DirectX 11 minimum requirement whining thread (no compatible graphic device)

Mik1984

Prince
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Feb 28, 2008
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I officially open the whining thread for all those that can't run the game because of lack of DX 11 support in their GPU. For all those old farts that remember the good old times, the same thing happened for release of civ 3 and the DX 8.0a requirement and Civ4 and 9.0c requirements - both relatively upscale in the time of release, eliminating a lot of PC's. The exception was civ 5, because it offered DX 10 fallback, which was relatively middle of the pack minimum requirement.

This time however, unlike over 90% games released this year, Civ 6 pushes forward with DX 11 minimum requirement, even though most likely the majority of major games released even next year will launch on DX 10.

I don't understand enough about graphics programming, could someone for the time being enlighten me about the benefits of not including older DX support? That is obviously without mentioning the dumb-obvious fact of new DX features, since players with older machines would gladly play without them. As far as i even know there is a popular cottage industry of graphics downgrade modding which includes among primarily changes that decrease GPU and CPU and RAM usage, features that downgrade the DX requirements. It is not as popular as the HD modding for old games, where graphics enhancement mods are created for old games. But it exists and it does have significant accomplishments.

So I wonder what is the benefit for game developers not to include support for abridged graphics in order to allow running on older machines? If all it takes is a single guy with a couple spare hours to produce a mod that slashes the minimum requirements by 25-50% by disabling certain graphic features in a game, that the game producers simply chose not to allow you to disable, I am certain that if they could, the producers could have given a fallback for downgraded graphics that would make the game run well enough on an GT 260M 1GB RAM GPU.

PS Graphics downgrade modding has a reputation of "downgrade to potato", however I believe that might change in the incoming years, since downgrading to year 2000 equipment might be a downgrade to potato, downgrading to 2010 equipment, not as much any more, and may very likely pass the threshold of "disfunctionally ugly".
 
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This time however, unlike over 90% games released this year, Civ 6 pushes forward with DX 11 minimum requirement, even though most likely the majority of major games released even next year will launch on DX 10.
[multiple citations needed]

I don't understand enough about graphics programming, could someone for the time being enlighten me about the benefits of not including older DX support? That is obviously without mentioning the dumb-obvious fact of new DX features, since players with older machines would gladly play without them. As far as i even know there is a popular cottage industry of graphics downgrade modding which includes among primarily changes that decrease GPU and CPU and RAM usage, features that downgrade the DX requirements. It is not as popular as the HD modding for old games, where graphics enhancement mods are created for old games. But it exists and it does have significant accomplishments.
Your knowledge gap here exists around how software houses design software and who funds that. Suffice to say, for your interests, is that none of it is couched in favour of the legacy gamer.

So I wonder what is the benefit for game developers not to include support for abridged graphics in order to allow running on older machines?
Cheaper development costs, primarily around licensing and development software.

If all it takes is a single guy with a couple spare hours to produce a mod that slashes the minimum requirements by 25-50% by disabling certain graphic features in a game, that the game producers simply chose not to allow you to disable, I am certain that if they could, the producers could have given a fallback for downgraded graphics that would make the game run well enough on an GT 260M 1GB RAM GPU.
They could spend development time on that, but only at the cost of other things. Also, the degree to which you are denigrating the talent and commitment of the people who bring out these compatibility mods is pretty revolting. Get a sense of perspective please.

PS Graphics downgrade modding has a reputation of "downgrade to potato", however I believe that might change in the incoming years, since downgrading to year 2000 equipment might be a downgrade to potato, downgrading to 2010 equipment, not as much any more, and may very likely pass the threshold of "disfunctionally ugly".
I genuinely don't understand what you are trying to say here.
 
[multiple citations needed]

I am eyeballing. This is not exact science. Overwhelming majority of this years major releases seems to be launchable with DX 10, not counting indie games, which are obviously much less demanding. Take it for what it is. I did not count.

Your knowledge gap here exists around how software houses design software and who funds that. Suffice to say, for your interests, is that none of it is couched in favour of the legacy gamer.

Cheaper development costs, primarily around licensing and development software.

