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adeadzeplin
The main problem I find impeding my enjoyment of the game is the current peer to peer netcode system.
Given the difficulty of writing robust matchmaking to work for a small player-base the issues are clear.
  • servers cost money.
  • not enough active players to consistently pay for enough servers worldwide to minimize latency.
  • the most invested players are the ones penalized the most, by network lag interfering with combos.
  • peer to peer minimizes server costs. but this falls apart during low player-volume hours (which is most of the time). And this greatly reduces gameplay quality/enjoyment for players who buy the game only to find out they have to go to a discord server just to find anyone to have a playable match with :/
Well luckily there is a netcode design-pattern that someone has developed to mitigate this very problem!
It's called GGPO (Good Game Peace Out).
GGPO Utilizes a technique called "rollback".
It is open source under MIT License.
Rollback is a form of client-side prediction that is designed for Peer-to-Peer games.
(meaning rollback overcomes lag by predicting what the player does before they actually do it)
It is the ideal solution to the problems with RUMBLE's netcode.
Yes this is a difficult technology to implement correctly.
Yes there are technical limitations to overcome with integrating rollback in a VR game.
But the pay-off?
  • A 1v1 fighting game that uses peer-to-peer is the ideal application of rollback to reap it's rewards.
  • When players are confident in a good network experience, they'll have a better online experience and will be more likely to keep returning to RUMBLE.
  • Encourages focus on core game-play experience.
  • Remote players suffer less noticeable network artifacts in-game when playing together over vast distances.
Rollback solves this problem (greatly impacts all skill levels of the game). AND doesn't majorly alter the server architecture (similar server costs)
I understand the dev team is focusing on expanding their playerbase by adding mobile VR support for the meta quest.
I believe rollback should be the next priority to Buckethead's team AFTER completing meta quest support. (Secure your funding first with new players and retain them long-term with good network match quality from rollback.)
I believe that adding rollback to the game will do more to extending the lifespan of this game and it's community; more than any new amount of content the developers could ever release.
I only have 90ish hours played on this game. And it would be far higher if I didn't get frustrated dealing with internet latency thwarting my combos(and fun).
I love this game. I don't want to play around lag, I just want to have fun.
I'm eager to hear other people's opinions on this matter.
Here are some relevant educational resources related to rollback netcode.
Wiki article on Rollback:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GGPO
Rollback Netcode in Unity & C# Repository:
https://github.com/zacpeelyates/unityrollback
This^ github repo has an accompanying explanatory video on implementing Rollback in a unity project:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCfouAH_N5w
GDC Talk about a Mortal Kombat Dev's experiences migrating to rollback netcode:
https://youtu.be/7jb0FOcImdg?si=HSz9AIfz2I_IrJbz
Cheers,
Adeadzeplin