If you're been waiting with baited breath for Deus Ex: Mankind Divided to incorporate a DirectX 12 renderer today is your lucky day. In the last few hours the team at Eidos Montreal launched PC Patch v1.4 build 545.4_P5, and players can opt in to a Beta that utilises the DirectX 12 render path presupposing you have the requisite hardware and software - essentially an NVIDIA or AMD GPU released in the last four years and a system running Windows 10.
It should be stressed that this release is a beta, and may not be stable or unlock performance improvements on all systems. The patch has been issued with the following release notes:
Release of DirectX 12 support in Deus Ex: Mankind Divided:
As of today, users are also able to utilize the awaited DirectX 12 Graphics API. To activate this you are required to do the following:
- Within your Steam Library, right-click on Deus Ex: Mankind Divided.
- Select ‘properties’ from the context menu and navigate to the Beta tab.
- From the dropdown menu, select dx12_preview then close the window.
After the game has downloaded the DirectX 12 supported build you can then toggle DirectX 12 from either the launcher window or from the Display options within the game.
Note that DirectX 12 requires a restart of the game if (de-)activated from within a running Deus Ex: Mankind Divided game session.
o WARNING: Using the DirectX 12 API can offer better performance on some systems, however, it will not be beneficial on all.
o Multi-GPU is not yet supported in this patch.
o If you encounter problems with DirectX 12, we recommend turning it off again. There are no visual or gameplay differences between the two DirectX versions.
o As always, make sure that your drivers are up to date.
Known DirectX 12 issue:
- There is a known bug that causes some very high end cards to regress relative to DirectX 11. This bug is being addressed by the development team.
While we expect this patch to be an improvement for everyone, if you do have trouble with this patch and prefer to stay on older versions, we have made a Beta available on Steam, v1.0_build524.6, v1.0_build524.7, v1.1_build524.10, v1.2_build524.15 and v1.3_build524.17 that can be used to switch back to previous versions.
As of today, users are also able to utilize the awaited DirectX 12 Graphics API. To activate this you are required to do the following:
- Within your Steam Library, right-click on Deus Ex: Mankind Divided.
- Select ‘properties’ from the context menu and navigate to the Beta tab.
- From the dropdown menu, select dx12_preview then close the window.
After the game has downloaded the DirectX 12 supported build you can then toggle DirectX 12 from either the launcher window or from the Display options within the game.
Note that DirectX 12 requires a restart of the game if (de-)activated from within a running Deus Ex: Mankind Divided game session.
o WARNING: Using the DirectX 12 API can offer better performance on some systems, however, it will not be beneficial on all.
o Multi-GPU is not yet supported in this patch.
o If you encounter problems with DirectX 12, we recommend turning it off again. There are no visual or gameplay differences between the two DirectX versions.
o As always, make sure that your drivers are up to date.
Known DirectX 12 issue:
- There is a known bug that causes some very high end cards to regress relative to DirectX 11. This bug is being addressed by the development team.
While we expect this patch to be an improvement for everyone, if you do have trouble with this patch and prefer to stay on older versions, we have made a Beta available on Steam, v1.0_build524.6, v1.0_build524.7, v1.1_build524.10, v1.2_build524.15 and v1.3_build524.17 that can be used to switch back to previous versions.
It's highly recommended that when running the DirectX12 Beta you make use of the latest GPU drivers from their respective manufacturers.
As far as performance improvements seen with the new patch, the results appear to be a mixed bag thus far. Judging by the announcement thread on reddit.com/r/deusex highest improvements appear to be in systems utilising the latest AMD GCN architecture, with reports of Fury X-equipped PC's seeing double-digit FPS improvements over DirectX 11. On the flip side Rx 200-series GPUs such as the R9 280 faired less well, whilst major performance drops have been seen with the NVIDIA GTX 1080 (hence the 'Known Issues' report).
Although it didn't turn out to be the first AAA title with DirectX 12 support, Deux Ex: Mankind Divided could still be a very important title for assessing relative GPU performance in the DirectX 12 era. The patch is currently available through the Steam update service.
