{"id":6803,"date":"2022-09-26T09:31:47","date_gmt":"2022-09-26T16:31:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/?p=6803"},"modified":"2022-09-26T09:31:47","modified_gmt":"2022-09-26T16:31:47","slug":"celebrating-20-years-of-directx-9","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/celebrating-20-years-of-directx-9\/","title":{"rendered":"Celebrating 20 Years of DirectX 9"},"content":{"rendered":"

The last 20 years have brought countless hours of <\/span>play <\/span>to<\/span> millions of<\/span> gamers <\/span>via<\/span> the DirectX 9 graphics API<\/span>,<\/span> with<\/span> 2<\/span>,<\/span>500+ games<\/span> still being enjoyed today<\/span>. <\/span>F<\/span>or the first time, <\/span>developers <\/span>experienced<\/span> the power of <\/span>high-level shader language (<\/span>HLSL<\/span>)<\/span> combined <\/span>with pixel and vertex shaders, paving the way for the future of <\/span>DirectX R<\/span>aytracing<\/span> and high-precision floating point color, <\/span>which would <\/span>bring new levels of quality and depth to <\/span>every pixel.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Microsoft <\/span>is<\/span> committed to bringing you a great gaming experience<\/span> and<\/span> in honor of the 20<\/span><\/span>th<\/span><\/span> anniversary of<\/span> DirectX 9, <\/span>we<\/span>\u2019re<\/span> happy <\/span>continue<\/span> our<\/span> dedication <\/span>to <\/span>the API <\/span>through <\/span><\/span>DirectX 9-on-12 Mapping Layers<\/span><\/span><\/a>,<\/span><\/span> which <\/span>will<\/span> ensur<\/span>e<\/span> that gamers can continue to enjoy their favorite games for another 20<\/span> years<\/span>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> Happy Anniversary DirectX 9!<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Intel has been providing DirectX<\/span> 9 support through our 9-on-12 layers since their 12<\/span>th<\/span> Gen Intel Core launch in <\/span>2021 and<\/span> will continue to do so with their recently announced<\/span> <\/span>Intel Arc GPUs<\/span><\/span><\/a>. <\/span><\/span><\/span>We <\/span>are<\/span> pleased<\/span> to support th<\/span>is effort<\/span>,<\/span> so <\/span>that<\/span> Intel <\/span>can continue innovating and looking to the future while Microsoft <\/span>provides<\/span> support <\/span>for<\/span> a <\/span>library of <\/span>classic games<\/span>.<\/span> Keeping games running great on today\u2019s PCs is not <\/span>just great<\/span> for <\/span>gamers<\/span> now<\/span>, but vital to preserving a generation of art and enter<\/span>tainment<\/span> that future gamers can also enjoy<\/span>.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When we designed DirectX 12, one of our design principles was to create a single <\/span>API and driver interface<\/span> capable of <\/span>both s<\/span>upporting all <\/span>features from <\/span>current and past APIs<\/span> and<\/span> enabling <\/span>the <\/span>next <\/span>era<\/span> of <\/span>graphics <\/span>innova<\/span>t<\/span>io<\/span>n<\/span>.\u00a0 <\/span>DirectX 12 m<\/span>apping layers <\/span>for D<\/span>irect<\/span>X<\/span> 9 is one example of the success of this design; developers can write D<\/span>irect<\/span>X<\/span> 9<\/span> games and <\/span>have them automatically <\/span>run with high performance<\/span> on any driver with <\/span>D<\/span>irect<\/span>X<\/span> 12 support<\/span>, <\/span>even if there is no <\/span>built-in<\/span> support for D<\/span>irect<\/span>X<\/span> 9 <\/span>a<\/span>pp<\/span>s<\/span>.\u00a0 <\/span>This mapping layer approach has <\/span>t<\/span>he <\/span>additi<\/span>o<\/span>nal<\/span> advantage that <\/span>it allows Microsoft and graphics hardware vendors to focus<\/span> on <\/span>optimi<\/span>z<\/span>ing<\/span> and increasing the reliability of D<\/span>irect<\/span>X<\/span> 1<\/span>2<\/span>.\u00a0 <\/span>What this means for gamers<\/span> is that <\/span>a<\/span>ny <\/span>such optimizations will automatica<\/span>l<\/span>ly <\/span>ac<\/span>c<\/span>rue<\/span> to D<\/span>irect<\/span>X<\/span> 9 games as we<\/span>l<\/span>l<\/span>,<\/span> multipl<\/span>y<\/span>ing<\/span> the efficiency of all engineering <\/span>work<\/span>.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Our effort<\/span>s<\/span> to <\/span>help all Windows apps benefit from DirectX<\/span> 12 <\/span>i<\/span>s<\/span>n\u2019t<\/span> limited to DirectX APIs \u2013<\/span> we a<\/span>l<\/span>so <\/span>pro<\/span>v<\/span>ide<\/span> an <\/span><\/span>OpenCL\u2122 and OpenGL\u00ae Compatibility Pack<\/a>. <\/span><\/span>Check out <\/span>o<\/span>ur <\/span>prev<\/span>i<\/span>ous<\/span> blog posts below for more information about mapping and translation layers from the DirectX team.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Further Reading:<\/h5>\n

Open Sourcing Direct3D 9 on 12 and the Release of the DXBC Signer NuGet Package – DirectX Developer Blog (microsoft.com)<\/a><\/p>\n

Announcing the OpenCL\u2122 and OpenGL\u00ae Compatibility Pack for Windows 10 on ARM – DirectX Developer Blog (microsoft.com)<\/a><\/p>\n

Engineering Arc – 8\/19\/2022 – Intel Communities<\/a><\/p>\n

D3D12 Translation Layer and D3D11On12 are now open source – DirectX Developer Blog (microsoft.com)<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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The last 20 years have brought countless hours of play to millions of gamers via the DirectX 9 graphics API, with 2,500+ games still being enjoyed today. For the first time, developers experienced the power of high-level shader language (HLSL) combined with pixel and vertex shaders, paving the way for the future of DirectX Raytracing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1747,"featured_media":12651,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-directx"],"acf":[],"blog_post_summary":"

The last 20 years have brought countless hours of play to millions of gamers via the DirectX 9 graphics API, with 2,500+ games still being enjoyed today. For the first time, developers experienced the power of high-level shader language (HLSL) combined with pixel and vertex shaders, paving the way for the future of DirectX Raytracing […]<\/p>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1747"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devblogs.microsoft.com\/directx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}