How will DirectX12 affect gamers and game developers?

The release of Windows 10 marks the first time where the broad PC gaming public will have access to a low-level, cross-vendor graphics API. Ever since AMD first presented Mantle in 2013, there’s been a lot of back and forth discussion on how significant the gains to be made by low-level APIs really are for games. Opinions range from considering it nothing less than a revolution in graphics processing, to little more than an overblown marketing campaign. This article aims to provide a level-headed outlook on what exactly DirectX12 will offer for gamers, in which situations, and when we will see these gains. To explain not just the what, but also the why of it, I’ll detail the tradeoffs involved in various API design decisions, and the historical growth that led to the current state of the art. This will get technical. Very technical. If you are primarily interested in knowing how these changes will affect you as a gamer, and what you can expect from an upgrade to Windows 10 now and in the near future, then skip forward to the final section, which touches on the important points without the deep dive.