Gaming DirectX or OPENGL?

[chrisj1968]

I have been going back to play Steam titles and one offers a large assortment of possibilities. Directx 32bit/64bit and OpenGL. Which is the preferred method?

 

Euro Truck Simulator 2 allows in steam to decide by a dialog box what you want for rendering the game I guess you could call it. I always opt for the DirectX 64bit version. seeems to give me better performance,

 

anyone else prefer OpenGL? are there any differences in gameplay enjoyment. OPENGL  I understand is an open source system for in game graphics. which is better?

[Boo Berry]

On Windows? DirectX.

[DrAwesome23]

45 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

I have been going back to play Steam titles and one offers a large assortment of possibilities. Directx 32bit/64bit and OpenGL. Which is the preferred method?

 

Euro Truck Simulator 2 allows in steam to decide by a dialog box what you want for rendering the game I guess you could call it. I always opt for the DirectX 64bit version. seeems to give me better performance,

 

anyone else prefer OpenGL? are there any differences in gameplay enjoyment. OPENGL  I understand is an open source system for in game graphics. which is better?

The performance deltas between the different graphical API's are negligible. It's how well each rendering API is implemented in each game dictates performance. While Direct3D might offer you better performance in one game, OpenGL might offer better performance in another. 

[spaceelf]

OpenGL paths on older titles are also sometimes missing features making a 1:1 performance comparison impossible.

[chrisj1968]

oh yes on Windows. Steam has a long list of options.. I use DirectX 64 bit

 

[Boo Berry]

I'd just stick with DirectX on Windows, IMO.

[chrisj1968]

that's what I'll do. My fear is, if I were to try out OpenGL 64bit even, I might mess up my installation somehow, or my gamesaves. I've heard of openGL and its standard with Linux mostly. But I know its on Windows in some titles.

 

[spaceelf]

A graphics renderer change pretty much never affects savegames.  Changing from 32 to 64 bit can in some titles, but not all.

[chrisj1968]

I am curious. I will probably try it out in 64bit mode and see what the differences are. I bet OpenGL doesn't even compare to DirectX

[adrynalyne]

5 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

I am curious. I will probably try it out in 64bit mode and see what the differences are. I bet OpenGL doesn't even compare to DirectX

I bet that was a reckless, baseless conclusion too.

 

The actual answer is, "it depends".

[Circaflex]

21 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

that's what I'll do. My fear is, if I were to try out OpenGL 64bit even, I might mess up my installation somehow, or my gamesaves. I've heard of openGL and its standard with Linux mostly. But I know its on Windows in some titles.

 

I sugest you re-read up on OpenGL. Its on more than "some" titles. Im not sure where you got the idea its a standard with Linux, but do some googling you might be surprised.

 

14 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

I am curious. I will probably try it out in 64bit mode and see what the differences are. I bet OpenGL doesn't even compare to DirectX

This is another example of a technology you do not fully understand, yet make ridiculous comments like this. OpenGL was actually seen as the better technology in the early 90s, many AAA games used over directx.

 

Here is a list of games, it might surprise you chris

 

Quote

18 Wheels of Steel

Alien Arena 2008

Alien: Isolation (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

America's Army

American McGee's Alice

Amnesia: The Dark Descent

Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs

Angry Birds (PC and Android versions)

Aquaria

Awesomenauts

Baldur's Gate 2 – Defaults to D3D

Bastion

Batman: Arkham Asylum Game of the Year Edition (Mac OS X version)

Batman: Arkham City - Game of the Year Edition (Mac OS X version)

Beat Hazard

Bioshock Infinite (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Borderlands 2 (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel! (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Boson X

Brink

BZFlag

Bugs Bunny: Lost in Time - Defaults to D3D

Bugs Bunny & Taz: Time Busters - Defaults to D3D

Bus Driver

Celestia

City of Heroes

City of Villains

Commandos

Cortex Command

Counter-Strike

Counter-Strike: Source (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive

Darwinia - Defaults to D3D

Dead Island (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Deus Ex - Defaults to D3D

Deus Ex Human Revolution (Mac OS X version)

DiRT Showdown (Mac OS X and Linux version)

Doom 3

Dota 2

Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil

Dragon's Lair 3D: Return to the Lair

Dungeon Defenders (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Dwarf Fortress

Dying Light

Earth 2150

Enclave Defaults to D3D8

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars

Escape from Monkey Island - Defaults to D3D

Far Cry – Defaults to D3D

FEZ

Frets On Fire

FlightGear

FooBillard

Game Dev Tycoon

GRID: Autosport (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Half-Life series

Half-Life 2 series (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

Heretic II

Heroes of Newerth - Defaults to D3D in Windows

Hexen II

Hitman

Homeworld 2

IL-2 Sturmovik

Keepsake

Killing Floor

Left 4 Dead (Mac OS X version)

