The Vulkan API has been released

The Vulkan API has been released

 

When the Vulkan API was announced PC gamers everywhere were excited, not just on Windows PC, but on Mac Linux and even reaching out to those who gamed on Android and Mobile platforms. 

Vulkan is the first Multiplatform Next Generation API, not being locked to one hardware manufacturer like AMD’s Mantle or Apple’s Metal API, or locked to a single OS like Microsoft’s DirectX, allowing gamers to benefit from the improvements made in modern APIs regardless of what you gaming platform is. 

Now the Vulkan API has been officially launched, with a full specification alongside conforming drivers from manufacturers and a lot more internal testing than previous APIs from the Khronos Group. Not only have AMD and Nvidia released new Beta drivers for the new API, but Croteam’s Talos Principle has just been updated to support the new API, meaning that a fully released game supports the new API. 

 

  

 

The Vulkan API started off as AMD’s Mantle API, which was given from AMD freely to the Khronos Group to create “OpenGL Next”, a successor to the OpenGL multiplatform API. From this base and the help of the many contributors inside the khronos Group, which includes companies like Intel, Nvidia, Valve and Qualcomm, was able to be forged into what we now call Vulkan 1.0.  

 

   Vulkan is the new generation, open-standard and cross-platform API descended from AMD Mantle, forged by the industry. As the product of an incredible collaboration between many industry hardware and software vendors including AMD, Vulkan paves the way for PC games with exceptional performance, image quality and features.

 

The main benefits of these new next generation APIs are to modernize the software, allowing it to better use modern hardware, enabling better use of Multi-threading on CPUs and the give close to the metal access to your GPU hardware.

Right now AMD and Nvidia have released new Beta Drivers that support the new API and Intel has released an Open Source Driver for the API.

Vulkan GPU support on PC –

– AMD : GCN 1.0+ GPUs – Radeon Software Vulkan beta Driver

– Nvidia : Kepler and above GPUs – Nvidia 356.39 Vulkan Beta Driver

– Intel : Skylake GPUs (Haswell and Broadwell support Unknown) – Download Open Source Driver Here

 

  

 

  You can join the discussion on the KHRONOS Group’s Vulkan API on the OC3D Forums.