Rise of the Tomb Raider patch adds DirectX 12 Support

[Master Disaster]

So as promised Nixxes pushed a patch to ROTR today which added support for DX12 making that 4 games which now support DX12 (AOTS, GOWUE, ROTR & Hitman)

 

Quote

PC gamers who haven’t played through Rise of the Tomb Raider

yet should be in for a treat with the game’s latest patch.

The update adds DirectX 12 support on Windows 10 PCs, joining Gears of War: Ultimate Edition as the second complete game to include Microsoft’s next-gen graphics tech. For high-end Nvidia GPU users, the update also a new ambient occlusion technology called VXAO, which improves lighting effects by voxelizing the scene.

 

You can reach PCWorld’s DirectX 12 FAQ or Tomb Raider developer Nixxes Software’s blog post for more about how the technology works, but the bottom line is that squeezes more performance out of existing CPUs in order to feed the GPU faster. In practical terms, a sample scene in Rise of the Tomb Raider at high settings with an Intel i7-2600 processor and GTX 970 card yields 46 frames per second in DirectX 11. That same scene with DirectX 12 brings the framerate up to 60 fps.

 

 

They also added support for Nvidias VXOA ambient occlusion too.

 

 

Quote

As for VXAO, Nvidia is still being cagey about the details—the company is promising a detailed breakdown at the Game Developers Conference this month—but basically it breaks down surfaces into voxels

to determine how lighting and shadows should look. Nvidia says VXAO is more accurate and more detailed than existing space-based solutions such as SSAO and HBAO, and provides a smoother response to camera motion, but it’s also computationally heavy.

 

The new Rise of the Tomb Raider patch is available now through Steam, and is coming soon to the Windows Store version of the game. The latest GeForce Game Ready driver is now available on Nvidia’s website.

 

Why this matters: Although Rise of the Tomb Raider isn’t the first out of the gate with DirectX 12 support, it’s arguably the best showcase yet for the new tech, given that it’s an entirely new game and not just a remake. Between that and VXAO, hopefully you’ve got at least a few hours of the campaign left to enjoy PC gaming in top form.

 

http://www.pcworld.com/article/3043068/software-games/rise-of-the-tomb-raider-patch-adds-directx-12-fancy-new-nvidia-vxao-tech.html

 

I've personally benchmarked it against the DX11 build and the results were less than impressive with around a 2 to 4 FPS boost on my setup, I've seen nowhere near the advertised boost (from 45 to 60FPS). I've also just tried to benchmark Hitman too but the benchmark doesn't work yet?

 

It looks like devs are jumping onboard with DX12 much quicker than they did with DX11. Things are gonna get interesting over 2016.

 

I suspect Ark will drop its DX12 support patch very shortly too.

[ivan134]

There's nothing surprising about the rate of adoption. The people who were saying we won't see any games until next year or 2, like other dx versions, were clearly not paying attention.

[Master Disaster]

Just now, ivan134 said:

There's nothing surprising about the rate of adoption. The people who were saying we won't see any games until next year or 2, like other dx versions, were clearly not paying attention.

Well if you remember Dx10 took forever for anything to actually come out after it launched and even then, very few other devs jumped onbaord. DX11 was a bit quicker but it was still quite a while before we saw any true DX11 titles (with full tessellation etc).

 

Its taken a while for any DX12 titles to drop too, but now we've had 4 in a month.

[Katorice]

sweet, going to launch this thing and see how it runs. I've had some serious drops no matter the quality settings on my rig)

Rig:

Spoiler

* i5-4690k @4.5GHz

* R9 290 @1100MHz

* 2x8GB DDR3 (16GBs) @2133MHz

* ASRock Z97 Fatal1ty

* Corsair RM750

* SSD for Windows, HDD for games

 

performance is "better" when compared to a couple of hours ago. However, same spots are causing framedips (to the mid 40's) on default-medium.

I don't really see why this game (at medium settings) doesn't use all of my resource and still dips frames.. (now on Dx12? )

[ivan134]

6 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

Well if you remember Dx10 took forever for anything to actually come out after it launched and even then, very few other devs jumped onbaord. DX11 was a bit quicker but it was still quite a while before we saw any true DX11 titles (with full tessellation etc).

 

Its taken a while for any DX12 titles to drop too, but now we've had 4 in a month.

One huge difference is that people did not immediately jump on the OSes that were required for dx 10 and 11. MS giving away win 10 for free was a huge catalyst.

 

Another reason is that devs have been wanting a low level API on PC for a long time. Hell, we even had AMD and Nvidia selling dx 12 ready cards years before it came out. This has never happened before.

[Majestic]

Paying attention Firaxis? This is how you support a game after release.

[afyeung]

Yay! I'm excited to see how this will run on my CF setup. I've been getting consistent 60+fps at max settings 1440p with my rig, but I had stuttering near the soviet base. Hopefully the new driver I just got yesterday and this new patch will fix that

[Master Disaster]

7 minutes ago, ivan134 said:

One huge difference is that people did not immediately jump on the OSes that were required for dx 10 and 11. MS giving away win 10 for free was a huge catalyst.

 

Another reason is that devs have been wanting a low level API on PC for a long time. Hell, we even had AMD and Nvidia selling dx 12 ready cards years before it came out. This has never happened before.

