There has been a lot of discussion on the effects DirectX 12 will bring to existing and new hardware, and Xbox Live Operations Manager Eric Neustadter gave more color on the issue during the latest Google Hangout by Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb.

Neustadter explained that the demo we saw during the Windows 10 keynote was meant to show how DirectX 12 can allow games to do more on existing hardware. Hryb mentioned that this has been pretty much the theme of DirectX over the year, and Neustadter responded that the API approaches both sides, making existing systems more efficient and taking advantage of new hardware features like shaders, that graphics chip makers are coming up with.

In the case of DirectX 12, Neustadter continued, it's going to bring "new goodness" to hardware we already have, plus on new hardware we'll get "extra goodness."

He also explained that thanks to the native support in Unreal Engine and Unity, a "huge chunk, probably the majority" of games on the market will get the effects without the developers needing to do custom DirectX work on them, because they're built in Unreal or Unity.