Inside Coherence 2.0 and lowering the barrier to building multiplayer games

• Smaller teams are often blocked from multiplayer by operational complexity rather than creative ambition.
• Hosting flexibility reduces risk more effectively than committing to a single infrastructure model.

When Dino Patti talks about Coherence 2.0, he frames it as a way for Unity developers to bring multiplayer into their projects without having to become networking experts. 

“Coherence 1.0 was already production-ready, but it still felt like a powerful toolkit you had to assemble. With 2.0, we have turned it into a single, cohesive multiplayer engine and hosting platform that fits naturally into how Unity developers actually work,” he says.

Coherence 2.0 is an updated multiplayer engine and hosting platform built for Unity. It combines networking, hosting and tooling into a single system.

It is built on technology used in live multiplayer games and supports different hosting options, including cloud, client-hosted and self-hosted setups. 

The update also introduces a new pricing model, which offers free access for smaller studios and a flat rate for larger teams. The latest update comes after lessons learned from previous launches, including Vampire Survivors online multiplayer.

Patti explains that stability and reliability were a major focus. 

“Every part of the stack has been refined through real launches, so stability, data integrity and error handling are significantly stronger.”

He also highlights how the engine now fits more seamlessly into Unity. “You can see authority, validate schemas and spot configuration issues directly in the Unity hierarchy and editor,” he says. For generalist developers, that means networking will no longer feel like a separate layer. 

Hosting flexibility was another key consideration. Coherence 2.0 unifies cloud hosting, client hosting, and self-hosting, which allows teams to “switch between them without rewriting your core game code”. According to Patti, that flexibility has already proved critical in past projects. 

“With Poncle and Vampire Survivors, for example, we saw first-hand how important it is to be able to move from cloud-based testing to client-hosted sessions, and even fall back to Coherence Cloud at launch when a platform provider had issues.”

Supporting studios and technical challenges

Coherence 2.0 also changes how studios of different sizes can work with multiplayer. For smaller teams, the starter tier “gives full access to the SDK, the network engine and the dashboard with no CCU caps and no project limits,” Patti tells us this lets them prototype or launch without worrying about infrastructure. 

Larger studios gain predictability through the pro license, and can “choose between cloud hosting, client hosting or self-hosting depending on their internal capabilities and risk profile.”

Patti says the same production-proven engine power is available to all hosting models, “regardless of studio size”, which he sees as a way to reduce the classic early-stage challenges developers face. Observability and debugging, he notes, are just as important as raw performance. 

“Better logs, better schema handling, load testing tools and consistent data replication logic all came directly out of real teams hitting real problems under pressure.”

Building 2.0 required redesigning multiple core systems so that the hosting options felt identical to the game. Mobile presented its own pressures, including variable connectivity, short session lengths, and bandwidth limits, all of which needed to be handled.

“Reconnect flows and graceful session recovery matter more on mobile than any other platform,” Patti explains.

Future of multiplayer

Patti explains how he sees the future of multiplayer evolving. “If we do our job with Coherence, more studios can treat multiplayer as a design choice, not as a five-year infrastructure project.”

He sees 2.0 as the starting point for a longer journey. “Better load testing, smarter simulation, more powerful observability and over time more automation around configuration and scaling. Our mission has not changed. 

“We want to make it as natural to build a multiplayer game as a single player game, and to make sure the games people love can stay online as long as there are players who care about them.”