Direct3D vs. OpenGL

[bjlockie]

Is Direct3D similar to OpenGL?
If it is then why didn't Microsoft choose a 3D graphics library that's out there instead of making their own?

OpenGL, Mesa3D, Direct3D.
There are too many competing products and there are probably more.

[eL_PuSHeR]

I think it depends on who makes the app/game. Some APIs are better than others under certain tasks only. Some games are better under Glide, others under D3D and others under OpenGL. It depends on the engine optimizations used. The best thing is to have full support for every API out there.

[saturnotaku]

DirectX is Microsoft's whiny answer to not getting what it wants out of OpenGL. DirectX is a more CPU intensive, slower overall API than OpenGL.

To illustrate the point - drawing a cubemap in DirectX takes about 15 lines of code whereas in OpenGL it only takes about 4. Any student of 3D programming will tell you that using OpenGL is vastly superior to DirectX.

Really, the only thing DX has in its favor is that its development has come along faster than OGL. I suppose that's what comes from Microsoft being autonomous for controlling DirectX. But if there ever is an option to use OpenGL in a game you can bet your bottom dollar that I'm going to use it.

[digitalwanderer]

Originally posted by saturnotaku
DirectX is Microsoft's whiny answer to not getting what it wants out of OpenGL. DirectX is a more CPU intensive, slower overall API than OpenGL.

To illustrate the point - drawing a cubemap in DirectX takes about 15 lines of code whereas in OpenGL it only takes about 4. Any student of 3D programming will tell you that using OpenGL is vastly superior to DirectX.

Really, the only thing DX has in its favor is that its development has come along faster than OGL. I suppose that's what comes from Microsoft being autonomous for controlling DirectX. But if there ever is an option to use OpenGL in a game you can bet your bottom dollar that I'm going to use it.

Thanks, I always sort of felt that OpenGL was kinder to me system than D3D but didn't have anything but gut feelings to back that up.

I always try the openGL option if it's there too, but that doesn't always mean it's the best option. There's a lot of D3D games that have openGL options that flat-out BLOW!

It varies from game to game, system to system; play around with it on your set-up to see what works best for you. (Oh, and remember to send some big ups to the Carmack for single-handedly keeping openGL alive against M$ wishes. )

[saturnotaku]

I've also found that it depends on your video card. ATI cards seem to handle DirectX in terms of performance and image quality. But hands down, NVIDIA has the best OpenGL support I have ever seen. I think a big reason for that is NVIDIA's continued support of Linux.

ATI is catching up fast in OpenGL, though. Games I've had problems with in previous drivers were fixed in the Catalyst 3.1 set. I just wish ATI would release an OpenGL 1.4 compatible set, which is something NVIDIA has had out for a while now.

[VeritechK7]

Yeah my friend's taking a game programming class at a community college nearby him and he was talking about how dx is getting up there or something, but a part of me remains loyal to open GL. Maybe its' because I got tired of winME and made the decision to play w/ NT4 workstation . as i couldn't run any of the newer DX games out there .but cs and quake 3 were a dream