Workshop Support Tune-Up - Client Update 9/24/2019
Today's update improves AArcade's support of legacy Steam Workshop shares & also improves the performance of very long favorites lists!
Subscriptions from AArcade's Steam Workshop will now be able to load up *much* faster when you start AArcade. Also, the subscriptions that used to get skipped as "GEN1" will also work fine now!
Note that the *first* time that you launch AArcade w/ this update, it will take longer than normal as AArcade consumes & caches the subscriptions. But after that, your subscriptions will load up ultra fast!
These Workshop improvements bring us very close to the goal of publishing new stuff from Redux, which will be re-enabled in the coming months. So stay tuned on that front!
There will also be more improvements in browsing / discovering / managing Steam Workshop subscriptions from in-game in future updates.
Party on!
Change Log:
Improved the F6 library's handling of very long favorites lists so that they load faster.
Improved framerate distribution between multiple playing embedded media screens. Also added the ability to turn off embedded media throttling to the Settings > General tab.
Improved the Edit Item and Edit Model menus to select all text when you first click on a field value.
Improved debug output to indicate the model name that it is about to have its thumbnail generated.
Improved AArcade's ability to load cached images from legacy workshop shares.
Improved legacy Steam Workshop support by adding the ConVar prioritize_legacy_workshop_images 0. When set to 1, the image loader prioritizes cached item images from legacy workshop shares over any URLs specified. (Also added it to the Settings > General tab.)
Fixed a bug that sometimes caused new web tabs to show up as solid black.
NOTE
At 3:33pm Pacific time I pushed a hotfix to correct a crash bug that impacted some users when using Wizards in the Library Browser. Should be all good now!
Maintenance & Fixes - Client Update 8/27/2019
Today's small update fixes the old bug of the CD Headphones Wallmount cabinet sometimes disappearing from your cabinet list, and also fixes the syncing of custom skybox materials in user-created maps.
Note that your AArcade will take a few extra seconds to load up as it finalizes this update the next time that you launch it - then it'll be back to normal!
Party on!
Change Log
Added Wireframe Toggle to the Commands tab.
Fixed a bug that caused certain items & objects to seem to forget that they existed. (Most commonly the CD Heaphones Wallmount.)
Fixed a bug that caused 3rd person camera to initiate upon map transition when a custom player model is being used.
Improved support for the morphmodel console command to be given a model name explicitly.
Improved syncing of skybox materials used in custom maps.
Improved Adopt Model to work on models bundled into maps.
NOTE
At 10:55AM I pushed a hotfix that resolved crash issues with 1st-time-users and some users with odd model IDs in their library.
Hammer Time - Client Update 8/22/2019
Do you make your own levels in Hammer? Today's update makes it easier to share your creations with others with support for cloud-transferring of your custom created maps! It also adds a new Uploads panel to the Transfers Tab, so that server hosts can see what assets their guests are still waiting on.
Filter Servers By Universe
The server list can now be filtered by universe - so it'll be easier to find other servers by the same author by clicking on their avatar at the top of the server list.
Note that older servers won't show up in the universe list because they were created before this feature was added - but they are still joinable through the regular list.
Project Manager (Maps > Level Designer tab)
Advanced users are using the Maps > Level Designer tab to create custom maps for themselves & their friends to use. Maps that are created through this project manager are able to be synced dynamically in multiplayer sessions - so that your friends always see your latest additions & changes that you've made since last time you hosted.
When hosting a server on one of the maps that you are creating, you'll notice a new menu on the bottom left-hand corner of the Main Menu. This is the Re-Upload Map panel. You click this to put your custom map onto the session cloud, or to update the version in the cloud after you've made changes to your map in Hammer & recompiled.
That's it! Now your friends can check out your custom map creations easily in multiplayer with you. Party on!
Change Log
Added support for cloud-transferring of custom maps created from the Level Design tab.
Added an Uploads section to the Transfers tab, when you are live-hosting a server.
Added a "Re-Upload Map" button to the Main Menu when hosting a server on your own custom map. This lets you update the version your guests receive when they join.
Added VR Mode Snap Turn as the default VR turn method.
Added VR teleportation system for locomotion as comfortable as Count Dooku in pajamas.
Improved VR Mode to automatically go into VR mode upon loading an initial map.
Added Z Far and Z Far VR to the Main Menu > Settings > Camera tab. Adjusting them also impacts z-fighting on far away holograms against the walls behind them. (Only advanced users would want to adjust these values.)
Improved the Server List to let you filter by User Universe.
