EGOSOFT and Deep Silver announce X Rebirth (updated 2011-07-29)

[Greyhawk1]

Lol DX9 /facepalm

Even crap looking DDO with its godawful graphics has direct x 11 support...even for little things like water interaction.

You aren't even going to support last generation but the previous to last generation? If you are going to produce a new game it should support Direct X 11 just as a matter of principle. New products should support the latest technology - especially when its your only current product.

[Wolfie276]

Actually DX9 is 100% viable, DX11 is unnecessary unless you're going to use tesselation and the likes.

[LTerSlash]

DX11 has a much better support for multicore rendering and multi-gpu system.

Its not like you cant do multi-cpu and multi-gpu on DX9, you can, but DX11 is better.

anyway, This game could use more of APP rather than of DX11...

[festa_freak]

How many people actually have SLI or Crossfire in their systems? I bet not many. Sure, maybe on the forums there might be a larger percentage but in the real world people don't do that often.

I am saddened however about the news of Dx9. I built my computer 4 years ago and while I did upgrade my video card to a 4870, my original 8800GTS could have done the job just as well . Actually, scratch that, the 8800 was more than the game needed.

Isn't it usually cross-platform developed games that are Dx9?
While I still think gameplay > graphics I also would like my soon-to-be new computer to be used by newer games!

[LTerSlash]

No, DX9 games are all those games dumbed down to fit in those crappy consoles that are ruining the pc games.

Linux has a basic, but yet, native DX11 support, so no. Still not implemented.

DX11 whould has been a better choice by far, rendering is done using a multi-theading model and less CPU cycles. In X:R for what it seem it does still uses a single-threaded model for rendering, just spawned in a diferent cpu core that is not used for anything else.
We are talking about a game that has a lot of objects on screen, so im not conviced at all, its a wait and see.

Maybe they found a way to workaround that in DX9, chosing DX9 was already a bad choice for them, mainly because DX11 makes things a lot easier for the programmers.

BTW, people whiout a DX10 capable gpu is already out of the equation, most of them are those with older IGP and very old low end cards.

[greypanther]

Which is what I said several pages ago! Egosoft appear to be aiming at the console; sooner or later! I would guess the XBox!

[forloren]

When Egosoft started developing the game, they probably chose DX9 over DX10. Halfway through developing the game they probably chose to stick with DX9 as opposed to redesigning everything for DX11.

I don't think it has anything to do with consoles.

[David Howland]

Of courser it is!
But do not expect anyone to admit it has been designed for for a console, when Egosoft are initially releasing the game for sale to PC. users?

[strude]

The argument that most people have DX9 hardware is invalid, as the Steam statistics suggest. Most people would have at least DX10. Additionally, given the number of people in this very thread with posts along the lines of

"Give me system specs so I can plan my upgrade to play Rebirth!"

shows that there are people willing to upgrade to current generation hardware in order to play.

And when considering the term "current generation", consider that Microsoft first revealed DX11 at the end of 2008, with end user release with Windows 7 late 2009, so it's already been in use by end users for over 2 years by the start of 2012.

[Nanook]

Which isn't really relevant because, as the devs themselves have said, programming the Rebirth engine was first started four years ago, in 2007. It's kinda hard to rewrite a game engine every time a new version of DX comes out, just look at what happened to Duke Nukem Forever. "Forever", as in how long it seemed to take to finalize the game engine.

Also, if you browse the Tech Support forums for both Reunion and TC, you'll see an awful lot of dxdiag reports for people still using Win XP, and even a lot with Vista and Win 7 but still using DX9-capable hardware. In the current economic climate, it's not likely most 'average' gamers are willing or even able to buy new hardware just for a game. The reality is that DX9 is still most likely the predominant system being used, despite the very limited, and somewhat biased, Steam poll. Biased because, in general, those posting in such polls like to brag about their equipment.

[Requiemfang]

^ this

[Greyhawk1]

Which isn't really relevant because, as the devs themselves have said, programming the Rebirth engine was first started four years ago, in 2007. It's kinda hard to rewrite a game engine every time a new version of DX comes out, just look at what happened to Duke Nukem Forever. "Forever", as in how long it seemed to take to finalize the game engine.

Also, if you browse the Tech Support forums for both Reunion and TC, you'll see an awful lot of dxdiag reports for people still using Win XP, and even a lot with Vista and Win 7 but still using DX9-capable hardware. In the current economic climate, it's not likely most 'average' gamers are willing or even able to buy new hardware just for a game. The reality is that DX9 is still most likely the predominant system being used, despite the very limited, and somewhat biased, Steam poll. Biased because, in general, those posting in such polls like to brag about their equipment.

You could say that for a good slice of games. Tech advances and a company should move with it. Techniques gained mastering DX11 now will pay off with the next product. Instead they wont be four years behind the tech - they'll be eight years behind with the next product.

If they know to stick to DX9 then they know what DX11 can do surely otherwise how did they make the decision? If thats the case I think its shortsighted not to take advantage of newer technology. It will hit them in reviews I'd wager. "...well the engine is direct x 9 which wont take advantage of your xxxx card you bought for £400" isnt a great line to see in a review IMO and the game will lose ratings.

