Windows 8 sold over 200 million licenses.

[rashdanml]

I thought you said opengl performance was better in windows than directx? 

It is, but no thanks to Microsoft. Valve has done most of the legwork to make OpenGL better than DirectX on Windows (actually, they focused on making OpenGL perform better on Linux with the Windows performance boost as a happy side-effect). Microsoft should hop on board. That's what @deathjester is saying with "Embrace OpenGL". 

[mr moose]

It is, but no thanks to Microsoft. Valve has done most of the legwork to make OpenGL better than DirectX on Windows (actually, they focused on making OpenGL perform better on Linux which the Windows performance boost as a happy side-effect). Microsoft should hop on board. That's what @deathjester is saying with "Embrace OpenGL". 

 

Earlier on in the thread jester and the misathropic said that MS is using Directx to force users to upgrade to win8,  then they go on to say that direct x isn't of any consequence now.  I am merely pointing out that they're mutually exclusive arguments, one cannot be true while the other is.  It doesn't matter what MS did or did not do to opengl, the fact is it is better and that that if a developer codes specifically for the new directx then they will be limiting their sales to windows 8 users only.  If you follow the logic of this argument through, the only conclusion can be either that directx is irrelevant and thus cannot be used by MS to force users to upgrade to win 8. (after all why would anyone pay to ugrade to win 8 to use directx if it is inferior to openg?)   or that direct x is the only api dev's are coding for because MS has a monopoly on the market. 

[deathjester]

I thought you said opengl performance was better in windows than directx? 

 

It is NOW.  Directx9 was the only time DirectX was faster and it was only faster in Windows. Games previous to this were OpenGL, and the OpenGL ports ran better. Windows got caught with their hand in the cookie jar sabotaging OpenGL performance. You have to remember that a lot of these new mobile games (the kind they want to sell in their app store, just like Apple) are OpenGL and Mac OS is OpenGL. These mobile game companies are not going to spend the money to code for DirectX. 

 

MS was in a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. Add to that they probably saw the writing on the wall. 

 

If I run WoW in Windows or Mac OS? There is no difference. The problem is Blizzard has to use both API's. People like Blizzard HATE Windows 8. Blizzard is one of the companies that has always supported MAC and OpenGL.  Blizzard doesn't fully support OpenGL outside of Mac, because why bother. Just more work for them and their plate is already full.

 

http://kotaku.com/5929569/blizzard-isnt-happy-with-windows-8-either

 

There were a few reasons the gaming devs hated Win 8. 1) fragmenting the Direct X's again (which is dumb) for people that refused to run 8 (and you still have people on freakin XP and DirectX 9). 2) The Windows store (I linked an article earlier showing how much the game devs hated the thing and were afraid it would lead to some very bad things).  3) companies that already ported OpenGL now had even more work. Do they, or don't they support the new direct x. Which DirectX do they code the game for (SWTOR was coded for 9, for example and BF4 is coded for Win 8)? If people hate 8, are they better off just coding for 7.

 

DirectX is stupid. It has always been stupid. Microsoft needs to force upgrades of their OS by making quality applications and a OS that people love, not by introducing artificial limitations on the older OS's and making game development hell for the devs.

[mr moose]

 

DirectX is stupid. It has always been stupid. Microsoft needs to force upgrades of their OS by making quality applications and a OS that people love, not by introducing artificial limitations on the older OS's and making game development hell for the devs.

 

My point still stands, if devs hate dx and prefer opengl then MS can't use dx to force upgrades because it can no longer be a prerequisite API with better alternatives that dev's actually prefer and can use.

[mr moose]

 

MS was in a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. Add to that they probably saw the writing on the wall. 

 

 

I don't fully understand the gravity of this,  PC gamers only constitute about 1.6% of MS's consumers, they don't really care about us, they throw us token bones but ultimately other than lipservice they give us very little.

[deathjester]

I don't fully understand the gravity of this,  PC gamers only constitute about 1.6% of MS's consumers, they don't really care about us, they throw us token bones but ultimately other than lipservice they give us very little.

