Synchronizing a Ragdoll in Networking with Photon Fusion 2

Hi guys,

Welcome to another devlog for Project Nightmares Multiplayer! Today, we’re diving into a technical aspect of our game that’s crucial for providing a smooth and immersive multiplayer experience: synchronizing ragdolls over the network. Specifically, we’ll discuss how we’ve optimized this process using Photon Fusion 2 to ensure both performance and realism.

The Challenge of Ragdoll Synchronization

Synchronizing ragdolls in a multiplayer game can be particularly challenging due to the complexity and the potential impact on bandwidth. A ragdoll consists of multiple body parts, each with its own physics calculations, making full synchronization both data-intensive and computationally expensive.

My Approach with Photon Fusion 2

To tackle this, I decided on a more efficient method: synchronizing only the hip (pelvis) of the ragdoll and allowing the rest of the body parts to be managed by the physics engine locally on each client. Here’s a breakdown of how we achieved this:

Implementation Details with Photon Fusion 2

Photon Fusion 2 provides robust tools for network synchronization, making it easier to implement our optimized approach. Here are some key points:

Conclusion

By focusing on synchronizing only the ragdoll’s hip and leveraging Photon Fusion 2’s capabilities, we’ve managed to create a system that is both bandwidth-efficient and visually realistic. This approach allows us to maintain high performance and a seamless multiplayer experience, even in complex scenarios involving multiple ragdolls.

 As always, we welcome your feedback and look forward to hearing your thoughts!

Thank you for your support. Stay tuned for more insights and updates in our next devlog!

See you in the game!