Left 4 Dead 2 (Mac OS X and Linux version)

Max Payne (Android, iOS, Mac OS X and Mac OS versions, not the windows version)

Medal of Honor: Allied Assault

Medal of Honor: Allied Assault - Spearhead

Medal of Honor: Allied Assault - Breakthrough

MegaGlest

Minecraft

Minetest

Myth III: The Wolf Age

Need for Speed: Carbon (Mac OS X version)

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (iOS version)

Need for Speed: Most Wanted (iOS and android version)

Need for Speed: ProStreet (Mac OS X version)

Need for Speed: Shift (iOS and android version)

Need for Speed: Undercover (iOS version)

Neverball and Neverputt

Neverwinter Nights

Nexuiz

NoLimits

Oil Rush

OpenArena

osu!

Payday 2 (Linux version)

Penumbra: Overture

Penumbra: Black Plague

Penumbra: Requiem

Performous

Portal (Mac OS X and Linux version)

Portal 2 (Mac OS X and Linux version)

Prey

Quake series

Rage

Red Faction

Receiver

Regnum Online

Retrobooster

Return to Castle Wolfenstein

RuneScape (High Detail Mode) - Uses the Java OpenGL library

Savage: The Battle for Newerth

Savage 2: A Tortured Soul

Scorched 3D

Second Life

Serious Sam

Serious Sam 2 - Defaults to D3D

Serious Sam 3: BFE

Shadowgrounds

Shadowgrounds Survivor

Shank

Shank 2

Sid Meier's Pirates! (2004 video game) (Mac OS X version)

Ski-doo X-team Racing

Soldier of Fortune series

Shogo: Mobile Armor Division (in the Linux, AmigaOS, and Mac OS X versions)

Spiral Knights

Spore

Spring

Space Engine

StarCraft II (Mac OS X version, completely disabled in Windows version)

Starsiege: Tribes

Star Trek: Voyager – Elite Force

Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy

Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II The Sith Lords

Steel Storm

StepMania

Stronghold

Team Fortress

Team Fortress 2 (Mac OS X and Linux versions)

The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena

The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay

The Sims 4 (Mac OS X version)

Tibia

Tomb Raider II (only new Mac OS X version, not the old Mac OS version)

Tomb Raider III (old Mac OS version)

Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (old Mac OS version)

Tomb Raider Chronicles (old Mac OS version)

Trainz

Tribes 2

Trine

Trine 2

Tux Racer

Unreal Gold – Defaults to 3dfx Glide

Unreal Tournament

Unreal Tournament 2003

Unreal Tournament 2004

Urban Terror

Warcraft 3 - Defaults to D3D in Windows

War Thunder - Defaults to D3D11 on Windows

Wolfenstein

Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

Wolfenstein: The New Order

Wolfenstein: The Old Blood

World of Goo

World of Warcraft - Defaults to D3D in Windows

Worms 3D

Worms Reloaded

Wurm Online

X-Plane

 

[chrisj1968]

I just tried out OpenGL 64bit and DirectX has the edge. OpenGL is close, VERY close in general. But there are subtle differences.

[chrisj1968]

Quote

+Circaflex

This is another example of a technology you do not fully understand, yet make ridiculous comments like this. OpenGL was actually seen as the better technology in the early 90s, many AAA games used over directx.

 

Here is a list of games, it might surprise you chris

Yeah I recall that Unreal in the early days of say gold or unreal 1&2. Please don't take this with offense. I just hauled a load from Erfurt DE to Frankfurt DE and they are both almost exactly close. only thing is, with the Open GL, I did have a few moments of graphical "hesitation" I was on the autobahn .. number slips me, but it would stop for just a second then it was over. the drawing of the scene was VERY close.

[Circaflex]

8 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

Yeah I recall that Unreal in the early days of say gold or unreal 1&2. Please don't take this with offense. I just hauled a load from Erfurt DE to Frankfurt DE and they are both almost exactly close. only thing is, with the Open GL, I did have a few moments of graphical "hesitation" I was on the autobahn .. number slips me, but it would stop for just a second then it was over. the drawing of the scene was VERY close.

That could be more driver related than anything, but nice to know.

 

Although DX seems to have taken the majority of new titles, games like the upcoming Doom are using idtech 6 which is still opengl with vulkan.

[chrisj1968]

1 minute ago, Circaflex said:

That could be more driver related than anything, but nice to know.

 

Although DX seems to have taken the majority of new titles, games like the upcoming Doom are using idtech 6 which is still opengl with vulkan.

I use to think OpenGL was inferior for many years. But it has been about, a little over 2 decades since I played unreal Gold. I liked the graphics but DirectX was the proprietary system used in most games. But I'm also noticing to some extent also that, OpenGL kept my system cooler too. about the same quality but runs cooler which means.. more efficient? I don't know, hard to say. but OpenGL runs cooler.