 

"Throw us token bones". Selling DirectX patches, more then once for 100 bucks isn't "throwing people a bone". It is bending them over. 

 

MS has never thrown gamers a bone. They could put the new DirectX on Win 7 within a day. It is the same freakin kernel. They could also allow it on Steam OS and linux (as if that would ever happen).

 

Please just stop it man. You seem to have a major agenda here to paint MS in a good light. They are one of the worst things that has ever happened to gaming and gaming development.

 

 

I don't fully understand the gravity of this,  PC gamers only constitute about 1.6% of MS's consumers, they don't really care about us, they throw us token bones but ultimately other than lipservice they give us very little.

 

Which is why the new DirectX is on Windows 7, right? MS makes a TON of money selling Windows as a gaming OS. Custom pc parts made like what 20-30 billion last year? All those parts are forced to run the newest OS for best gaming performance. 

 

MS hasn't thrown 3 Billion down the toilet with the Xbox division without reason. MS has also thrown away money with their "games for Windows" which require DirectX and were used to push a new OS where they withheld the new Direct X from the previous version.

 

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/12/13/microsoft-bringing-a-beloved-franchise-to-windows-8

 

^ More money being spent to require Win 8 as a gaming OS. Will probably be Halo. But yeah. MS is throwing all this money away for no reason.  

[Hobox]

License sales doesn't mean anything. If I remember correctly, early Microsoft also stated that they were actually getting record high license sales at first but their ACTIVATION rates were record lows. People bought when it was $15 or whatever the price was and never used them. And little do they know, those numbers expire.

[mr moose]

"Throw us token bones". Selling DirectX patches, more then once for 100 bucks isn't "throwing people a bone". It is bending them over. 

 

MS has never thrown gamers a bone. They could put the new DirectX on Win 7 within a day. It is the same freakin kernel. They could also allow it on Steam OS and linux (as if that would ever happen).

 

Please just stop it man. You seem to have a major agenda here to paint MS in a good light. They are one of the worst things that has ever happened to gaming and gaming development.

 

 

 

Which is why the new DirectX is on Windows 7, right? MS makes a TON of money selling Windows as a gaming OS. Custom pc parts made like what 20-30 billion last year? All those parts are forced to run the newest OS for best gaming performance. 

 

MS hasn't thrown 3 Billion down the toilet with the Xbox division without reason. MS has also thrown away money with their "games for Windows" which require DirectX and were used to push a new OS where they withheld the new Direct X from the previous version.

 

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/12/13/microsoft-bringing-a-beloved-franchise-to-windows-8

 

^ More money being spent to require Win 8 as a gaming OS. Will probably be Halo. But yeah. MS is throwing all this money away for no reason.  

what's this $100 for directx patches you keep referring to?  I don't know anyone, developer or otherwise that has to pay for DX. 

 

Also gamers make up no more than 10% of OS sales.  With 1 billion active pc's estimated in the world and MS with 96+% share and about 100Million dedicated gamers gives them less than 10% of their sales that would go to people looking solely to play games. Keeping in mind that there are also estimates that up to 20% of gamers pirate their OS and games, so this figure could be even lower if we are talking about legitimate money making sales. Making the figures more realistic at 8%. Another way to look at it could be the 65 million steam accounts, how many gamers do you know that don't have one of those?  I don't know many, but I do know a few that have accounts and also use their PC for work or other duties. which suggests the total figures for gamers who buy the OS purely for games at or below 6%. 

[GoodBytes]

People complain that you need to buy a new version of Windows for the latest DirectX. Why not complain on Nvidia, AMD and Intel, why we have to buy a new graphic card for support of new version of OpenGL and DirectX? So porting DirectX, doesn't help in any case, as we can see with OpenGL, where game devs still uses old version of OpenGL for their games, much like games still using DirectX9.

