Will Nvidia scare S.T.A.L.K.E.R.:Clear Sky developer away from DX10.1?

According to a news that I have just read this morning, it looks like S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky has joined the dark-side.

http://firingsquad.com/news/newsar [...] chid=20972

Interestingly enough, sites like GPUReview.com have written articles stating how 10.1 is not really catching traction with "popular" games.

http://www.gpureview.com/amd-annou [...] e-725.html

Regardless, this is a pleasant surprise for many ATI card owners and it is safe to assume that Nvidia is going to be disappointed about this one... what are your thoughts?

Do you see another Assassin's Creed fallout... or is this going to stick?






EDIT: Apparently, Far Cry 2 is now going to support Directx 10.1.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/256057-33-directx

No, Nvidia can emulate it in DX10 and its only some of the DX10.1 stuff they can emulate. Its not the same as being fully DX10.1 capable.
If it wasnt an issue then patches to enable it wouldnt be getting released now would they ?
DX10.1 has in AC shown quality and performance improvements and as i havent seen any benchies for the newer games im only guessing but would expect to see a similar result with these titles as well. I would also expect the Nvidia cards to loose some performance with this emulating, the same as XP users who hack the V high settings in crysis. Thats kinda obvious, more for the card to do = less performance.

mactronix

What was it August last year when the 8 series arrived ? Nvidia owned the performance crown when that happened and it didnt really change untill the 4 series, sure the 3 series was more competative but it wasnt untill the 4 series people started saying they would consider ATI over Nvidia.
So now we have to wait a while untill the next set of games are developed and maybe the devs will want to use ATI hardware this time around and include some of the benefits of its capabilities. A lot of games are just ports these days and the few that are aimed at the PC specifically have turned out to be lacklustre. Its my opinion that we will have to get used to it and just bulk up on the hardware,4 gig of Ram instead of 2, Spend that bit more on a faster CPU. Its all based around making profits and console games is where the money is, then they port them across and if you want it to run right you need extra hardware. More sales the games are cheaper to produce, they must be laughing all the way to the bank.

Mactronix

hmm, i thought it was mainly developed using ati hardware but was then added to the TWIMTBP program later on no?

I sit in no ones camp, i just want the best price/performance and to some degree longevity from my GPU, it just so happens that either because the rig when bought had an ATI card in it or because the card suited at the time i have never owned an Nvidia card. Having said that if DX10 had been worth it i would have had an 8 series card a while ago. However i dont think the markets work like they used to anymore and i honestly think that having the best price performance matters more to people these days than the need to have X make of card just because they make the number one performing card. On that subject i didnt think either camp could claim that at this moment in time, i thought depending on the games it ebbed and flowed too much to call it ?

Mactronix