How Triangle Factory Used Photon Fusion to Build a Competitive VR FPS
Ever thought about bringing your favorite childhood shooter experiences into the immersive world of Virtual Reality? That’s exactly what the indie studio Triangle Factory, based in Belgium, set out to do. But they didn’t just want to build any VR shooter; they wanted to build a hardcore tactical shooter where competitive gameplay is key. This ambition led them to create Breachers, and their journey provides a fantastic example of overcoming significant technical hurdles to deliver a top-tier competitive experience.
Triangle Factory is an indie studio with a passion for bringing classic shooter mechanics into the modern VR space. For Breachers, they saw a gap in the market for a strong tactical shooter in VR and decided to fill it. Their main priority was to create a game where competitive integrity was paramount.
Solving Core Gameplay and Networking Challenges in a VR Tactical Shooter
Building a competitive first-person shooter is technically demanding, and doing it in VR adds unique layers of complexity. For a tactical shooter like Breachers, where every shot matters, accurate hit registration (hitreg) is absolutely crucial. This wasn’t a simple task; it required deep knowledge of the networking library and their own game code, especially with character, hand, and head movements being input-authority driven and needing to work with server-added recoil.
Beyond the core shooting mechanics, VR presented a specific challenge: waiting when you’re dead is incredibly boring because you can’t just switch to another window. Triangle Factory knew they needed creative solutions to keep players engaged even after being eliminated.
“Basically when you’re dead, you can still see everything your team sees, but nothing else. This is a very cool feature, but requires a meticulous system to understand in-game visibility states. On top of that, all systems need to work together with this, including audio of players and items that cannot be seen anymore by dead players. […] Bot takeover: If you’re playing with a non-full lobby and you die, you can take control of a bot and get a second chance at playing this round. This drastically improves the player’s experience.”
Choosing the Right Multiplayer Solution: Why Triangle Factory Returned to Photon
Triangle Factory wasn’t new to the world of game networking. They had previously used Photon’s Bolt for their title Hyper Dash, which gave them positive experience with Photon’s solutions and support quality.
They had also explored other options for different projects. While they appreciated some being open-source, they found them “lackluster in key aspects like client-side-prediction and lag compensation” and noted the absence of convenient features such as NAT Punchthrough.
Why Triangle Factory Chose Photon Fusion for Breachers’ Competitive VR Gameplay
Given their positive track record and experience with Photon’s support, Triangle Factory decided to choose Photon Fusion for Breachers. They believed Fusion would be a great fit, and their experience with the “Photonians” (the Photon team) proved excellent, citing detailed support feedback and a willingness to help solve user problems.
“Since we built experience working with Photon on our previous title Hyper Dash, we knew that the newest product Fusion would be a great fit for Breachers. The experience we’ve had with the Photonians so far have been great. We get detailed feedback on support tickets and Photon always shows that it’s ready to help deliver a solution to the problems that its users are facing. This team operates with a level of openness and adaptability that’s rare in the industry. They’re not constrained by corporate structures, which allows them to respond directly to developer feedback and evolve the product based on real-world needs.”
Photon Fusion’s built-in features were key to tackling the challenges of a competitive VR FPS. They heavily utilized client-side prediction, a handy feature for ensuring a smooth user experience. For instance, when a player grabs an item, the client instantly predicts and performs the action, preventing annoying delays. The server then verifies this prediction, ensuring game integrity – if the prediction was wrong, the item is dropped. This created a smooth, yet secure, grabbing system.
Crucially for a shooter, Fusion’s lag compensation feature was deemed “a vital feature for a shooter like Breachers”. This feature allows clients to accurately hit opponents exactly where they see them on their own screens, regardless of network latency. Without it, players would be forced to “lead” their shots based on estimated network delay, which is terrible for competitive play.
Beyond these core mechanics, Fusion’s bandwidth efficiency and performance capabilities were also essential for delivering the required level of quality for a top-tier VR experience.
Streamlining Multiplayer Testing with ParrelSync and Photon Fusion
To streamline the complex process of testing multiplayer functionality, Triangle Factory integrated the ability to choose networking modes (server, host, client) into a Unity editor tool. They also found the ParrelSync plugin worked perfectly with Fusion, allowing developers to test server/client interactions locally with multiple editors running concurrently. This testing setup significantly sped up their development process.
“The most challenging part of making a multiplayer game is testing your game in a multiplayer environment. That is why we added the ParrelSync plugin which works perfectly with Fusion. One of your editors can function as the server, the other as a client. Being able to test like this on your own speeds up development. But of course you will still need to test with a real dedicated server and on your target device.”
Fusion fully supports the use of ParrelSync and also Unity’s Multiplayer Play Mode package to streamline development and testing of multiplayer games.
Delivering Competitive-Grade VR with Photon Fusion’s Advanced Networking Features
By leveraging Photon Fusion’s powerful networking features, Triangle Factory brought a competitive-grade FPS experience to VR.
The game achieved:
- Smooth gameplay
- Accurate interpolation
- Lag-compensated favor-the-shooter mechanics, allowing players to hit targets precisely where they appear on their screen
- Overall optimized performance and bandwidth efficiency
- Accurate hit registration, fundamental for a tactical shooter
- A smooth, yet secure, grabbing system thanks to client-side prediction and server verification
Triangle Factory highlights that Fusion’s tools, particularly client-side prediction and lag compensation, are “essential for advanced competitive XR games”.
Breachers Proves What’s Possible with Photon Fusion and Competitive VR Development
Breachers stands as a great example of how dedicated development, combined with robust networking technology, can overcome significant challenges to deliver a high-quality competitive experience in a demanding medium like VR. By choosing Photon Fusion and strategically utilizing its built-in features, Triangle Factory achieved the technical foundation necessary for accurate hitreg, smooth mechanics, and competitive integrity.
The success of Breachers demonstrates the power of Photon Fusion in enabling developers to build complex, competitive multiplayer games, even in emerging platforms like VR, where performance and reliability are critical. Triangle Factory created something special with Breachers and we’re proud to have played a part in that.
We’re also excited to share that Triangle Factory announced a new game, Forefront, which will also be built using Photon Fusion. It’s a large-scale VR shooter with 32-player battles, vehicles, destructible environments and class-based gameplay. It’s a big step up in scope and we’re happy to support them again as they bring this closer to release. With playtests kicking off this summer and Early Access not far behind, we’re happy to keep our partnership going strong.
Ready to build your own successful multiplayer game? With Fusion and Quantum by Photon, it’s never been easier to integrate cutting-edge multiplayer features into your project. We offer the industry’s most advanced tools, comprehensive support, and everything you need to get started – from downloadable samples to detailed documentation.
Take the first step today – download Fusion or download Quantum and start building. If you’re looking for in-depth assistance, join our Gaming Circle, where you can connect directly with our developers and get expert guidance throughout your journey.
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