Improved the Server List to always consider cloud-available maps as joinable.
Improved obsolete Legacy Support to be opt-in only. (Reduces new user install size by over 500MB.)
Fixed a missing material in hub_construct.
6 New Cabinets, New Hub Map, & Events - Client Update 8/10/2019
Today's update brings 6 new cabinet models along with a new map that test out improvements to the upcoming Nodes feature.
6 New Cabinets Models
From left to right: Moon Kiosk, VRCade, Triple Force, Moon Kiosk Wide, Podium, Monolith.
Add some more variety to your arcades with these stylish new cabinet models. :) The Monolith and Triple Force cabinets are animated. The Monolith The Triple Force also allows you to change which image channel is used on it using Skins. The VRCade cabinet flashes colors in response to your system audio levels, and also allows you to toggle the VR gear on the shelf on/off using Body Groups. It was requested by AArcade user FunkyPixie, who also graciously donated $45 dollars with his request. (Thank you FunkyPixie for the support!)
Also, a bug has been fixed that might have caused the previous set of new cabinet models to be missing from your list in the past. So you might notice even more new cabinets on your list than these 6.
New Hub Map & Upcoming Nodes Feature
This new map looks strange, but that's because it IS strange. Hub maps are designed to be used with an upcoming feature called Nodes. Nodes are simple physical clusters of items & objects that an instance of can be spawned into any of your worlds. Hub maps, such as the new map hub_construct, are like node factories. They are where you create, edit, & save your nodes.
Nodes are an upcoming feature that are not fully implemented just yet, but are already partially working for users to start testing out. Full instructions for nodes will come in a few weeks when they are completed, but for now the main thing to know is that pulling the leaver next to a node is how you manage them. And also that nodes show up in your library like regular items. If you need help in the mean time, the Twitch or the Discord are the best places to get live chat with AArcade users.
AArcade Creators Meetup & Arcade Tours
Every 2 weeks AArcade users who create addon content using hard-mode tools (like Hammer, Blender, Photoshop, etc.) and I meet in an AArcade world where screenshots of the stuff we are working on are archived onto the walls. We talk about what people have been working on lately, check out the screenshots together that people have shared, and discuss upcoming features & development of AArcade. This is called the AArcade Creator's Meetup, and here is the Twitch VoD of the last one we had on Aug. 3rd: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/462872103
After this event, we all go and meetup with other AArcade users to tour multiplayer arcades together. Often the person who created the arcades we visit are in there with us, guiding us around and telling us about what we're looking at. This is called the Arcade Tours event, and here's the Twitch VoD of the arcades we toured last time on Aug. 3rd: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/462873799
If you'd like to take part in these live events, or just want to connect with the AArcade community, you can find us often at the Anarchy Arcade Twitch channel (twitch.tv/AnarchyArcade), or always in our Discord: https://discord.gg/9FSCDuJ
I'll see you around the metaverse! Party on!
Change Log
Added 6 new cabinet models: Triple Force, Podium, Moon Kiosk & Moon Kiosk Wide, Monolith, and VRCade.
Added the new map hub_construct for building & testing out the upcoming Nodes feature.
Added a new node style named Loft. It's like a floor node, but taller.
Fixed a bug w/ nodes that could cause nodes to spawn in duplicate objects.
Fixed a bug w/ nodes that could cause incorrect object orientations when saving.
Fixed a bug that caused some people not to get new cabinets added to their default library in AArcade updates.
Fixed a bug that caused Body Groups to appear blank on cabinet models.
NOTE: The new map, hub_construct, may not appear on your list if you have disabled detecting maps at AArcade startup. You could go to Main Menu > Settings > Import tab > Maps button in this case to detect it.
Quick Spawn & Paste - Client Update 8/2/2019
Greetings arcaders! Today's small update will help you add new things to your library faster. You can now CTRL+V paste a URL while in walking-around mode without bringing up any menu at all. This update also adds a new Quick Spawn Items option to the UI tab that lets you bypass the properties menu when adding new items.
Change Log
Added support CTRL+V pasting of URLs while in walking-around mode.
Added Quick Spawn Items to the Settings > UI tab. It allows you to skip the Create Item menu when spawning new shortcuts into your world. (You can always Edit Item to modify them afterwards.)
Removed Tutorial Nag from the Settings > UI tab because it was obsolete.
Improved the Servers Menu to load faster & prepared it for further improvements.
Body, Skin, & Vehicles - Client Update 7/25/2019
A Skin is the material used to give an object its looks & colors. Body Groups allow objects to have alternative and/or optional 3D parts attached to them. Today's AArcade update adds support for both Body Groups & Skins to the Transform menu!
