DX12 Game Ashes of Singularity Coming to Steam Early Access on October 22

By admin On Oct 14, 2015

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Ashes of The Singularity, the RTS game from development studio Oxide, is coming to Steam Early Access on October 22. The game will most likely be the first game available to use Microsoft’s latest graphics API, DirectX 12.

The use of DX12 in the game, according to Oxide, makes it possible to display more visual detail on each unit, and to allow battles to take place on a much larger scale. The game runs in the Nitrous Engine, which Oxide develops itself. Ashes of the Singularity is a 64-bit game and DirectX 12 only works on Windows 10.

Oxide made headlines with its game last month because, according to the developer, Nvidia’s graphics cards would not support the DX12 functionality of asynchronous compute. This would ensure that AMD cards have the potential to perform significantly better in DirectX 12 games that use the feature. Nvidia claimed at the time that the feature is simply supported in its DX12 cards. Whether the problems Oxide ran into are Nvidia hardware, Nvidia drivers, or the developer’s fault remains to be seen.

The DirectX 12 function asynchronous compute ensures that multithreaded 3d applications are handled efficiently. Multiple queues are used for certain graphical calculation tasks, while with DirectX 11 those tasks are still handled one by one, one after the other. By using asynchronous compute, the computing power of the gpu can be used better, but there must be support from the hardware and the driver.

The fact that the game is going to Early Access means the game isn’t finished yet. According to Oxide, the first version contains different planets on which battles take place, and both a single and multiplayer mode. The developer does emphasize to the player that they do a lot of work to get the artificial intelligence in the game up to standard. “Single player is not an afterthought with this game.”

The game will be available on Steam Early Access on October 22 for a promotional price of $39.99. The regular price is $49.99. The price in euros is not yet known.

The developers of ARK: Survival Evolved are also working on a DX12 update for their Early Access game. That update should result in about twenty percent better performance, but no release date is currently scheduled.