Also, the whole thing about Vista drop in performance of OpenGL, I recall being a myth, and that it was just driver re-optimizations that needed to be done as the OS was remade from scratch, well almost(~80%). The difference is that Microsoft was pro-active in helping graphic card manufacture in getting their drivers well optimized for DirectX, and provided, as always, full documentation. OpenGL doesn't have this service, as it's free, and well, don't know how the new Windows works, even if they offered that. They are apart. It took time, but performance is back with OpenGL.

[deathjester]

People complain that you need to buy a new version of Windows for the latest DirectX. Why not complain on Nvidia, AMD and Intel, why we have to buy a new graphic card for support of new version of OpenGL and DirectX? So porting DirectX, doesn't help in any case, as we can see with OpenGL, where game devs still uses old version of OpenGL for their games, much like games still using DirectX9.

Also, the whole thing about Vista drop in performance of OpenGL, I recall being a myth, and that it was just driver re-optimizations that needed to be done as the OS was remade from scratch, well almost(~80%). The difference is that Microsoft was pro-active in helping graphic card manufacture in getting their drivers well optimized for DirectX, and provided, as always, full documentation. OpenGL doesn't have this service, as it's free, and well, don't know how the new Windows works, even if they offered that. They are apart. It took time, but performance is back with OpenGL.

 

Cool now we are getting revisionist history.

 

http://www.astahost.com/topic/7377-microsoft-cripple-opengl-3d-graphics-performance-windows-vista-longhorn/

 

^ We knew what MS was up to in 2005. BTW I love how you try to spin it and blame the GPU makers who supported both API's.  

 

Even funnier? AMD/Nvidia/Intel are partners in the group that owns OpenGL. MS is NOT a partner *shocker*. Linus Torvalds should be giving MS the finger, not Nvidia. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khronos_Group

 

Anyways thanks for the laughter. I shot orange juice out of my nose reading the post you made. 

[Profquast]

Linux feels incredibly unpolished to me and drivers still aren't what they're supposed to be, and as long as osx can't be installed in a normal way I'm not even gonna try it. Also I like the new start menu, because you can actually store more icons on it than on the desktop and you can also create groups.

[GoodBytes]

Cool now we are getting revisionist history.

 

http://www.astahost.com/topic/7377-microsoft-cripple-opengl-3d-graphics-performance-windows-vista-longhorn/

 

^ We knew what MS was up to in 2005. BTW I love how you try to spin it and blame the GPU makers who supported both API's.  

 

Even funnier? AMD/Nvidia/Intel are partners in the group that owns OpenGL. MS is NOT a partner *shocker*. Linus Torvalds should be giving MS the finger, not Nvidia. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khronos_Group

 

Anyways thanks for the laughter. I shot orange juice out of my nose reading the post you made.

Yea I am sorry. This is all B.S.

This is all "Vista can't play MP3's" crap statement of the time. False claims.

[deathjester]

Yea I am sorry. This is all B.S.

This is all "Vista can't play MP3's" crap statement of the time. False claims.

 

You blamed the video card makers when they are partners in the group that owns OPEN GL. The you have the audacity to accuse me of BS? 

 

I linked you posts from 2005 where people called MS out on not supporting the newer versions of OpenGL (when the GPU makers did).

Everyone with a clue knew what was going on back then.

 

I pity anyone that believes anything you say at this point. False statements, twisting of facts with no basis in reality. Trying to turn the discussion towards other things like MP3 (LOL). 

 

The question is WHY. Why are you doing this? Financial gain? Are you an employee? Shareholder? You are far from stupid. Manipulative and practiced in the art of deception? Yes.

[Profquast]

You blamed the video card makers when they are partners in the group that owns OPEN GL. The you have the audacity to accuse me of BS? 

 

I linked you posts from 2005 where people called MS out on not supporting the newer versions of OpenGL (when the GPU makers did).

Everyone with a clue knew what was going on back then.

 

I pity anyone that believes anything you say at this point. False statements, twisting of facts with no basis in reality. Trying to turn the discussion towards other things like MP3 (LOL). 

