microsoft. Microsoft only does the specs of the Direct3D API and a bit more.

When you use Direct3d you are targeting Microsoft's implementation (that's the layer you are talking to, not the hardware drivers), and generally it will be a fixed one (like Dx 9.0c June 2010, or whatever). Yes the hardware differences are there, but the API is consistent. With OpenGL you have no idea (without asking) if the function has been even implemented. Even though OpenGL is arguably a higher level API you are talking directly to the driver's implementation of that API. And vendors have different interpretations of the OpenGL specs.

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Quoting: subIf the target really ist just WinXP - which I doubt - they could just use OpengGL 4.x for modern graphics features, couldn't they AFAIK the drivers are available.

Yes, which is what UE4 does (it still runs on XP). You missed my point though.

The advantage right now is that DirectX works out of the box. The implementation of DirectX is by Microsoft, not the hardware vendors (unlike OpenGL), which means it's a slightly more reliable target. Have you not used the AMD drivers? (Or Intel for that matter.) DirectX 9.0c is a better target to aim for at the moment, even if it's holding back those games visually.

But despite all that, the fact that you said OpenGL is an option there kinda proves my point about Vulkan. Vulkan a means to keep XP machines playing games and bringing in money.

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Quoting: subWell, Newell said (see the GDC interview) Blizzard is a Vulkan supporter.
Why should they support it, if they're not aiming for SteamOS?
If they stick to Windows, they could just stay with Direct3D 12.

It's got nothing to do with Linux. The reason for the support is because of Windows XP.

Windows XP will never support DX12, Windows Vista and 7 might not either (although the later not getting support is unlikely). Blizzard games are net cafe favourites, and keeping the licensing requirements (and subsequently costs to the cafes) lower is important. It's much like the opposite of a Microsoft-published game (when they used to do that) Halo on PC required DX10 (although didn't show much for it). Vista was new and rubbish, but I'm sure some people installed Vista for the game. Take every Blizzard game, every Valve game (but notably even the recent ones), LoL, Quake Live - what do they have in common? They all have XP as a minimum requirement. DirectX 9.0c. An ancient (2004) API.

Vulkan could bring modern graphics to those machines.

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This is brilliant news.

And it actually makes me wonder how similar the APIs of DX12 and Vulkan will be. Surely there will be some convergent evolution going on here.

DX12 might be easier to wrap into Vulkan than DX10/11 was into OpenGL (especially since the later has never happened).

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Games using Wine wrappers (such as The Witcher 2) do not count as Wine games since they are categorised as Linux on digital distribution platforms.

Witcher 2 doesn't use a Wine wrapper/bottle/whatever.

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Again without any meaningful change, the only thing that this month's stats showed us is how inaccurate those numbers can be....

Wait, how does this follow?

Quoting: Ignis

Quoting: HoriOne problem that comes through my mind are WINE clients that would count as Windows clients

WINE can be detected, AFAIK.

Of course it can. It's part of the computer specs that get submitted to Valve, specifically the Wine version number. It's also the reason why opening steam under Wine at the beginning of the month just about guarantees a survey (seriously, try it). Valve is deliberately targeting under-represented systems because they know what they are doing, they need a representative sample. Everyone who opens Steam on Wine and gets the survey closes it because they think it will be counted as Windows. The people refusing the survey [External Link] are trying to game the survey by not completing it, but statistics 101 is knowing how your polling technique is biased. Valve would have OS stats from connections and they fire off a survey request to those they need more numbers for. (Seriously, do you really think Valve doesn't know the OS version + Steam version of every connection? Of course they do.) The survey isn't asking what OS you are running, it's asking for specific version detail, it's asking for hardware details. They already know the answer to the Linux percentage.

Seriously people, stop questioning the numbers every god damn month. Yes there is always error, but Valve hires extremely smart people [External Link] who know how to run a survey.

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hmmmm

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193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   001   001   000    Old_age   Always       -       787498

HIGHSCORE!

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No Witcher 2?

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Quoting: pd12And definitely a breaker for some Linux WINE runners.

couldn't you just use the GOG installer in wine anyway?

Quoting: SamsaiI might have overlooked that bit when I went through the forum thread. Based on the messages I read and the tip that was given to us I got the impression that the password wasn't general knowledge.

it was in the github post (like one post after the one you linked to), not trying to sound like an arsehole here, but i didn't read the thread much either. it just seems like a bizarre change, yes, but the response is completely overblown (like every linux gaming issue).

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