Microsoft has announced that a DirectStorage API is now finally out for developers building games on Windows PCs. Coming nearly 2 years after it was first detailed, and after collecting feedback from a developer preview, the feature promises faster load times in games, and so much more (via Neowin.)
For developers and Microsoft’s partners, this API has everything needed to bring a new model of I/O for games. Microsoft has a full list of benefits over on its blog, but it boils down to making games load much faster, enabling games to be more detailed and expansive, and reducing the volume on I/O operations. DirectStorage is also compatible with Windows 10 devices, too but Microsoft still says that Windows 11 is the “Best Windows ever for Gaming.”
The technology is similar to what’s used on the Xbox Series X and uses parallelization to work, though best leveraged on NVMe SSDs. Developers can check out this webpage for downloads and all the SDKs. As for what’s next, Microsoft is hoping to work on GPU decompression. It’s a feature a feature that will “give developers more control over resources and how hardware is leveraged,” per the Redmond giant.
