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  1. #1
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    Exclamation OpenGL vs DirectX

    What are your opinions on this topic, considering my game is in planning stages and will be starting programming in the next week or so, Im wondering what would be better for a very highly graphical (MMORPG) game, planning to top EQ2, MEO and Blizzard as our first major game, It hasn't been announced yet but im wondering what are the avantages / disadvantages to each and why should i pick one of over the other, Thank you for your opinion.

  2. #2
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    DirectX.

    All the major game companies can't be wrong.
    --

  3. #3
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    DirectX is fine if you are only targetting windows. Though, if you want to go cross platform, OpenGL is the only way. If you plan for going cross platform at the beginning, then it costs very little extra (according to the UT guys anyways).

    OpenGL is supported very well on older cards too remember. OpenGL has most (and soon to be all) of the pluses that directx provides, yet, it'll be a lot quicker.

    As for which one is easier to program for, I don't have a clue

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  4. #4
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    Yeah my main target is windows, i dont care about the difficulity to program, thats what we were going to use anyway. Thanks for your input.

  5. #5
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    DirectX for sure

    Depends what you want though, for Windows only, DirectX for the most support, OpenGL

  6. #6
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    OpenGL!!!! Please god OpenGL.

    All us mac users get shafted the minute anyone says DirectX, because of course MS won't releast DX for Mac or Linux (or any OS other than windows)

    OpenGL works just fine for everything, and is 100% cross platform. Hell, the whole of OS X is rendered in OpenGL where possible.

    Us mac users have little enough MMORPGs as it is (Lineage2 wasn't brought to mac, even though they are using the unreal engine, everquest is far too old, all the korean games (Ragnarok, Mu, etc.) are coded for windows only, even though many *cough ragnarok *cough* gravity *cough lazy *cough could be ported to mac in a matter of days, simply because they use Granny or similar, which is a multiplatform graphics abstraction layer. They simply have to change a flag, factor in big/little endian differences and convert their code from WinSock to unix sockets (which are far more logical.)
    Gone.

  7. #7
    I'm sorry to say this but DirectX is better for now, and you dont have to use OpenGL to make your game run on linux. just dont use the very latest DirectX (9) elemnts, and it should run under wineX... maybe a little tweaking...
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  8. #8
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    webster, winex is not the solution. For a start it only runs on certain linux distros and support for games is pretty poor (sure, some major games work, but a lot don't)

    Secondly, there's no DirectX for mac.

    OpenGL is simpler to use, and portable across almost every architecture and operating system in existance. Write portable network classes and do a few ifdefs for big/little endians and your game will run on all those platforms and architectures.

    Whereas with DirectX you are stuck in x86 and the windows platform. Your graphics code will also be around double that of OpenGL The learning curve is incredibly steep compared to OpenGl as well.


    What do you think's so special about DirectX that makes it any better than OpenGL?

    Code portably in the firstplace, and you will reap the rewards as linux, mac, and even irix etc. users buy your product (you will sell a lot on these platforms because not so many developers make games for them)
    Gone.

  9. #9
    phision I'm not saying that openGL is bad, its great, however most games are sold for windows. thats one point... another point is that openGL is not as powerful right now. (will be soon )

    He said that its for a "a very highly graphical (MMORPG) game, planning to top EQ2, MEO and Blizzard as our first major game." so for him, for now, thats probably the way to go.

    Personally I'll be making my game in openGL, but thats just me. as for wineX, it runs directX 8 games for me just fine... guess I'm lucky. but I do see your point.
    IWDN - Really smart web developers... and me!
    More than any time in history mankind faces a crossroads.
    One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction.
    Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly.

  10. #10
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    OpenGL is just as powerful as Direct3D, if not moreso.
    Gone.

  11. #11
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    Originally posted by phision.com
    *cough ragnarok *cough* gravity *cough lazy *cough
    You should seriously get that cough checked out by a doctor!

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  12. #12
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    How long would you expect it to take to convert a Direct X 9 windows game to be compatiable with Linux / Mac OSX

  13. #13
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    Months and months. It would have to be converted into OpenGL. If it was done in OpenGL from the outset, then it would most likely work with a little tinkering, providing you used cross platform network, sound, input etc. APIs (of which there are many). If you can have, for example, a FBSD box, a Linux x86 box, a Linux PowerPC box and a Mac OS X box to test compiles on, and test+fix code up for them all daily, then you will be able to have a simultanious launch date for all versions.
    Gone.

