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Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

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Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#331

Post by talldayo »

wmf wrote: post #33
aurareturn wrote: post #6

I wonder if this effort to add Vulcan to Linux and then translate DirectX in Asahi Linux would impact Apple's dream of landing AAA games on Apple Silicon. Apple would like AAA developers to port their AAA games over to Metal so that the game has one code base but can run on iPhones, iPads, Macs, and the Vision Pro. Perhaps Mac gamers will install Asahi Linux in order to play AAA PC titles.

Apple already released the Game Porting Toolkit.

...which, unlike DXVK, cannot be redistributed with your app to make it playable on MacOS. So, by definition, Game Porting Toolkit is a mandatory extra-step for Mac users when Linux and Windows users press the little green "Play" button on their screen.

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#332

Post by talldayo »

flohofwoe wrote: post #249
DeathArrow wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The Apple Metal platform surely is customized to the needs of Apple, its devices and its users ultimate needs, in a way Vulkan will never be. Maybe Metal is customized to Apple's needs but how is it customized to Apple user's needs? One thing is for sure, had Apple been using Vulkan, the porting process to macOS would have been much easier.

> the porting process to macOS would have been much easier Porting the 3D renderer to another 3D API isn't the hard part of a game port, but also: Apple is offering a D3D12 porting toolkit since a little while which TBH makes a lot more sense than native Vulkan support (since there are so many more D3D12 games than Vulkan games): https://developer.apple.com/games/

> Apple is offering a D3D12 porting toolkit since a little while which TBH makes a lot more sense than native Vulkan support

It would make more sense... if GPTK behaved like DXVK.

But instead, you're not allowed to distribute games with it, you can't easily modify it, and Apple themselves doesn't commit to supporting or updating it. Unlike Proton, which is community maintained, GPTK is Apple-maintained. If something breaks, your best option for "fixing" it is to run upstream DXVK on a properly supported machine.

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#333

Post by talldayo »

inDigiNeous wrote: post #237
talldayo wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It feels unlikely. Much smaller companies (Broadcom, Qualcomm) have no trouble writing compliant Vulkan drivers (let alone singular people), so I find it hard to give Apple the pass here. Assuming good faith on their part, Vulkan should be available; or at least some kind of cross-platform API target. Otherwise people are just going to ignore Mac and keep focusing on DirectX, like the status quo. Vulkan is everyone's…

Metal allows Apple to squeeze that extra performance out of their devices. They have full control over, and can implement whatever they need to deliver Apple Vision Pro for example. With Vulkan, they would have to wait for a committee to approve required changes, and still they could not probably optimize it to match their GPU an CPU hardware profiles in such an efficient way. And not least at all, to optimize the de…

> why should Microsoft get to keep DirectX, and not just write a Vulkan driver ?

They support both. And sometimes the Vulkan driver is faster than their native DirectX one too.

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#334

Post by talldayo »

dagmx wrote: post #97
out_of_protocol wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The argument that Vulkan would have solved this but it in fact did! You can play 90% of games on linux precisely because of Vulkan. Just boot Steam Deck or whatever and play. There is no way it would work out without Vulkan

And I address Proton specifically in my comment and also address why it’s not an indicator of increased gaming support on Mac. I truly feel half of the replies here are glossing over the things I’ve already covered and perhaps are people who haven’t actually tried the equivalent Mac solutions and seen where the resultant deficiencies lie or the delta between platforms that proton would also have to bridge further. Vu…

Conversely, I'm convinced that you haven't tried Proton and are trying to defend Cider and Whiskey as analogs when in-fact they are pale imitations. Gaming on Mac is derelict; you can get a few games working, but it's still absolutely pathetic stood-up next to Windows or even modern Linux. The number of playable desktop games is just a blowout for MacOS.