I think the console prediction is pretty on the money here.

[Santi]

DX9 means everybody will be able to run the game, so they are aiming for 100% of the player base. Is that wrong?

Dumb down games and consoles comments, you clearly fail to notice that video games is a business generating more money that films or other entertaining industries apart from porn. Get use to it, video games are mainstream now.

[Legionnaire]

As Nanook said, they started work on X:Rebirth, designing the new engine, BEFORE DX11 was available, and before hardware was available that would run it. Vista was the only way of getting DX10 as long as you had a video card that was DX10 compatible, the Nvidia cards were DX10, AMD use a version called DX10.1. So i honestly think that using DX9 is the best choice Egosoft could have made. Who here bought a DX10 card when DX 10 was first released and found that games performance was poorer than the same card and drivers running under DX9, I would expect if people were being honest it would be a lot of people. I went from a 6600 to an 8600, but was still on XP, so had no access to DX10 at the time, because that was tied to vista, and when vista launched it was buggy as anything. I stayed with XP until Win 7 released. I'm still pretty much using the same pc i was 4/5 years ago which was built the year before X3:TC launched, so yes its limited, I am currently saving for an upgrade to a decent machine, but being unable to work, its very slow for me to save the amount of cash required. and i suspect there might be others on the forum in a similar situation. Hopefully future titles will support DX11 but just now its still at an early stage and as such, turning all effects in dx11 to max will most likely bring any computer to its knees, I would rather see a game thats released that is playable by everyone on these forums, rather than just those that have been able to upgrade in the last 6 months or so.

The steam results are compiled by those who actually use steam, not everyone with a pc has steam, and those who have allowed their info to be used in the survey, again not likely to be everyone. So while that is a current steam survey, it cannot be taken as proof that that is what 100% of pc gamers use.

Legionnaire

[softweir]

DX9 means everybody will be able to run the game, so they are aiming for 100% of the player base. Is that wrong?

I agree.

What we NEED, what we DEMAND, what we EXPECT is a game that runs well for EVERYBODY. (Does anybody actually disagree with this? Anybody?) Anything less and the game will sell badly. For that, it has to work well in dx9. 54% of gamers is not a big enough majority that a game like X-R can survive.

Any effort put into dx11 will detract from that essential, core requirement. When funds are limited, developers have to concentrate on the essentials.

dx11 is - for a niche game like X-Rebirth - a white elephant.

[strude]

Which isn't really relevant because, as the devs themselves have said, programming the Rebirth engine was first started four years ago, in 2007. It's kinda hard to rewrite a game engine every time a new version of DX comes out...

True enough, but they didn't need to rewrite the game engine. It most likely wasn't complete after one year of coding (two at most) between starting development (not necessarily coding at this stage) and the release of DX11 available to developers.

Also, if you browse the Tech Support forums for both Reunion and TC, you'll see an awful lot of dxdiag reports for people still using Win XP, and even a lot with Vista and Win 7 but still using DX9-capable hardware. In the current economic climate, it's not likely most 'average' gamers are willing or even able to buy new hardware just for a game.

So developers should avoid releasing a game using newer technologies in 2012 because some people are still using an operating system from 2002? Doesn't sound very smart to me.

...Who here bought a DX10 card when DX 10 was first released and found that games performance was poorer than the same card and drivers running under DX9, I would expect if people were being honest it would be a lot of people...,

I did, and I can say for certain that I didn't notice the improvement I had expected to see, and in reality you are correct in saying that I probably saw a decrease in preformance when using the newer DX10 effects. But as I said, we are not talking about jumping on the band wagon at release. DX11 was release with Windows 7, in 2009, two years ago. DX11 graphics cards are in their second or third generation now.

The steam results are compiled by those who actually use steam, not everyone with a pc has steam, and those who have allowed their info to be used in the survey, again not likely to be everyone. So while that is a current steam survey, it cannot be taken as proof that that is what 100% of pc gamers use.

I only said the Steam survey suggests, not proves. Looking at it again, it lists less than 20% of participating Steam users having DX9 or lower available to use, and a further 16% having DX10/11 capable cards, but only using XP.

[Trialbyfire]

The thing that disappoints me the most is lack of information from Egosoft. Several months ago after releasing the initial trailer they said we'd be getting more information "soon".

Why didn't they release more official videos etc. instead or leaving it to fans with cell-phone videos cams and untranslated or poorly translated interviews in German?

This is piss-poor marketing imo. Very disgraceful and disappointing!

[the old one]

there is a lot of different opinions being exppressed in this thread,so maybe some one could do a poll on those people who will buy the game on release and those who will wait and see how the game pans out,the old one

[Whiteblade]

the information politics are not from Egosoft. Its DS.

And please all the pro gamers remember one thing when you say you want this and that.

Ego is a Company with less than 25 members and not very much money.
its not a Bethesta, Blizzard ore Bioware.

And for that they made a great job in the past. Xbtf startet with only 2 friend and an Idea.

[strude]

And for that they made a great job in the past.

Yes they have. Seems to me they are now going back there though