Zenyth Engine

A DirectX 12 toy rendering engine written in C++20, designed for learning advanced real-time rendering techniques and serving as a research platform for hybrid precision rendering.

Purpose

Zenyth is primarily an educational project focused on exploring modern GPU-driven rendering techniques. The engine serves as a testbed for implementing and experimenting with:

• Deferred Rendering Pipeline
• Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO)
• Anti-Aliasing Techniques (MSAA, TAA, FXAA)
• Hybrid Precision Rendering - Research into mixed floating-point precision for performance optimization
• Modern DirectX 12 Features - Command queues, descriptor heaps, and GPU-driven rendering

The included Minicraft demo showcases a voxel-based renderer that demonstrates the engine's capabilities for handling large-scale geometry with multiple rendering passes.

Features

Rendering Core

• Modern DirectX 12 Backend: GPU-driven rendering with explicit resource management
• Multi-Pass Rendering: Deferred shading with geometry and lighting passes
• Advanced Buffer Management: Custom upload allocators and command batching system
• Shader Reflection: Automatic pipeline generation from HLSL shaders using DXC
• Multiple Render Targets: Support for G-buffer rendering and post-processing

Development Tools

• ImGui Integration: Real-time debugging and parameter tweaking
• Hot Shader Reloading: Rapid iteration on rendering techniques

Sample Implementation

• Voxel Renderer: Chunk-based world with frustum culling
• Texture Atlasing: Efficient batch rendering of textured geometry
• Multiple Shader Passes: Opaque, transparent, and water rendering

Current Research Focus

Hybrid Precision Rendering

Investigating the use of mixed floating-point precision (FP32/FP16) in the rendering pipeline to:

• Reduce memory bandwidth requirements
• Improve performance on modern GPUs
• Maintain visual quality through selective precision usage

Building

Prerequisites

• CMake 3.29+
• Visual Studio 2022 with C++20 support
• Windows 10/11 with DirectX 12 compatible GPU
• Windows Game SDK (Windows 10 SDK version 10.0.19041.0 or later)
• Git with submodule support

Build Instructions

git clone --recursive https://github.com/TNtube/Zenyth
cd Zenyth

# If you forgot --recursive, initialize submodules:
# git submodule update --init --recursive

mkdir build && cd build
cmake ..
cmake --build . --config Release

Dependencies are managed through:

• Git Submodules: DirectX Headers, DirectXTK12, ImGui
• Auto-download: DirectX Shader Compiler (DXC) via CMake
• System: Windows Game SDK (must be installed separately)

Running the Demo

./Sandbox.exe

Controls:

• ZQSD - Camera movement
• E/A - Vertical movement
• Mouse - Look around (hold left/right button)
• Shift - Speed modifier

Research Applications

This engine will be used to research on the domain of hybrid precision rendering:

• Memory-Efficient Rendering: Custom allocators reducing GPU memory fragmentation
• Precision Analysis: Tools for measuring numerical accuracy in rendering pipelines

Limitations

As a research and learning project, Zenyth focuses on rendering techniques rather than being a full game engine:

• No audio system
• Minimal physics
• Limited asset pipeline
• Windows/DirectX 12 only

Academic Use

If you use Zenyth in academic research, please consider citing this repository and any relevant papers that emerge from the hybrid precision rendering research.