We've all used tinker-tool applications to get a random app running through WINE, but DXVK is more than that. It is the solution to a problem Apple refuses to address, and even Apple is willing to admit that they need DirectX translation in order to make games run on Apple Silicon. How is the future of gaming on Mac going to look any different if we continue to follow in the footsteps of Cider? How long do you think that shanty-utopia will be supported on the latest OS update?

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#336

Post by kbolino »

babypuncher wrote: post #319
kbolino wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love to hear about all these DRM-free single-player AAA games. If you're talking about older games, then maybe we're just talking past each other; I assumed we were talking about recent AAA games.

Recent AAA games absolutely run on Linux using Proton. DRM isn't really a concern. The biggest and most successful DRM vendor, Denuvo, even goes out of their way to make sure their product does not interfere with Proton compatibility. It's pretty rare for a new game to come out and not be playable on the Steam Deck within a week if not on day 1. And when that does happen, it's usually a PvP multiplayer game with kern…

I'd assume Denuvo DRM works on Linux x86-64 because the company has made it work on that platform. I'd be surprised, with FEX in the middle, if it doesn't get bent out of shape running on ARM: either flagging itself as having been tampered with, or the game. Maybe the company also has a solution for ARM support though.

I do think the question of "why Vulkan" has been thoroughly answered though: 1. DXVK means Direct3D->Vulkan translation already exists (but not the other direction) and 2. Proton already proves that Vulkan gets you most AAA games (with the exceptions having nothing to do with the 3D API).

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#337

Post by dieortin »

talldayo wrote: post #320
flohofwoe wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supporting a different 3D API is really not the complicated or time consuming part of porting a game to another platform, especially when the target API is Metal. The poor game support on macOS is a mix of Apple apathy towards gaming and the low potential sales numbers. Also, of the few new Vulkan apps being released (a whopping 9 in 2023), most actually only support a single platform: https://carette.xyz/posts/state…

> Apple also offers a D3D12 porting toolkit now Now they do. After 5 years of people begging them for DXVK, Apple gives us... a downstream fork of DXVK retooled for Metal. I really just feel bad for Mac owners. Like; you could be playing Apex Legends with us, but can't. Like I said, these changes to Asahi will likely make it easier than MacOS to play games on. Who would use MacOS for gaming when Steam Play works out-…

I doubt anyone buys a Mac to install Asahi on it

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#338

Post by SushiHippie »

delta_p_delta_x wrote: post #86

Hacker News regularly makes me feel very stupid, and none more so than blog posts by Alyssa Rosenzweig. I couldn't even write an engine that used Vulkan in six months, nor a software rasteriser; meanwhile, Alyssa wrote an entire compliant driver on a non-native operating system running on locked-down hardware in one month flat. What am I doing with my life? EDIT: I point this out because I'd eventually like to write…

> I couldn't even write an engine that used Vulkan in six months

There is now a blog post on the frontpage where someone wrote a game engine using Vulkan in 3 months ;)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40595741

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#339

Post by pjmlp »

talldayo wrote: post #324
pjmlp wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, sure, like Google, Intel and AMD aren't to blame for having made a mess out of OpenCL on their products.

Go ahead, blame literally every single person except the lead maintainer and developer of the project.

The reality is that Google, AMD and Intel have more than enough time since 2009, to provide a developer experience, and drivers, that would make people actually use OpenCL instead of CUDA.

Instead, Google created the proprietary Renderscript for Android, while AMD and Intel kept delivering broken drivers, partial implementations of OpenCL, never delivered a proper OpenCL 2.x implemenation with mature C++ support, IDE and GPGPU graphical debuggers.

Re: Vulkan1.3 on the M1 in one month

#340

Post by pjmlp »

talldayo wrote: post #328
pjmlp wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is still Metal, regardless.

You are literally comparing a bunch of gambling apps to a library of desktop gaming experiences. "It is still Metal, regardless" you say, with your mind scrolling full of Zynga dice-rolling games and Supercell micro-transaction machines.

I am comparing what brings money home, big boys club money, versus hippie feel good complaints.
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