https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aarcade/anarchy-arcade

This should be an amusing thread because it combines two things Massassi traditionally hates: SM_Sithlord and Kickstarter.

For a long time now my friend, SM_Sithlord, has been working on a source mod called Anarchy Arcade which has been greenlit by Valve. The mod lets you customize a 3D environment for launching games, playing movies, ect. Because it's a source mod it supports multiplayer and the experience can be shared with friends. It's often compared to Playstation Home, but for Steam. If you would like to know more visit the link, and if it's something that interests you then please consider supporting this project.

Sorry, don't know how to play this video :(
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lzc4BBFOUfM

This needs to be made specifically for the oculus rift. Otherwise what's the point.

Sith specifically mentions the oculus rift on the Kickstarter page:



I have tested Anarchy Arcade with Sith a few times, but don't regularly use it. It's sort of interesting how different people find different uses for it.


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When you say that it compares to Playstation Home, why are huge red flags not going off? Playstation Home was awful. The whole point of an actual arcade is to interact with machines, especially things like pinball, racing, etc.

Honestly I truly believe the only reason it was ever greenlit was because the average population completely doesn't understand what it's actually capable of (that is, it doesn't actually have any games and everything has to be manually configured).

If there was a feature of breaking/entering into other people's arcades and burglarizing or vandalizing their stuff, I would play. Why partake in a game that has no conflict? Would that be, you know, anarchy?

thread one
thread two
thread three

You may find my opinion w.r.t. the HCI problems in one of these threads. But since none of these threads contain my opinion about the name change (irc did, a long time ago!) I will share that here:

Anarchism stopped being cool in grade 7.

True. I can see this resonating with a certain crowd though, especially when it comes to rearranging the cabinets and items and stuff. Constant rearranging and rotating. Like the crowd who play those train simulator games on Steam ... alone ..by themselves.

I think it might have something to do with the promise of "free legal media sharing" in the trailer.

I, for one, wish the best of luck to SM_Sith_Lord and his Kickstarter campaign.

Sith messing with his oculus rift. I'm a tad jealous.

Sorry, don't know how to play this video :(
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khm5cJYb8KU

When I went to the kickstarter page the first thing I did was ctrl+f `rift`. I didn't read the entire kickstarter because TL;DR and maybe some of my concerns are addressed... But here's my 2cents which probably isn't worth anything these days.

I feel like this would actually be very cool for O.R. only game. Personally, if I'm just on a 2d screen I'd rather navigate my computer through the OS. Not some 3d wrapper that makes it even more inefficient for me to get things done or do something.

Someone already mentioned it, PS home sucked. This isn't too much different. But if it was in VR (I mean.. obviously it is) well that changes everything. I would love to try this on my rift but the price tag for early access is.. a little high. I could see some good value if I can hook up with my friends in VR, watch a movie in VR, play an arcade and all that. Tons of fun. 2d, I wouldn't even bother. Especially if I'm going to be watching something. Then either A) the screen is not going to be filled up with my video and the majority of the screen is taken up by the "room" to this arcade. Or B) you go fullscreen, you don't even feel a presence in the acarde room, and you might as well be watching with media player classic while having a skype chat with your buddies. I'd rather do that.

And I really hope that this guy doesn't think that just because he's using the Source Engine that it's suddenly easy peasy to do Oculus Rift support. You have to actually plan the UI out to work with it, and based on everything I've seen of this, that would mean a gigantic redo of all the UI in the arcade.

The thing that concerns me is how vague his site, the greenlight page, and the kickstarter all are w.r.t. what exactly it means to "share" in Anarchy Arcade.

If that means he's planning on streaming user-added content, well, it's non-transformative so it doesn't pass the bar for fair use, and digital transmission is legally a public performance. Anarchy Arcade would qualify as contributory infringement since significant portions of the program were clearly intended for the sole purpose of distributing unlicensed copyrighted material. Since he's trying to raise a profit on Anarchy Arcade (regardless of final pricing, Kickstarter backer rewards are considered sales of final goods and taxed as such) it would be criminal copyright infringement, he would face charges of up to 5 years in prison and $250,000 in fines, assuming it is his first offense.

buttes

I mean, I don't know for sure how the whole thing works, so I'm just assuming here. But if I'm right, I have to guess his logic is something like: "it's legal to watch a movie together in a room, so it must be legal to watch a movie together in an e-cyberweb room dot tk" even though that's not how US copyright law works. And since every site he's on has some vague, handwavey assurance that everything he's doing is absolutely legal, he's obviously alarmed a lot of people. It might help if he posted a statement from the legal representation I'M SURE HE'S HIRED in order to assure his backers that he's not going to end up in federal prison for releasing it.

