Originally posted by: gururu
I seriously see no future for OpenGL. Old diehards like Carmack are going to be fading away (can you say Armadillo?). DX is just making too many leaps and bounds to ignore in terms of features. Plus microsoft is now so intimately involved with game development. I am also inclined to believe that DX drivers run DX games better than OGL drivers run OGL games. I'm not sure, any speculation or fact analyses?
Sadly, there is a lot that we don't know, and perhaps will never know.
For example, here's a few small nuggets to chew on:
First of all, SGI invented "GL", before it became multi-platform, and changed name to "OpenGL".
Second, it's still basically a standard in the professional/workstation-software industry. That is unlikely to change in the near future.
Third, SGI and MS had a tentative joint project to develop a 3D API that would succeed
both OpenGL and D3D. It was called "Farenheight" (sp?). Unfortunately, it seems like that project is basically dead at this point, or has submerged, possibly emerging again at some later date under another code-name. (But I think that's unlikely.)
Forth, I don't recall the exact reason, but SGI sold to MS a whole huge bunch of their 3D-graphics patent portfolio.
Fifth, At some later point in time, MS showed up an an ARB meeting (OpenGL review board), apparently threatening some sort of patent-infringement, if they implemented some of the newer advanced features that DirectX was sporting, due to the fact that now MS, not SGI, controlled those key patents.
You see, MS has a very strong vested interest in maintaining their 3D-API near-monopoly, in order to extract "rent" from the devs and their customers. In fact, they tried to strongly pursuade Nintendo and others to adopt their .Net-based game/3D programming SDK, which I would assume also uses a variant of the DirectX/D3D API.
So it's not like OpenGL couldn't also "make leaps and bounds in terms of features", but that because MS controls, via patents sold to them by SGI, the ability to implement those features, then they will attempt to monopolize the 3D API market and prevent OpenGL from adopting those features.
At least, thats the way it was the last time I heard.
I am also inclined to believe that DX drivers run DX games better than OGL drivers run OGL games.
As for that matter, that's entirely up to the driver and applications developers, how well they adhere to the standards, and how much development effort they put into optimizing.