Body Groups
If a model supports body groups, they'll be listed in the new Body Groups tab of the Transform menu. Each body group has its own name & slider. Some body groups can just be turned off/on, while others might have many different values to choose from! Note that most models do not utilize body groups.
Skins
If a model supports skins, they'll be listed in the new Skins tab of the Transform menu. Skins only impact the look & color of a model. Note that most models do not utilize extra skins.
Visual Vehicle Override
We've always been able to spawn the default HL2 Air Boat, but its looks are so basic & boring. Today's update lets us override the air boat's visual model with **any** of our own custom addon models.
Only the visual model is replaced with our own static addon model, not the behavior of the air boat, but even this is a big step up from the ugly air boat.
This feature takes a couple steps to setup, but is worth it especially for your arcades in very large maps!
First, you have to spawn your model into the world. Next, you middle-click on it, choose Advanced, then Flag As Vehicle. After that, it'll appear on the new Settings > Vehicle tab.
The Vehicle tab allows you to spawn your vehicle, but also allows you to adjust the camera position when riding in your vehicle, as well as adjust the offset & rotation of the visual model you are overriding the air boat with. Hover over any of the sliders for in-game help text about what they do.
Change Log
Added support for Body Groups & Skins. (Also added them to the Transform Menu while in Object Placement Mode.)
Added Mouse Wheel Up / Down to be enter/exit third person mode & camera zoom. (Only when weapons are disabled, otherwise it is switch weapons like normal.)
Added a Visual Vehicle Override system so that we can drive better vehicles than just the default HL2 Air Boat.
Added Flag As Vehicle and Unflag As Vehicle buttons to the Object Properties menu. Flagging an object's model as a vehicle adds it to the new Settings > Vehicle tab.
Added a Vehicle tab to the Settings menu. It will only be useful after you've flagged some of your addon props as vehicles. It is where you can adjust the camera & model overrides for each vehicle model you flag.
Added Vehicle Menu and Vehicle Remove All Spawned to the Commands tab. Also renamed the Air Boat command to Vehicle Spawn.
Added Camera Vertical to the Settings > Camera tab. It lets you control the vertical offset of the camera while in 3rd person mode.
Added help text when hovering over tab icons in the Tab Menu.
Added a Close Task and Close All Tasks buttons to the Commands tab. Useful for people who have Auto-Close Tasks turned off.
Added various console variables & commands associated with the new vehicle system: vehicle_menu, setvehiclemodel, air_boat_model, air_boat_offset, air_boat_angles, vehicle_eye_offset.
Improved addon model compatibility & stability. (ie. Fixed a crash bug that lots of models had.)
Improved range of motion of the values on the Settings > Camera tab.
Improved the Commands tab by renaming Toggle Libretro, Toggle Mute, and Stop Sounds to Libretro Auto-Play Toggle, Sound Mute Toggle, and Sound Stop respectively in order to make them easier to find in the list.
Fixed various issues with saving new nodes. (The rotation bug with objects positioned at odd angles is still an issue though.)
Fixed the togglephysics command to show up in console search & auto-complete.
Action Bar - Client Update 7/12/2019
Greetings! Today's update adds an RPG-style Action Bar that is customizable from the F7 Commands tab, and also addresses some issues with the launcher that users reported.
Action Bar
You can now set your keyboard buttons 0-9 to quickly perform any action from the Commands tab. First go to the Commands tab and set stuff to the buttons, then you can use them while walking around your arcade.
Note that when you have All Guns On enabled, keyboard buttons 1-5 are occupied by weapon slots. So be sure to bind your All Guns Off to a keyboard button higher than 5.
Change Log
Added an Action Bar that lets you bind commands to the keyboard buttons 0-9. Customize it from the F8 Commands tab.
Added Tab Menu binds to F7 through F9. Added slot binds to keyboard buttons 7 through 0 for use with the new Action Bar.
Added the following commands to the Commands tab: Object Move, Object Delete, Object Clone, Object Mirror Toggle, Painted Material Paint/Pick/Reset/Reset All, Pause AArcade.
Added icons for every command in the Commands tab.
Added the console command paint_menu, which opens up the paint tab.
Added a basic way to favorite or hide sequence names on the Transform Menu. (Also added Sequence Names to the Main Menu > Settings > UI tab > Manage Hidden Library Entries menu.)
Added Damage Enables Physics to the General tab of the Settings menu. When enabled, objects will automatically become physics-enabled when they take damage from weapons.