Here's my thoughts on the last few posts:

Sith has mentioned to me that he believes he needs legal representation and not just for the media sharing issues that might arise, but from issues that any programmer selling a product might face.

I'm not sure Anarchy Arcade (AA) or Sith would be liable for any illegal copyright infringement, that's still the responsibility of the end user. In this regard AA doesn't seem any different than any other webcam / screen-sharing software. It's entirely possible to use Anarchy Arcade in a non-multiplayer environment, or use it only to stream non-copyrighted material. Possibly Sith's wording could be modified to express this better.

Well since he has one now, I would assume he's going to make any changes required. After all the biggest user of AA is Sith.

US copyright law includes provisions for software and tools which are specifically intended to aid copyright infringement (this is contributory infringement). The portions of webcam/screen-sharing software which can used for copyright infringement have clear non-infringing purposes, while Anarchy Arcade does not. Even worse is the fact that he has been promoting his product as an aid to commit copyright infringement. c.f. MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd. (tl;dr: promoting the use of a product to commit copyright infringement is enough to establish contributory infringement even if the product has legitimate uses.)

Even if it wouldn't pass the bar for contributory infringement by itself, his public statements to that effect are going to hurt him a lot. Not to mention that Valve is a big juicy target for media corps and indemnification is gonna be a clause in his contract w/ them. Obv IANAL but this is what he's going to be told when he goes to one.

Edit: Sith doesn't need legal representation, he needED it like a year ago. I mean kickstarter is already quasi-legal enough as it is, aint no way I'd start one until I cleared my potential liabilities with a lawyer. I hate to say it but it's actually real good that his kickstarter isn't getting a lot of attention yet, because if his campaign hits its goal he might end up in court either way.

The fact that even Triscuit doesn't seem to know the full extend of its sharing capabilities is a problem.

I don't see a problem. I think Jon'C has some valid points, but I would think they can be addressed before it becomes a commercial product. I'm far from an expert on AA, I'm just supporting the project of a friend.

I cited case law, I would hope it's a valid point.

They can't be addressed without removing those features. It's just too late now; he's basically straight-up confessed to contributory infringement, and any of the public statements he's already made w.r.t. the media sharing capabilities of AA could be used in a future case against him (whether tort or criminal). And he's already released a prototype, which I assume implements some of these features as well. He needs to talk to a lawyer about this immediately.

(Again, assuming it works in any way like I am imagining it.)

Hey everybody! Glad to see there's some discussion going on about Anarchy Arcade.

I was a little upset when I was shown this thread and saw where it went, but now I've calmed down and want to thank you guys for pointing out your concerns. If the first part of my post seems a little angry, that's because I was raging when I wrote it.

First of all, I understand the confusion of not understanding how Anarchy Arcade works, and that's why I have a playable prototype linked on the Kickstarter page. I have to strike a balance between pointing out that Anarchy Arcade does what it does in a legal fashion, and trying to share why the game is awesome.

It seems you guys are making a lot of assumptions that Anarchy Arcade is about illegal media sharing. I call it legal media sharing because it doesn't do the things you guys are assuming, lol.

Streaming a movie to your friends is illegal. People get banned for this on Twitch constantly. Anarchy Arcade is not screen sharing software; there is no peer-to-peer transfers of anything other than lists of URLs, thumbnail images to use on the cabinets, and standard game engine assets.

And since I know that next you're going to assume that these URLs are pointing to illegal downloads of movies on MegaUpload, again this is an incorrect assumption. There are similar programs now that do this, such as Riftmax 4D Theater, but to me this seems to promote illegal behavior because I just don't know of any other reason somebody would want to stream a movie off of MegaUpload like that. And because this seems illegal, it is not a part of Anarchy Arcade. Instead these URLs point to YouTube videos (or streaming videos from other non-shady sites like VEMO), image URLs of movie posters or wallpapers, and URLs to information databases such as TheMovieDb.org or the Steam Store itself.

Now you're probably asking yourself, "then how the hell does it work?" Honestly, it's complicated. I'll try to explain that in a few different parts so that you know that it's both 1. legal and 2. awesome.

