Today at its Build conference, Microsoft detailed the new DirectX 11.2 for Windows 8.1. The various visual enhancements will be available to developers, and will be available for both PC and Xbox One games.
You can check out the update notes for the technical details. In particular, the toolset includes streamlined shading functions, GPU overlay support to open up system resources, tiled resources for greater texture fidelity when zoomed in close to an object, lower latency, buffer scaling, and more.
Microsoft also published a lengthy Windows 8.1 preview (PDF), which includes an overview of the new DirectX features, along with the other additions coming to Windows 8.1.
VentureBeat reports that VP of Windows Antoine Leblond showed a few practical examples of tiled resources at its conference. A map of Mars was blurry when zoomed in, but then became clear when tiled resources was turned on. A second demo showed the individual rivets and bits of dirt on a glider when zoomed in close.
Well you're on a gaming website where most of us use desktops... not faggy little tablets to play games. Windows 8 sucks...
this win 8 hate shtick is really getting tired
Devs will target the lowest common denominator, don't worry about it. Windows 7 installs will be huge for a long long l...