Interesting choice for them to do their own API when they could just help out with OpenGL considering it's mature and pretty awesome.Dog Pants wrote:Something interesting I remembered. AMD are now developing their own API. It's not explicitly connected to SteamOS - Nvidia are doing that - but if devs suddenly stop relying on DirectX then Windows becomes a lot less essential. Of course we're still stuck with the problem that they'll have to design a DirectX version for people with Nvidia cards...
DirectX however is more than just a graphics API, it handles sound and input too, which is why it's just so handy for development.
If you go down the OpenGL or even another API route, you then start having to include things like OpenAL and then find a similar thing for input (or go for OpenGL bundles like freeGLUT or GLFW).
What's more interesting is the reason why DirectX and OpenGL exist, which from what I've read was to get away from the manufacturer specific API's which used to be a big part of setting up games in the mid 90's, in order to make development easier.
