Back in the days, the PC version of Alan Wake – the one that was cancelled – was not supposed to be compatible with DX9 and Windows XP. As we had guessed back then, that DX10 requirement was simply a marketing trick from Microsoft in an attempt to boost Vista’s sales. Fast forward a couple of years and here we are today with a new PC build for Alan Wake that will support DX9. Yeap, you read that right and it’s official. Alan Wake PC will support DX9 and Windows XP.
That was revealed at the official forum of Alan Wake. According to Remedy’s Markus, the team has on their hands a “very advanced” DX9 engine. Which was to be expected as it’s a console title. Thank God for the cancellation of the previous PC build as that would have a negative impact to Remedy’s reputation. Yes, we know guys that you were forced to use DX10 and we are grateful that it will now – that Microsoft is out of the picture – support DX9. Moreover, it’s pretty evident that Alan Wake PC won’t support DX11.
As Markus said:
“You can do pretty much everything you want (even deferred rendering with MSAA some have said was impossible) apart from some special techniques like HW tessellation on shader model 3 if you have the performance.”
So we can safely say that PC gamers can kiss goodbye to DX11 for Alan Wake PC. We should also note that the PC version will support HDR/FP16, SSAO is featured and some other effects have some higher quality settings. FXAA will also be natively supported.
As for the game’s requirements, Markus said that Remedy can’t comment on that right now:
“We’re not quite ready to announce min spec yet as we’re working on scalability settings and some optimizations. Also a few more fixes are needed before we can even check how the game runs on some earlier DX9 hardware.”
Alan Wake PC is currently slated for a Q1 2012 release!
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
Contact: Email