 

The question is WHY. Why are you doing this? Financial gain? Are you an employee? Shareholder? You are far from stupid. Manipulative and practiced in the art of deception? Yes.

Has Microsoft killed your family or something? You seem really frustrated.

[deathjester]

Has Microsoft killed your family or something? You seem really frustrated.

So let me get this straight. Other people are allowed to twist facts and utter completely false statements, and I am not allowed to call them out on it? Again...some of you (and it is only like 3 of you who are always to be found in any Win 8 thread) are working WAY too hard at defending what happened with OpenGL. It is very clear what happened, and it is very clear people are trying to twist what happened (and you should question their motives). No amount of insults from you or the other few people are going to change that. 

 

This also happened in the transition to Vista from XP.

 

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/hardware/microsoft-stealth-update-and-windows-xp-repair-dont-mix/817

 

Not everyone here is a child. We remember all this.You can try to sell them revisionist history, but we aren't buying it. You can keep this thread going, but you would be better served to let it go.

 

I have appreciated the laughter you have brought me this morning though. I never thought that the GPU makers, who are partners in the group that owns OpenGL would be blamed for the newer versions of OpenGL not working in past versions of Windows. Funniest damn thing I have ever read. MS prevents newer versions of OpenGL working on Vista and you blame the partners of OpenGL.

 

BRILLIANT. Propaganda at it's finest. Machinima and Xbox. EA and youtube partners. You expect people to believe this junk? Next you are going to question my sanity, when the same people are always selling the same product and resorting to outright lies. 

 

This is almost as funny as the official BF4 forum where MS employees tell people that unparking cores on Win 7 can hurt a computer when Windows 8.1 unparks cores...

 

Well done MS. Well done. 

[GoodBytes]

No, you are following someone doing assumptions to the next level, and take it as facts.

I am no employee or shareholder of Microsoft, nor getting money or any gifts, nor I am some fanatic of the company. They are many things I don't agree, and I have many complaints.

You are being cynical, in believe that all actions that Microsoft does is bad, and completely done on purpose with some kind of grand plan. Because Microsoft is this big bad evil corporation.

Then you sprinkle elements of other things out of context, incomplete, to show how "Microsoft is this big bad evil corporation", so that you can act like if know more than them, and you are not fooled with Microsoft doing.

Microsoft does not block new version of OpenGL from working in Windows. The entire structure of Windows has changed in Vista. Install Vista now, and you'll see that all the OpenGL features of your GPU works fine.

[mr moose]

The important thing is not to assume the other person is wrong, he just see's it from a different angle:

 

 

[TheProfosist]

How about a version of windows that isn't a complete piece of fucking garbage that I would consider be worthy of an update? Yes this ties into your example: A lot of development stopped flat on it's track on Direct X 9 like you mention, and yes like you mention but this was true even when Direct X 10 was brand new. You wanna hear why nobody talks about Direct X 10 and everything its either 9 or 11? Because Direct X 10 was a windows vista exclusive and NOBODY wanted to upgrade to Vista (piece of shit, garbage, etc.) The fact that Microsoft decided "we don't care if developers suffer, we will make this new version exclusive to our newest OS version because fuck you, you must update" hurt PC gaming a lot. If you look at the timing this was a bit before Steam was a popular thing and PC gaming all but disappeared from the retail, most people denounced it as the death of the PC, most pc game development stopped, we are only now beginning to see PC exclusives again, etc.

Nobody is saying Microsoft isn't allowed to make money, this is about them using their size to still make money out of subpar products. Yes it did hurt them as well but not as much as it hurt the PC Gaming industry. It's easy to say "oh they aren't that relevant anymore" but for a while they basically dictated what happened on PC gaming before Valve was big enough to undermine them like they do now.

Ok so now you just hate Windows as a whole, well I can see this is never going to go anywhere. So would you be okay with still using Windows XP right now if they said they were going to keep doing security patches?

