Tankoop is the results of my Bachelor’s Thesis and it consists of a multiplayer game that connects two players from two different platforms (being VR and PC) in the same lobby.
The PC player has a clear top-down view of the game area and is in charge of controlling a tank around the circular map. The VR player impersonates a soldier in the tank’s turret, and has a first-person view of the game area, making it much more chaotic. The VR player is also able to aim and shoot with the turret.
The goal of the game is to have the players coordinate in order to survive the multiple calamities that appear as the match goes on. To each calamity a floating sphere is connected, floating around the map, out of the PC player’s sight. The VR player has to spot these spheres and tell the PC player how to turn the tank in order to shoot the sphere and make the calamity disappear. There are also calamities only visible by the PC player and the two will have to work together to overcome these challenges.
The main challenge of the game was setting up the networking, since it was my first time approaching multiplayer experiences. Fortunately, Unity’s Mirror package came in handy in doing just that and simplifying the whole networking process. Another challenging aspect of project was the VR side of the game, which was mainly reduced by the great VR support of the Unity engine.
The following is the Bachelor’s Thesis, though it is unfortunately in Italian.