First of all, somebody mentioned how it would be lame to watch a whole movie inside a virtual environment on a small in-game screen, and I agree. Even more so when it comes to playing games, because you sure as hell don't want to be squinting looking at the crazy 3D screen when trying to kill baddies. Everything in Anarchy Arcade is a beefed up shortcut. You click the Launch button on the cabinet to launch the shortcut. Somebody mentioned how they'd probably want to watch it on Media Player Classic, which is odd because that's my favorite media player! And clicking the Launch button opens the shortcut in your default Windows associated program (by default), so probably in MPC for a lot of people (I use HC Edition myself.)

Now, another thing that Anarchy Arcade does is it abstracts these shortcuts in such a way that they can be used in multiplayer. What the heck does that mean? Well, it means that I can have my game installed in C:\Steam\Games\Assassin's Creed\Game.exe and you can have the game installed in X:\MyGames\Creed\engine.exe and the SAME shortcut can launch Assassin's Creed for both of us. As a movie shortcut example, my Hunger Games could point to X:\Dvd\vidoe_ts\hunger.vob and your Hungers Games could point to http://www.netflix.com/WiPlayer?movieid=70206672 and the same shortcut could launch the movie for both of us. So, this is how the functional part of the shortcuts carry over into multiplayer. I'd love to talk about how Anarchy Arcade is able to make shortcuts work like this, but I'll skip that for now and move on to the next point that I think you guys will be interested in.

LEGAL MEDIA SHARING! It's finally here, and you don't need to be afraid! So, how does it work? Not the same as illegal media sharing, obviously. Another thing that it's not is it's not peer-to-peer.

Here's the theory that I used when designing how you share your favorite games, movies, and anything else with people: everybody already has their favorite places to get their media from. Some people like the Steam Store, others like Origin. However, there's also an infinite amount of other stores and sites that people like to go to buy & download their media. And I'm not just talking Hollywood movies and blockbuster games, but ALL media. News stories, free videos, free games, websites, tweets, live streams, etc. And I know that when people send me a link to buy a game on their favorite store, the first thing I usually do anyways is try to find it on MY favorite store (which is the Steam Store btw.) Since Anarchy Arcade is for everybody, not just myself, I wanted it to be able to send people to what ever YOUR favorite store is.

So, Anarchy Arcade does this by allowing you to tell it what your favorite site is and how to search it. This is done through a very simple script file that you can either generate yourself (through a wizard), or in the future you could grab it from a community site like GameBanana.com as an addon. For example, here is the single line that explains how to search Netflix for a movie:


It is very simple, the $TITLE is a variable that gets replaced by the title of the movie. Anarchy Arcade is able to determine a title of the movie, and again I'd love to explain how it does this but it's not really the focus of this post.

So now I think I'm ready to walk through a couple scenario where you join a buddy's arcade in Multiplayer and do some of this awesome "new" guilt-free legal media sharing.

Scenario 1:
Your friend has the movie Hunger Games spawned on the wall in his arcade. He owns a digital copy of this movie, but you do not.
So you walk up to the movie on the wall and say, "Hunger Games, I never saw that movie. Is it any good?".
Your friend clicks on the movie once, and a trailer or movie clip (or what ever he has set as the preview URL) stars playing on the screen for both of you.
You say "Oh wow, that movie does look awesome! I want to see this movie!" (Keep in mind this is only a hypothetical.)
So, when you look at the shortcut it's going to tell you "You do not yet own this media item." But you're going to click Launch on it anyways, either because you know what's going to happen next, or that's just how you roll, either one.
Now you'll get a prompt, one that says "This media item could not be found in your Anarchy Arcade library. If you DO have it, click Browse, otherwise, feel free to use one of the following links that have been generated by your personal settings for getting this media," which is followed by a list of links.

Again, these links are generated based on your own preferences as described above, and naturally point to your own favorite stores and sites. By default, the prototype automatically generates links to the Steam Store, Amazon, Netflix, and a few others. Even though I don't want to force any particular site or store down somebody's throat, I think including these trusted media sources is important for promoting legal computer use since so many negative assumptions are automatically associated with media sharing. For trademark reasons, I will probably not be able to include the links to Netflix and other companies by default in the Steam version; however, I will be able to continue distributing the Steam Store links in it. This is okay, because the ones included with the prototype are just examples; you are free to shop from your own favorite sites and stores as we all want to do anyways.

So back to Scenario 1... after you've acquired the media item from your favorite store using the link that Anarchy Arcade generated for you, you simply point AA to the new file location and the shortcut to your brand new movie that your friend shared with you is functional.

