First Contact Entertainment revealed its next title today – Firewall Ultra. Releasing exclusively for PSVR 2, First Contact describes the game as an ‘evolution’ of the franchise, following on from Firewall Zero Hour.
Zero Hour, a tactical multiplayer VR shooter, released in 2018 and essentially felt like VR’s answer to Rainbow Six Siege. It was a seminal and exclusive PSVR release and continued to see support for many years, right up until a few months ago with the launch of the final season, Operation: X.
We knew that First Contact Entertainment was working on an unannounced PSVR 2 title, but today we got official confirmation. Firewall Ultra is set five years after Firewall Zero Hour and will introduce a bunch of new content, while carrying over and upgrading content from the first game as well.
Alongside new contractors and locations, First Contact Entertainment says existing contractors and locations from Zero Hour have “evolved and moved into the next generation” in Firewall Ultra. To take advantage of PSVR 2’s upgrade in visual fidelity, the studio has remade all character models and given existing maps a “complete overhaul” with new textures and new areas.
There will be more weaponry and equipment options in Ultra, featuring “a much deeper level of customization.” Rounds will also be added to the game, making all matches a best-of-three, alongside an “entirely new PvE experience.” As you might have guessed, there are plans to add more contractors, maps and weapons post-launch.
On the technical side of things, Firewall Ultra will make some significant upgrades. For starters, in light of community feedback over the last four years, First Contact announced that Ultra will run on dedicated online servers.
Ultra will also take advantage of several new PSVR 2 hardware features, such as eye tracking, foveated rendering, improved haptic feedback and adaptive triggers. First Contact says using eye tracking “enables you to intuitively swap weapons and bring up HUD indicators.”
In many first-person shooters on PS5, developers have used the variable resistance in the DualSense controller triggers to create much more tactile and realistic weapon effects when shooting. Given PSVR 2’s Sense controllers will feature the same adaptive trigger technology, First Contact should be able to follow suit with similar effects for guns in Firewall Ultra.
There’s no indication on pricing for Firewall Ultra yet, but it is available to wishlist on the PlayStation Store. Likewise, there’s no word on release date either, but we do know that PSVR 2 itself is set to release in early 2023.
Firewall Ultra isn’t the only tactical shooter coming to VR headsets soon – announced earlier this week, Breachers (from Triangle Factory, the studio behind Hyper Dash) will take on the genre across multiple VR platforms.
