Microsoft DirectStorage showcased in Forspoken demo
NVMe: "I am speed."
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AS part of GDC 2022 Luminous Productions has showcased what technologies will be utilized in its upcoming game Forspoken. In the video demo, it shows off a wide range of software implementations including utilizing Microsoft DirecStorage API. Alongside Fidelity FX library of improvements, as well as FSR which shows 1.0 now but promises 2.0 when that is available.
Comparing three different storage solutions utilizing DirectStorage, Luminous Productions shows off the loading times. There is no comparison without the API but with it on the NVMe takes 1.9 seconds to load the scene. Whereas a SATA SSD needs 3.7 seconds, and an HDD requires 21.5 seconds.
What is Microsoft DirectStorage?
Released on March 14th, Microsft DirectStorage is a public SDK that aims to decrease loading times for NVMe SSDs. It achieves this by unloading information from the RAM in a system onto the GPU VRAM. This allows the GPU to work on decompression. With higher bandwidths, it works better for streaming and load times, saving the CPU significant work and freeing the IO. Along with the GPU supporting constant maxed IO rates for load times and the data remains the smallest until the destination.
DirectStorage is a big factor for the current-gen of consoles which benefit from a more integrated coherent system. This means the system is more in unison decreasing the latency between the different components. Even if it only is using an NVMe SSD which may be an expensive solution to hold all your games.