So what exactly was shared?
What your friend shared with you was the actual media, not his copy of it. It was easy for him to share, and it was easy for you to get from the places you normally get media from; all assisted by Anarchy Arcade. If it makes things easier, you could imagine AA as forcing you to shop from 1 official online store. Then it's not so difficult to see how this is perfectly legal and is, in fact, sharing your favorite media with your friends in a legal way.

That's all for scenario 1, but launching shortcuts isn't the only thing you can do in Anarchy Arcade. You can also stream stuff like Hulu, Netflix, or other paid services directly onto your in-game screens, and yes they are synced in mutliplayer. So, how is Anarchy Arcade able to do this awesomeness without being illegal? This scenario is a bit more simple.

Scenario 2:
Your friend has an episode from the HuluPlus TV show "South Park" spawned on his wall. He has a HuluPlus account, and so do you.
Your friend goes up to the South Park episode and clicks it once. The video starts playing on the screen for both of you.

Scenario 3:
Your friend has an episode from the HuluPlus TV show "Fringe" spawned on his well. He has a HuluPlus account, however you only have a standard Hulu acount.
Your friend goes up to the Fringe episode and clicks it once. The video starts playing back on the screen for both of you. However, a few seconds in, your screen fades and you see the message "Your preview of his HuluPlus show has concluded. Please upgrade your account today!"

It says this because this is the default behavior on Hulu; it is not something that is specifically coded into Anarchy Arcade. If a similar scenario happened on Netflix, you would immediately show the sign-up screen because Netflix has no preview for non-subscribers. Likewise, YouTube videos also respect region enforcement and all other features provided by YouTube. This is just how these online services naturally work; they follow all of the restrictions that you would encounter if you went to the site themselves because underneath it all Anarchy Arcade is just sharing shortcuts.

In conclusion
I hope this clears up the assumptions about Anarchy Arcade. It's not about breaking the law. It's about having a good time with stuff that you legally own and giving you the freedom to continue using your computer just like you always have. At least, this is how the 3D desktop part of it works. The Steam version also jumps into an entirely different area where the 3D worlds are auto-generated using your Steam games, screenshots, videos, achievements, etc. combined with the staggering amount of other content that the Steam Community has to offer.

It seems that I spent most of my time here talking about the legal part, and not very much about the awesome part. Thankfully, I focus on the awesome in the Kickstarter. You can check out Triscuit's original post for the link. Keep in mind that Anarchy Arcade is for entertainment and works best when used on a PC that is used for entertainment. Even though the concept isn't something everybody will get into, I do believe a lot of people who don't think they'd like it at first might think differently after they've played around with it for a while. Just remember to have fun!

The only legal concerns I have is that companies will file tons of law suits based on these false accusations of illegal file sharing. Even though Anarchy Arcade has absolutely nothing of the sort, I won't be able to afford to defend against these types of lawsuits without going bankrupt. That is why I make a point to say Legal Media Sharing in my video, and also mention it briefly in the Kickstarter without going into too much detail.

From the risks and challenges section of the Kickstarter page:


Raising awareness of how Anarchy Arcade does not break any laws without bogging everything down with legal mumbo jumbo is something I am trying to accomplish. I look forward to your guys' feedback as it will no doubt help me understand how to do this better. This is actually the only forum where people focus so heavily on it, so thanks for giving me this opportunity.

Sorry, don't know how to play this video :(
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1-k4hcrm4Q
Btw, just noticed the Massassi forums support many of the same streaming video services that Anarchy Arcade does.

Well I'm glad it's not illegal then. And you should just post that on your Kickstarter page.

Still don't think it's something I'd ever want to use though. It's several things that have been tried in the past to no effect (by larger companies as well, such as PS Home or 360's Netflix shared watching).

All I can say is that I agree, all the ones that exist suck for one reason or another. Mine fixes all the stuff that pissed me off about similar programs. I also have been able to accommodate most user requests.

Here's a snippet from the outdated FAQ (pre-Greenlight):

9. Hasn't this been tried before?
Yes. Similar games/programs have been attempted in the past; however, they all sucked. Seriously. I
tried them all, and wasn't happy with any of them. Each one did something terribly wrong which broke
the whole concept. The most common mistake among them was being too restrictive for one reason or
another. Other blunders include being too difficult to use, and not game-like enough.
The ones put out by the big-name companies like Sony and Microsoft seemed only concerned with
making them money. They force you to shop from their stores and you can only launch their own
products from the game.
The smaller, independently developed ones usually suffered from being too difficult to use or were
built on ugly old graphics engines. They tried to deliver the right experience, but fell short due to
technical limitations or bad interface design.