I did not bring up DX 9 to DX 10 so that you could diverge off about vista. I brought it up because of there now having Open CL 2. I also like with all that I said thats the bit you went off on.

Another thing that you may want to think about is that you have to upgrade your hardware to get compatibility with newer API's or say in the case of CPU's new instruction sets. So why is there such a big issue with upgrading your software too?

You mention DX10 being exclusive to Vista, well isnt DX 11 just as exclusive to 7?

Also I really think the whole second part of the first paragraph and the second paragraph are just off by a fair bit but im just not going to into it just like vista stuff. We are far enough off topic as it is.

I got my 840evo with a relatively fresh install of windows 7 with some programs and it had the same boot time as my old windows install: like 20 seconds.

You guys do bring up a good point of windows 8 utilizing the shortcuts, but I don't think I could remember half of it let alone transition from game to game and messing up with the controls.

I also learned a bunch while you fellows were argueing. basically I got that MS is a bunch of suckers because they're the only one with Directx and everything else is OpenGL causing devs of games and such to make somethign available only for the one popular OS, causing more work for devs to make it for OpenGL. I have no clue what i said, someone clarify if I'm right or wrong? Thanks, from a guy who knows nothing about software.

Once you use the shortcuts on a regular basis for a bit it just becomes natural. i find it pretty close to getting used to a new keyboard or mouse. This is especially the case if the keyboards layout is a bit tweaked like many of mine and the mouse has more than ~5 buttons.

Well Direct X is a microsoft product and was designed for windows so its only been in windows and the xbox's (to some extent). But I dont really know what you want to know about that.

Sort of, the problem is not coding for any one particular API but how many API's game dev's are willing to code for (the end users they can sell to, if they don't code for PS4 then they can't sell to that market). The issue some people have with direct x is that they feel because you have to upgrade to win8 in order to get the latest DX that we are being forced to upgrade our OS, I.E an undue cost. However these people also use the argument that Opengl is better and mantle is better therefore DX is irrelevant, you can see then how it is a self defeating argument, Either dx is not relevant and dev's can code for opengl (still playable on windows). Or it is relevant and any game dev that codes for it will be limiting their game market to win8 .  Not a very logical conclusion.

That is a very good point indeed.

Mantle is basically DirectX with extensions (and all these extensions do is cut down on how much garbage, the API has as overhead).

 

Mantle can be extensions on OpenGL as well (AMD has already said this, Carmack said that OpenGL with extensions is the same damn thing). Mantle uses the DirectX shader library because the game (BF4) and games (mantle games) are made with those shaders. Mantle and the DirectX on a Xbox = same damn thing. This is all marketing. AMD? Could care less which API wins. They just want extensions to use their cpu's better, because they are way behind Intel in games, where all of their cores aren't used well.

 

People called OpenGL a low level API in this thread. That is 100 percent absolutely false. It is just a better DirectX. It has ALWAYS been slightly better then DirectX except for when MS sabotaged it's performance in Vista. The newer OpenGL is ahead by quite a bit. Still we are forced to use Windows 8 and Direct X, which is stupid because...

 

Wi, Mobile, PS4, Mac, Linux, Steam OS, Windows can all use OpenGL. OpenGL is not "harder to code for". They have already been using it when they do a Mac Port, or a PS4 port, or a Nintendo port. People just got used to using DirectX, because they were FORCED to use it on Vista. OpenGL performance was crippled. Add to that to the Xbox getting PC ports and people just used DirectX instead.

 

http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/133824-valve-opengl-is-faster-than-directx-even-on-windows

 

DirectX is pointless because only two platforms use it, and both could run OpenGL and get better performance. Period. End of story. The only reason DirectX exists is to create a monopoly of forced OS upgrades on the PC. Xbox has always lost money and it is advertising and a way to promote DirectX. It was not designed to make a profit. It was designed to push Windows as a gaming OS and cripple other OS's in gaming. 