How much cheaper? They are really shutting out large sections of their market. I would bet that no DX 10 support has slashed the sales of Civ 6 by 5% bare minimum(though I would suspect rather something around 10%). Since the game is sold digitally, 90-80% of that corresponds to an impact on the profit margin. I don't know their profit margins, but that may even mean 20-30% less profit.

They could spend development time on that, but only at the cost of other things. Also, the degree to which you are denigrating the talent and commitment of the people who bring out these compatibility mods is pretty revolting. Get a sense of perspective please.
I don't want to argue about that, but the profits they are foregoing are not a triviality, so unless there is some kind of an insurmountable difficulty in adding such options per manufacturer, I don't see it being justified by a petty saving. That is why I asked if anybody knows what would be so REALLY difficult and expensive about it.

I genuinely don't understand what you are trying to say here.

I think what I am trying to say is obvious enough, downgrading to 2010 compatibility is not downgrading to "potato quality", because you are downgrading to much more powerful equipment in absolute terms, so the fact that downgraded games in the past may have been so ugly that it would be besides the point to play them, it might not be as much of a problem in the future.
 
I am eyeballing. This is not exact science. Overwhelming majority of this years major releases seems to be launchable with DX 10, not counting indie games, which are obviously much less demanding. Take it for what it is. I did not count.
Let's be real, I have no idea either, you may be right, you may not. I'm sure there is a list somewhere but it's not actually relevant to this, specific, conversation in any case.

How much cheaper? They are really shutting out large sections of their market. I would bet that no DX 10 support has slashed the sales of Civ 6 by 5% bare minimum(though I would suspect rather something around 10%). Since the game is sold digitally, 90-80% of that corresponds to an impact on the profit margin. I don't know their profit margins, but that may even mean 20-30% less profit.

I don't want to argue about that, but the profits they are foregoing are not a triviality, so unless there is some kind of an insurmountable difficulty in adding such options per manufacturer, I don't see it being justified by a petty saving. That is why I asked if anybody knows what would be so REALLY difficult and expensive about it.
The savings are very significant although I can't quantify $ values. Here's how it works, very generally, though: Firaxis Games are a wholly owned subsidiary of 2K Games which is itself a wholly owned subsidiary of Take Two Interactive. Imagine how the reality of a 3 tier, corporate, cost-benefit system might be working here. While neither of us can testify as to the specifics I myself happen to work in a similarly structured company. The phrase I would use to describe it is "utterly fudged". I apologise for the profanity but I believe justified by context, there is simply no other way I would describe it, to anyone.

I think what I am trying to say is obvious enough, downgrading to 2010 compatibility is not downgrading to "potato quality", because you are downgrading to much more powerful equipment in absolute terms, so the fact that downgraded games in the past may have been so ugly that it would be besides the point to play them, it might not be as much of a problem in the future.
I see. This all requires different tools, different build strategies, massively increased compatibility issues etc etc etc. Other companies are better at this but personally I don't think anyone is as backwards compatible as you would seem to think appropriate.
 
Other companies are better at this but personally I don't think anyone is as backwards compatible as you would seem to think appropriate.

Who is not backwards compatible enough as I would think to be inappropriate?

Many major releases of this year thought it is appropriate to have DX 10 support. Firaxis though not to.

Its not a question of appropriate or not, its their product.

I only wonder what pushed them into that decision, there are still plenty of people using 2010, early 2011 equipment.

Possible explanation is that they are planning a very long lifecycle for their game, unlike other Civ releases, they are going to stick with this one for 10 years, and release update after update, akin to Paradox Games. HOI 4 has been released this year, and they plan to keep the project alive for 10 years.

It would be great if they did that.
 
If you want to play a 2016 game, get a graphics card that isn't a potato from 2012.
 
AAA developers generally set hardware requirements based on the Steam Hardware Survey, since that targets gamers more precisely than any other stats. For November 2016, the SHS says 96.8% of systems have a DX11 (or greater) compliant GPU and Windows 7 or later. It sucks if you're in the remaining 3.2%, but that's PC gaming for you.
 
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