10. How is Anarchy Arcade unique?
Anarchy Arcade is non-restrictive, easy to use, built on a state-of-the-art graphics engine, has
progressive gameplay, and always puts the user first. These are all essential to make the concept work.
No other program combines them all like Anarchy Arcade does.

Yeah I get that. But what I mean is it's quite a bit easier to just navigate with the OS instead I suppose.

Yeah, but I don't think anybody's ever accused Windows of being fun. You have to remember that this is an entertainment experience. When used in a chill & relaxed way, it is a hell of a lot of fun.

By the way, I just updated the website http://www.anarchyarcade.com/ with a new template, new info, and an updated FAQ section. I try to cover some of the stuff I talked about here.

Thank you FastGamerr, and btw I noticed how much ass you kicked on ModDb with your DuesEx release. Very epic.

Actually the UI in Anarchy Arcade is ideal for VR because it is displayed on in-game 3d planes. You can check these videos out for some great info about VR: http://www.steamdevdays.com/

The Steam version is going to have you holding an in-game smartphone up to your face for the "fullscreen" videos, which is great for VR because you can keep head tracking and don't break immersion.

Honestly the last thing I do before I leave a multiplayer server is rip all the guy's stuff of the walls and ramsack his house, lol. They freak out until I tell them that changes I make aren't saved in the prototype. And yes, you can die and by some pretty strange ways. The other day somebody killed me with the master sword from Zelda. :S But the focus is on games and media, not the killing.

Cheers, man!

I remember reading about this project years ago but I never got around to trying it. I can't promise that this will change but I hope that I do because it sounds like it could be an enjoyable experience. Good luck with the Kickstarter campaign!

Yeah, I thought the world was really always missing a multiplayer version of Packard Bell Navigator.

Neat, you actually remembered that ****.

New video on the Kickstarter, and I'll be giving away free Steam games every hour this Wednesday during my live 24 hour pledge drive on Twitch.tv. Full info is in the Kickstarter updates.

Sorry, don't know how to play this video :(
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmbRXPa6E5k
This video talks about a lot of non-gaming uses of Anarchy Arcade.

if he were to only allow streaming from youtube, would he be able to piggyback off their legality?

don't see why not, as long as his use falls within the scope of the streaming api tos.

Well he should have done this for each free streaming service. Copyright is no joke in the west. SM_Sith_Lord is going to get ****ed

I've never played a Steam game that wasn't fairly slow-loading and unhappy about minimizing itself. It seems like a pretty poor choice for something you use to launch other games.

The level of hassle involved just so I can, I guess, stand in front of a 3D game cabinet and launch Assassin's Creed with a friend simultaneously (which I assume then we're left to the mercy of that game's load times, multiplayer lobbies, etc) seems just way too much. It doesn't look fun enough in and of itself to be worth it as opposed to "hey want to play AC" "yeah ok" *clicks invite*

That's just me though, maybe I'm not the target audience.

Seems like you guys are still making all the wrong assumptions about how it works.



I don't know if you're tried them, but VMRL websites are horrible. They remind me a lot of Second Life. They are not like Anarchy Arcade. They look horrible, are laggy, and have very limited functionality. I would not recommend them to anybody.



I fall more into the realm of a web browser. I display full websites. The Chromium core powers it.



I don't violate any copyright laws, and I'm not exactly sure of the scenario you are thinking of that makes you believe I am violating them. If you can lay out the scenario, I can explain how that specific case is handled in a legal way. Nothing is shady in Anarchy Arcade.



Anarchy Arcade allows you to instantly alt+tab, can instantly be minimized (if you wish), only needs to be loaded up once, and can behave as a 3D Windows desktop wallpaper. The hassle involved is walking up to the Assassin's Creed cabinet and clicking Play on it.

It might not seem fun to you Massassians, but I personally would love to walk around one of your guys' personal little world and see what you are into. I've found some great new music and games this way already.

Anyways, come watch me make an ass out of myself on Twitch tomorrow if you want to see it in action. I spend more time playing other games than just wondering around my arcade, but you will be able to see the mayhem that happens in between games.

twitch.tv/AnarchyArcade

Sorry, don't know how to play this video :(
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzY89785sNg