Respected Game Developers Prefer GCN Programming Documentation Over GameWorks “black boxes”

[LtMatt]

As a brief background to this thread I'm sure all the regulars here remember the ExtremeTech article 'Nvidia’s GameWorks program usurps power from developers, end-users, and AMD', as well as the thread i created here so we could discuss the ramifications of this. The general gist of the article was that NVIDIA’s Gameworks libraries were “black boxes” that could not be modified by developers and also left AMD unable to provide their own performance optimizations via their drivers when these libraries were used. There was a lot of debate, denial and deflecting in that thread and even though i asked Joel (the author of the article) to sign up and explain things it ended in a stalemate. Fast forward to today and as i was on holiday i saw an interesting conversation taking place between highly respected game developers on twitter. The general gist of the conversation was interesting, i thought. One of the things that interested me was first that they confirmed the original article was true, regarding the black boxes. What i found even more interesting was that they've started working more on GCN because of AMD's open programming documentation and AMD's involvement in consoles.

Here's is a snapshot of the conversation

At first i didn't recognize any of these names, aside from the legend that is Johan Anderson of course. However after a little bit of googling, looking at twitter profiles and research revealed the people posting above are in fact:

·John Kloetzli is graphics programmer at Firaxis.

·Bart Wronski is graphics programmers at … Ubi Soft Montreal!

·Timothy Lottes is ex-NVIDIA and now works at Epic (the author of TXAA).

·Michal Drobot also works at Ubi Soft Montreal.

·Johan needs no intro.

Ubisoft seem to be in partnership with Nvidia and GameWorks at the moment and so are Epic, so i find it fascinating that they would speak this way regarding GameWorks and specifically GCN.

Comments, opinion and healthy debate welcome folks.

Source
https://twitter.com/repi/status/452812842132332544

 

[LtMatt]

are you also Rizen on Hardforum, or did you just copy this thread idea from him (pretty much verbatim)

No idea who that is and i don't visit H often. Link to the thread?

I have my own account on H LtMatt though i think ive only posted there twice. I saw this as Johan's tweet popped up on my twitter feed.

Johan has a nerve talking about loosing respect for someone who puts out something unusable

I wonder how much respect gamers (you know, the guys that pay their wages) have for dice?

I blame your mouse tbh.

Snapshot of a Twitter 'conversation' shows one person talking lol.

Added a source to the OP. Its hard to post the whole convo as i have to shrink my browser to unreadable levels to fit all the messages in.

https://twitter.com/repi/status/452812842132332544

.. removed ..

Nothing to worthy to add? Don't reply. No need for baiting.

 

[LtMatt]

Sorry johan is part of frostbite team. Not dice.He only develop the graphic engine

Well said. He is not responsible for the bugs of BF4.

 

[LtMatt]

Never heard of Charlie eyetrip. I am in fact me and as i posted the original topic i found this interesting. First because it confirms the first article and second because it was interesting to see the game developers talk about the "black boxes" of GameWorks and GCN programming documentation that way. Apologies if this offends or makes difficult reading for some, but there you have it. Try not to get too emotionally attached would be my advice to you. Also its not a bash at Nvidia, i did not say those things. I merely picked up on it and posted it here for a discussion. Unfortunately most here are incapable of such a thing without resulting to insults in some form or another.

 

[LtMatt]

** comment removed - Information concerning you user notes is no one else's business not does it have anything to to do with the thread in hand. **

Charlie demergian I think was the name of the guy I was thinking of.

And believe me, I suffer no emotional attachments to either gpu vendor. Check my sig to see who I'm with now. I go where I get best support for what I need/want

I only question as I do, because not many people stand out to me personally on the forums, but you certainly do as someone biased very strongly against nvidia. And it's purely down to how strongly your bias seems to come across, making it difficult to take anything you say without wondering about some agenda.

I haven't said anything about Nvidia here though, nor do i normally. I just post articles for discussion and if they mention anything bad regarding Nvidia that = insults, name calling, baiting and my apparent hate of anything Nvidia. Pretty much what is going on here from several posters already with nothing to add, just to attack and bait me rather than address the topic at hand.

 

[LtMatt]

Where do I find that info on self? Think I may have been suspended once... For member market infraction, lol.

User CP.


** Edited **

 

[LtMatt]

Another thread clean up.

If you don't like other peoples comments or opinions, then that's fine. There's no rules about you having to agree but don't start dishing out personal insults and inflammatory remarks because i won't tolerate this any longer. If you have nothing constructive to add to the debate, then try just ignoring them instead if you must.

A few of you are right on the brink, so tread carefully.

Thank you Huddy and duly noted. Apologies for posting my infraction log.

 

[LtMatt]

read johans comment just laughed when come here to see it confirmed as devs hate Nvidia

come on matt where the hell do you make the stuff up from

Nothing to do with me dgee's. I have no influence (sadly ) on respected game devs. I just found it interesting to see, especially given the previous thread on the subject and the level of denial involved in that thread.

The 7850/70 in question still averaged over 60fps, so not like it suddenly made the game unplayable

What about those of us like me with a HD7770? FXAA absolutely kills performance on AMD cards for no reason. Still can't fathom how a 770 can beat a 290X or a 660 can beat a 7950 boost at one of the most commonly used resolutions. In no other game known to man will a 770 beat a 290X by 5fps at 1200P.

Spoiler

 

[LtMatt]

That's 1200p, not 1080p, and you'd just lower the settings.

And FXAA is crap.

Thanks corrected my typo. It won't change the results though and thats the point. FXAA costs 1fps (if that) normally, we all know that. Any gpu can handle FXAA, typically.

 

[LtMatt]

1080p would change the results, not by much, but it'd be around 10%, so the 7770 now is doing 41 FPS.

The 7770 is frankly a low end GPU, that AMD's IGP's are getting close to (Well.... We'd be nigh on as close had AMD not derped them bandwidth wise) and in next revisions when they apply what they've done to the PS4, the 7770 will be giving off less performance than an IGP.


How much does performance change using low FXAA?

But the HD7770 can handle BF4 1080P at medium-high settings @60fps but can't handle Batman @1200P with FXAA? Nah, its not right Martini.

 

[LtMatt]

You can't compare X game to Y game, different engines and all that.

Or we'd be questioning AC3's performance every day.

But look at the silly high fps Batman produces. Its not a demanding game when compared to BF4. Anyway we're getting off the point a bit here.

I think we need a new section called "Graph & Article Wars" where the likely suspects can go post all the lovely information that tends to side with their viewpoint.

Why do ANY of us care what Developers think about either brands back-end? We play the games and that is it. I do not buy and play a game because it is developed by a company/group of people who favour my brand of GPU.

Graphics Card has turned from discussion about GPUs with a firm focus on PLAYING GAMES into a place to try One-Up either of the brands. Now all of a sudden most of the new topics posted are what you would expect from the brands themselves - The sort of tripe PR and Marketing Spin that would go into a TV advertising.

The GPU buyers becoming the spin-masters? Not even being paid for it.

These sort of posts should be banned. There is absolutely no worth in "Discussing" rampant PR Twitter posts and nothing to be gained from said 'discussion'. It's flame bait, pure and simple veiled trolling.

People that are interested in this are entitled to discuss it. Some of us find it interesting. Those that do not, should stay out or ignore the thread as instructed by Admiral Huddy.

Another thread clean up.

If you don't like other peoples comments or opinions, then that's fine. There's no rules about you having to agree but don't start dishing out personal insults and inflammatory remarks because i won't tolerate this any longer. If you have nothing constructive to add to the debate, then try just ignoring them instead if you must.

A few of you are right on the brink, so tread carefully.