> we've seen more fragmentation in the last 5-6 years due to the brief introduction of Mantle
I thought Mantle was what became Vulkan?
> Consoles have always used propiertary APIs
I certainly don't expect console manufacturers to adopt Metal, but at least there's the possibility of (eventual) unification with Vulkan.
> OpenGL ... support from various vendors wasn't always good and official Microsoft support lapsed
And Windows was the main PC gaming platform, so developers used DirectX instead of OpenGL as a result.
On OSX, Metal became a thing; as a result, last time I checked OpenGL was stuck back at version 4.1 (that's > 5 years behind everyone else).
I don't see Android, iOS, or Linux adopting DirectX. I don't see Windows or Android adopting Metal. If you're hoping for unification, Vulkan seems like quite literally the only possibility. Add to that Vulkan support from a variety of hardware vendors other than AMD and Nvidia as well as officially planned Vulkan-OpenCL interop and I'm actually somewhat optimistic about things.
To add to this, I can see Microsoft adopting Vulkan. I don't understand why Apple has taken this approach. Well, I understand why _Apple_ did, but I feel like most companies in their position wouldn't invent a new API.
I thought Mantle was what became Vulkan?
> Consoles have always used propiertary APIs
I certainly don't expect console manufacturers to adopt Metal, but at least there's the possibility of (eventual) unification with Vulkan.
> OpenGL ... support from various vendors wasn't always good and official Microsoft support lapsed
And Windows was the main PC gaming platform, so developers used DirectX instead of OpenGL as a result.
On OSX, Metal became a thing; as a result, last time I checked OpenGL was stuck back at version 4.1 (that's > 5 years behind everyone else).
I don't see Android, iOS, or Linux adopting DirectX. I don't see Windows or Android adopting Metal. If you're hoping for unification, Vulkan seems like quite literally the only possibility. Add to that Vulkan support from a variety of hardware vendors other than AMD and Nvidia as well as officially planned Vulkan-OpenCL interop and I'm actually somewhat optimistic about things.