[adrynalyne]

9 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

I use to think OpenGL was inferior for many years. But it has been about, a little over 2 decades since I played unreal Gold. I liked the graphics but DirectX was the proprietary system used in most games. But I'm also noticing to some extent also that, OpenGL kept my system cooler too. about the same quality but runs cooler which means.. more efficient? I don't know, hard to say. but OpenGL runs cooler.

Unreal Gold was released 17 years ago. Not quite over 2 decades

 

[Athernar]

Depends if you have an NVidia or AMD GPU.

 

AMD's OpenGL drivers tend to be relatively somewhat lacking in compliance & performance as they don't have the massive budget to spend on driver development that NVidia do.

[Jim K Global Moderator]

16 minutes ago, Riva said:

DirectX is a lot better on Windows. On a side note, isnt OpenGL about to be replaced with something else which is unknown for now?

Vulkan

[chrisj1968]

42 minutes ago, adrynalyne said:

Unreal Gold was released 17 years ago. Not quite over 2 decades

 

well as I recall, Unreal 2 came out in 1996 if my memory recalls correctly.  Gold came out in 1998 I think. don't quote me on that.

[adrynalyne]

24 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

well as I recall, Unreal 2 came out in 1996 if my memory recalls correctly.  Gold came out in 1998 I think. don't quote me on that.

Unreal 1 came out in 98. Gold came out in 99. Unreal 2 in 2003.

[chrisj1968]

1 hour ago, adrynalyne said:

Unreal 1 came out in 98. Gold came out in 99. Unreal 2 in 2003.

I said don't quote me. I was going off of memory. /sarcasm  adrynalyne trying to bring the smoke.. on me.. can't smoke a rock!  

[chrisj1968]

I'm considering doing a side by side comparison of Directx 64 bit with OpenGl's 64 bit. I bought litecam game 5 for doing Directx in game recording. I don't know about if it will work with OpenGL but I'll try and post two videos of me transporting cargo.

 

I'm seriously thinking I had a bias against OpenGL but Open GL with the new vulkan seems like a decent system to play games. is there a utility like Nvidia inspector to tinker with Open GL settings to squeeze every frame rate and graphics quality.

 

or would Nvidia inspector be able to adjust OpenGL? it is after all a low level driver adjustment app that allows me to adjust everything.

[spaceelf]

3 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

I'm seriously thinking I had a bias against OpenGL but Open GL with the new vulkan seems like a decent system to play games. is there a utility like Nvidia inspector to tinker with Open GL settings to squeeze every frame rate and graphics quality.

As an enduser there's little reason to be concerned with it.  When a new DX is released it has features that take years to get to OGL, though OGL has surpassed it at times usually only several years after.  The games that do have OGL renderers usually only have them for alternative OS support, not for mainstream/Windows users.  OpenGL 4.3 was the first one that matched DX11 features IIRC, but 4.x has seen adoption in so few games it's almost pathetic.

 

Vulkan is a clean slate and could change the landscape for everyone, but it's too new to have real support behind it yet and everyone's already learning/releasing DX12 games so it might be a few years before it matters.

 

Any game with both renderers will usually be using similar renderer levels/featuresets - ETS2 uses directx 9 and OGL 2.1 I believe, meaning it certainly isn't useful to show the strengths of either.

[chrisj1968]

3 minutes ago, randomevent said:

As an enduser there's little reason to be concerned with it.  When a new DX is released it has features that take years to get to OGL, though OGL has surpassed it at times usually only several years after.  The games that do have OGL renderers usually only have them for alternative OS support, not for mainstream/Windows users.  OpenGL 4.3 was the first one that matched DX11 features IIRC, but 4.x has seen adoption in so few games it's almost pathetic.

 

Vulkan is a clean slate and could change the landscape for everyone, but it's too new to have real support behind it yet and everyone's already learning/releasing DX12 games so it might be a few years before it matters.

 

Any game with both renderers will usually be using similar renderer levels/featuresets - ETS2 uses directx 9 and OGL 2.1 I believe, meaning it certainly isn't useful to show the strengths of either.

well when this Vulkan with Open GL does hit market, won't it install with a new Nvidia driver update via Nvidia. But I should think they wouldn't let out without it being cutting edge for the OpenGL side of things.

[spaceelf]

57 minutes ago, chrisj1968 said:

well when this Vulkan with Open GL does hit market, won't it install with a new Nvidia driver update via Nvidia. But I should think they wouldn't let out without it being cutting edge for the OpenGL side of things.

The Vulkan runtime libraries are already included in the newest NVidia drivers.  So far only one game uses it, and even there you might as well just keep using DirectX 11 for the moment.