Graphine CEO Says DirectX 12 is ‘Closer to the Metal’ – Allows More Optimization for Granite’s Back End Tiling

Fahad Arif

Microsoft announced DirectX 12 at Game Developers Conference 2014, a newer version of its famous and widely utilized DirectX gaming API. Along with the support for PCs, Laptops and Windows Phone devices, Microsoft also boasted individual Xbox One DirectX 12 support, claiming that the new API will provide much-needed strength to the latest next-gen console.

DirectX 12 Comes with Titles Resources Feature - Gives More Control to Developers and Allows Further Optimization

In this situation where Microsoft's Xbox One video game console has to bear swelled amount of blame everyday, the company's new advanced API support for the console appears kind of a reinforcement. The new enhancements and improved hardware utilization that Microsoft promises DirectX 12 will offer seems quite an addition to the new API.

Software aside, DirectX 12 may seem like an aide for the Xbox One by tweaking hardware utilization mechanism but it is apparently quite clear that it will not directly put a great influence on the hardware and increase its overall aptitudes. Though the better software optimization will provide increased efficiency and will make the development process easy. Middleware SDKs like Graphine Software’s Granite SDK will correctly profit from upcoming DirectX 12.

Granite SDK is actually a graphical landscape generator. It is a set of software development tools that has been developed by middleware software company known as Graphine Software. Granite assists video game developers in creating HD in-game textures while preserving concentrated compression. Such SDKs will outwardly produce good results if utilized in PlayStation 4 and Xbox One game development.

Speaking to Gamingbolt, CEO of Graphine Software Aljosha Demeulemeester explained what new improvements could Microsoft's API offer. After explaining how company's Granite SDK performs with DirectX 11.2+, Demeulemeester shed light on how developers can benefit from improved capabilities of DirectX 12. He said:

“DX12 continues to build on DX11.1+ and as such, also includes the Tiled Resources feature. DX12 is however closer to the metal and gives more control to the developer.

This allows us to further optimize our tiling back end (for DX12) that takes care of loading texture tiles into video memory. Also, we get more access to how data is stored in video memory, which is very important for us. Specifically for our tiling back end, we expect a performance increase compared to DX11.1+ but we don’t have any hard numbers on this yet.”

It is still in debate that whether DirectX 12 will truly prove to be a win for Xbox One or if it will not be more of a little assistance. The upcoming gaming API will release next year but it has already unhinged the table. What do you think about DirectX 12? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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