True, if you look at the most popular DX versions they correspond with the most popular OSes (DX9 & XP then DX11 and Win 7).

 

Also I guess that MS saying Win X will be the last Windows is also helping, not only is that pushing upgrades but it offers devs an extra layer of security that no matter where MS go with DX next it will be supported for everyone running Win X.

[Prysin]

17 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

Well if you remember Dx10 took forever for anything to actually come out after it launched and even then, very few other devs jumped onbaord. DX11 was a bit quicker but it was still quite a while before we saw any true DX11 titles (with full tessellation etc).

 

Its taken a while for any DX12 titles to drop too, but now we've had 4 in a month.

a while?

DX12 was "released" in july-august 2015...

 

ive never seen 8 month adoption of ANY DX system before.

[stealth80]

46 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

So as promised Nixxes pushed a patch to ROTR today which added support for DX12 making that 4 games which now support DX12 (AOTS, GOWUE, ROTR & Hitman)

 

 

They also added support for Nvidias VXOA ambient occlusion too.

 

 

 

http://www.pcworld.com/article/3043068/software-games/rise-of-the-tomb-raider-patch-adds-directx-12-fancy-new-nvidia-vxao-tech.html

 

I've personally benchmarked it against the DX11 build and the results were less than impressive with around a 2 to 4 FPS boost on my setup, I've seen nowhere near the advertised boost (from 45 to 60FPS). I've also just tried to benchmark Hitman too but the benchmark doesn't work yet?

 

It looks like devs are jumping onboard with DX12 much quicker than they did with DX11. Things are gonna get interesting over 2016.

 

I suspect Ark will drop its DX12 support patch very shortly too.

Ive just ran the in game benchmark:

 

DX 11 = 72 FPS

DX 12 = 43 FPS - For some reason in DX12 SLI isn't being utilised

[-BirdiE-]

6 minutes ago, stealth80 said:

Ive just ran the in game benchmark:

 

DX 11 = 72 FPS

DX 12 = 43 FPS - For some reason in DX12 SLI isn't being utilised

They added an in-game benchmark? I thought that was only in TR 2013.

[stealth80]

5 minutes ago, -BirdiE- said:

They added an in-game benchmark? I thought that was only in TR 2013.

ye its in the main menu

[-BirdiE-]

Just now, stealth80 said:

ye its in the main menu

Was it always there and I'm just blind, or was it added with the patch?

[Katorice]

Just now, -BirdiE- said:

Was it always there and I'm just blind, or was it added with the patch?

well, just so you don't feel completely blind.. I didn't know it was there 

[VagabondWraith]

Nice... I just bought the game yesterday and I'm downloading it now. I guess I picked a good time to get the game. Hopefully I'll have a smooth experience with the DX12 patch.

[MEC-777]

Everybody keeps talking mainly about the performance difference with DX12, but isn't also a big part of DX12 is introducing more/better visual/graphical features? Even if the performance isn't much better, does the game not look better with these added features? 

 

I have the game, but I'm at work and can't play/benchmark it for a couple more hours.

[MoonSpot]

2 hours ago, Master Disaster said:

I've personally benchmarked it against the DX11 build and the results were less than impressive with around a 2 to 4 FPS boost on my setup, I've seen nowhere near the advertised boost (from 45 to 60FPS). I've also just tried to benchmark Hitman too but the benchmark doesn't work yet?

Did you try only one of your 970s or with both in SLI?

[pedro69]

Dx12 gave me a slight performance increase according to the new benchmark utility.

[Master Disaster]

1 hour ago, MoonSpot said:

Did you try only one of your 970s or with both in SLI?

My second card is out of action, has been for a few months. I keep meaning to try and RMA it but I never get around to it.

[Doobeedoo]

Good to see games taking advantage from new API in good pace. Wish to see WoW get DX12 cause that lower CPU overhead is well needed.

[Notional]

Does not seem to be a very good DX12 patch. Get about ½ an fps more. However the minimum fps does go up quite a bit in the benchmark, which is nice. From 6 fps to 30+ min fps.

 

I do have 2 issues with it:

1. There seems to be some artifacting going on some places.
2. It seems like the mouse input gets extreme latency on it or something. It just feels slow, sluggish and weird. However it might be my aim being used to The Division, which is super snappy. Idk.

 

[GoodBytes]

Like it anything, there is a different between actually implement DirectX 12, and do a quick job to slap DirectX 12 on the box as a way to push sales. Of course, to be fair, documentation of DX 12 is limited as it is new.

 

 

[grayperview]

anyone with an AMD card tested this yet?

[Nergale]

Yeah, atleast tried. I'm recommending a fresh install to get this running at all. And crossfire is obviously not working yet.

But all in all having 1 HD 7950 doing 24 fps on 5760x1080 was pretty impressive admittedly.

 

I can share results on benchmark with DX12 and DX11, if it offers the internal benchmark on DX11 aswell.

[MEC-777]

Well it's broken on my PC. Ran DDU, installed drivers 364.51. The game runs fine in DX11 mode, but when I change it to DX12 mode, my GTX 980 won't go higher than 540mhz. After that it won't go higher than 540mhz for any game and I have to restart the PC to get it back to normal. Not sure what's going on. 

 

Anyone have any ideas? 

 

**Edit** - Never mind, it seems to be working now after a restart.