Well this is where steam might actualy come in usefull... Just like HDR; instead of making a new engine; they can just write a new module, stream it to steam; and voilla, the old engine is updated... Thats what they did with 64 bit CPU's, so Im sure they are going to take full advantage of DX10; and aren't they already doing that? I saw somewhere some one post a thread where they were demonstrating DX10 effects on source...
According to PC Gamer UK (and thats normaly unreliable and overpriced) steam fully support dx10, and are allready whipping their coders with marmite covered whips into getting sorce dx10 ready by summer... ...hmm, dx 10, sorce update... hl2:ep2 delayed.. i wonder....
Steam is already dx10 ready. :p As for Source updates, there is multi-core processing support, dynamic shadows, soft-perticles, and cinematic physics. These alone are enough to delay it for quite a while. There is also a new renderer, which very well could be the DX10 support, which I hypothesized a while ago. (but Sandbag doesn't seem to think so. XD ) O I almost forgot the better foliage rendering. :D
After they've updated the SDK, which should happen shortly after release. They might be busy porting their inhouse mods first, though, or patching critical stuff for EP2, TF2, Portal, etc. If they don't screw up, Krenzo should be able to port it pretty fast after the SDK update is released, but I don't expect him to release a patch only for the engine upgrade. I wouldn't get my hopes high any time soon.
As far as I can tell, the only renderers that AREN'T already done for Source are software, DX10, and OpenGL. The obvious answer is the one in the middle. And multi-core support? Bah. They mean they bothered to thread the damn thing finally. Multi-cpu systems finally got popular, and this is the result. They COULD have done this when they first made the engine, but I guess they like to re-write stuff.
How much longer do you think I'll be able to use my dx7 card? Will the game always be backwards compatible?
Imagine Empires using cinematic physics when buildings are destroyed... The VF's roof would start collapsing in on itself with the sounds of metal twisting and grinding, the force would shear off part of the room adjacent and the lone wall would collapse without anything holding it up.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................*wakes up* Damn, it was all a dream!