  14. #14
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    uh, a very long time, since you'd need to pretty much redo the entire code. If you have any intentions to be portable, then do it in OpenGL in the first place

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  15. #15
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    Sadly ive aready got a basis of an engine finished in directx, is it worth completely recoding just for cross compatibility, or should i just leave it to windows users and keep the code i have (Its very good)

  16. #16
    Originally posted by websterworld
    I'm sorry to say this but DirectX is better for now, and you dont have to use OpenGL to make your game run on linux. just dont use the very latest DirectX (9) elemnts, and it should run under wineX... maybe a little tweaking...
    Saying that DX9 is "better" is highly subjective. Sure, it might have a lot of features that OpenGL does not. But I've also heard more than one game programmer say that DirectX is one of the most bloated, poorly-designed APIs in wide use today. OpenGL is fast and doesn't trip over itself. DirectX is highly inefficient, and the only reason Microsoft gets away with it is because today's powerful video cards still allow for acceptable performance.

  17. #17
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    Originally posted by Tee
    Sadly ive aready got a basis of an engine finished in directx, is it worth completely recoding just for cross compatibility, or should i just leave it to windows users and keep the code i have (Its very good)
    Definitely worth recoding it. D3D and OpenGL both share the same ideas, so it wouldn't take you too long to do. If you can write a good, cross-platform and cross-architecture engine in OpenGL, you stand to make a lot of money if you license it out (like the ever popular unreal engine -- now that is an example of a high quality 3d engine. Portable over x86 and PowerPC - little and big endian, windows, Mac OS X (PowerPC) and Linux (x86 flavours))
    Gone.

  18. #18
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    Originally posted by Tee
    Sadly ive aready got a basis of an engine finished in directx, is it worth completely recoding just for cross compatibility, or should i just leave it to windows users and keep the code i have (Its very good)
    I don't think we're the right people to be asking about such a thing my friend You must ask the project head/management/etc such a question. Assuming this is being done the complete, proper way, then it can take many weeks to change such a thing. This is assuming, of course, that you actually have documentation from the system analysist that covers what modules and such would be required.

    You also gotta ask the team, how much is that otehr hunk of the market worth to you? Sure,you're argueing over like, 7% or something? But (from what i've seen of course) if you take the time to make it cross-platform, the non-win people will be very loyal (heck, i've seen a bunch be loyal to companies that put out just flat out bad games).

    On top of this, you'd need to learn how openGL works, as compared to DirectX. It'll take time, i'm sure (assuming the core is a decent size, and not just like, a couple hundred lines of code).

    EDIT - *note* Wanted to clear up something. The 'professional' comment is more about how big hte team is that's working on it. If it's just you and another person or so, then i doubt you would really need to spend weeks doing the analysis part. Please don't take it as a burn or anything

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  19. #19
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    What you have to realise, is that apple have around 10-15% installed base (not market share, as macs last a lot longer than PCs). And there are less games to choose from on the mac, mainly because of situations similar to this - people can't be bothered to write clean, portable code, so they write their ugly bloated, hackish code for a microsoft operating system with many of the same properties. As there are less games to choose from, you will probably end up getting 25-40% of your total sales from macintosh and linux users, as instead of having a choice of 100 games similar to yours, they may only have 20 to choose from -- and thus making your chance of getting picked much higher.

    Another gripe of mine: I can understand not porting a game which is a long way into development, and porting would mean a major code overhaul. However, what 'piddles' me off is when games which could be ported so easily (Lineage 2 for example uses the unreal engine - portable over 3 platforms and 2 architectures and porting it would be a matter of setting a flag in the config file and converting the client-side network code, not hard if you have already written good OO code). RagnarokOnline by Gravity Corp. is another example of lazyness. Porting their game is much the same, they use totally cross platform tools from www.radgametools.com for the client, and the network code isn't too extensive either.

    If you don't want to code in OpenGL yourself, you could always strike a deal with a company like Destineer // www.macsoftgames.com who work with you in development and port the code over for you (for a fee, of course - they publish the your game for the macintosh)
    Gone.

  20. #20
    Originally posted by Tee
    Sadly ive aready got a basis of an engine finished in directx, is it worth completely recoding just for cross compatibility, or should i just leave it to windows users and keep the code i have (Its very good)
    Personally, I would try to conquer a market with hardly any games compared to Windows, but if your engine is almost finished in DirectX then shoot for Windows and complete the game, then hit the other platforms as soon as possible before the other game companies come to their senses! And believe me, it will be a gold rush in the near future, and the first one to realize this will be swiming in millions!

  21. #21
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    Directx is the key!

  22. #22
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    HostQuest: Ill do that, thanks for the advice

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