 

All games used to be OpenGL. This is not some "new api" or something no one knows how to use. The only reason that changed is MS sabotaging OpenGL and Xbox being relevant. 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_OpenGL_programs

Id just like to say lower level when I used it refers to the fact that it is closer to the hardware. That is inherently harder to code for/with. It would be in a way comparable to C vs C++. More and more things are starting to use OpenCL and OpenGL I see no problem with this. It should also be noted that Direct3D of which DirectX is a part of handles a bunch more than gaming. From my understanding in Windows 8 it even handles the desktop.

This is interesting, but what i want to know is the stats for sales to customers as opposed to oem's. As this number is clearly the total of activated W8 keys.

So like people just going out and buying a retail copy of windows 8? Because if that is what you want that number is going to be quite low and would be regardless of whether it was windows 8 or not.

Uh...

 

They held back a  new DirectX in Vista, ruined OpenGL performance, and with Win 8 they again withheld a Direct X from 7. MS makes their money from software. Xbox is advertising. They have lost like 3 billion on it since it's creation. It is a drop in the bucket for them to push DirectX and Windows as a gaming OS.

 

Steam OS might change this all. If game devs make native steam ports for it? MS might say the hell with Direct X AND Xbox. It isn't that MS is changing, the landscape is changing. 

 

Personally? I think MS would be much better off making top tier video makers, and soccer mom friendly stuff like Imovie. Pretty sad when Linux has things like Openshot that are free and superior. Not that Linux is an alternative for most soccer moms. I am just saying that MS is WAY behind Mac OS as far as good, simple programs that anyone can pick up and use easily.

 

THAT is where they should be investing. Make Windows as user friendly as Mac OS as far as every day stuff that people want to do and give the option of not having things forced down peoples throats. That will sell the OS on Steam machines. Embrace OpenGL, and add things like video capture for gameplay etc. MS simply needs to adapt. Put things like Kinect on the PC. Drop the damn Xbox all together.

 

They may already be doing things like this. MS isn't stupid. They are just ruthless and very ambitious.

I never assume that I will be using any of the built in applications in windows. I think they know that because it was win7 I believe that doesnt ship with video editing software. Also win8 even pro doesnt ship with Windows Media Center anymore which in my opinion was actually one of things they have done relatively well.

[TheProfosist]

@deathjester please just stay off windows and use OpenGL youll be a happier man

People complain that you need to buy a new version of Windows for the latest DirectX. Why not complain on Nvidia, AMD and Intel, why we have to buy a new graphic card for support of new version of OpenGL and DirectX? So porting DirectX, doesn't help in any case, as we can see with OpenGL, where game devs still uses old version of OpenGL for their games, much like games still using DirectX9.

Also, the whole thing about Vista drop in performance of OpenGL, I recall being a myth, and that it was just driver re-optimizations that needed to be done as the OS was remade from scratch, well almost(~80%). The difference is that Microsoft was pro-active in helping graphic card manufacture in getting their drivers well optimized for DirectX, and provided, as always, full documentation. OpenGL doesn't have this service, as it's free, and well, don't know how the new Windows works, even if they offered that. They are apart. It took time, but performance is back with OpenGL.

I just brought up the point you did in the first paragraph before reading your post.

No, you are following someone doing assumptions to the next level, and take it as facts.

I am no employee or shareholder of Microsoft, nor getting money or any gifts, nor I am some fanatic of the company. They are many things I don't agree, and I have many complaints.

You are being cynical, in believe that all actions that Microsoft does is bad, and completely done on purpose with some kind of grand plan. Because Microsoft is this big bad evil corporation.

Then you sprinkle elements of other things out of context, incomplete, to show how "Microsoft is this big bad evil corporation", so that you can act like if know more than them, and you are not fooled with Microsoft doing.

Microsoft does not block new version of OpenGL from working in Windows. The entire structure of Windows has changed in Vista. Install Vista now, and you'll see that all the OpenGL features of your GPU works fine.

I just quoted this saying I agree because a like just wasnt enough.