Improved the Toggle Physics command to reset the object's position when toggled OFF.
Improved the AArcade Launcher to more reliably save its settings & avoid false-positive AV issues.
Fixed an issue that caused newly assigned Video Mirror objects to act buggy until the map was reloaded.
Fixed an issue that caused the VGUI to sometimes not render when switching from ReShade to non-ReShade modes.
NOTE At 11:47AM Pacific I pushed a hotfix to include the updated launcher assets.
Transfer Menu - Client Update 7/6/2019
Good morning arcaders! Today's small update focuses on improving the multiplayer experience for guests.
Transfers Tab
A Transfers tab has been added to the Tab Menu that shows you what props are still downloading when connected to a multiplayer server as a guest.
Newly Downloaded Addon Props
Newly downloaded props now spawn into the world more reliably & with proper collisions. No more having to rejoin!
As always, more updates are around the corner. Be excellent to each other, and party on, dudes!
Note About ReShade Settings
Today's update might slightly impact your ReShade settings, specifically it might switch your active preset back to DefaultPreset.ini and change your ReShade shortcut key back to Shift + Scroll Lock in AArcade. I apologize for this minor inconvenience and should have zero-impact updates soon! In the mean time, you could just hit Shift + Scroll Lock and change back to your preferred presets & shortcut keys.
Note About Launcher Bugs
Just a PSA about 2 bugs in the current launcher in case they are impacting you.
I should have these fixed by next week, but if they are impacting you in the mean time, here's some info on them & workarounds.
First, the launcher is sometimes reverting to DISABLED on all options for some users. The result is missing addon & workshop content in-game. If this impacts you, you can right-click on AArcade in your Steam Library, choose Properties, and then set your Launch Options to have -config in them. This will cause the launcher to display itself the next time you launch AArcade for you to confirm your options are ENABLED as they should be - restoring the addon & workshop content in-game.
Second, a handful of users report their anti-virus settings delete arcade_launcher.exe as soon as Steam tries to downloaded it - leaving Steam in an endless downloading loop. If this impacts you, users report that adjusting their anti-virus settings or adding an exception for arcade_launcher.exe resolves their issue.
So keep an eye out for an improved launcher in next week's update to resolve these bugs, and I'll see you guys next time!
Change Log
Improved reliability of keyboard & mouse wheel input. (Click on the UI to focus the UI, or click on the web page / content to focus on it instead.)
Added the console command nodraw_shortcuts 0. When set to 1, all of the stuff you spawned will be invisible. Useful for taking comparison screenshots of empty arcades vs full arcades. (If set to 2 AND Stereo Rendering is enabled, it instead shows the left view as the blank vanilla map, and the right view as the populated map.)
Increased the supported AI Node limit from 1500 to 2000. (Increasing compatibility with maps that already expect a higher limit.)
Improved AArcade's material adoption to detect $normalmap, $normalmap2, and $texture2 channels.
Added a Transfers tab to the Tab Menu. It will show you what addon content is still transferring, and which has already spawned in.
Fixed an issue that caused addon models to not spawn in until the 2nd time that the guest joined.
Fixed an issue that caused addon models to be non-collide the first time that the client connected.
Improved item matching as a guest in MP servers by reducing false-positive matches.
Improved the (F5) Screenshot Menu to be able to scroll, if needed.
Improved drag & drop support slightly so that dropping multiple MDL files into AArcade as the same time is supported.
NOTE At 7:26AM Pacific time I pushed a hotfix so that individual props that are drag & dropped onto AArcade's window still spawn correctly.
Happy Accidents - Client Update 6/9/2019
Greetings! Today's update adds a pretty substantial paint feature to AArcade!
Paint Your World - No Mistakes, Just Happy Accidents
Now you can go around, sampling textures from any map you visit and adding them to your texture palette. Then you can use your texture palette to repaint any surface in any of your arcades! :)
This feature was developed all last week thanks to suggestions & input from various Discord users! A special thanks to Howie Duhzit, who dug around in the Source engine to find the mat_crosshair command and other techniques that led to this feature in AArcade!
Note that, for now, your paint job is local-only. But in a future update, your custom paint jobs will also be synced when hosting your arcades!
First Step - Add textures to your palette
Load up a map that has textures you like, look at a surface that has the texture, then go to the new Paint Tab on the Tab Menu and click Pick Texture.
Final Step - Paint using your palette
Now that you have a texture in your palette, you can look at any other surface, go to the new Paint Tab on the Tab Menu, and click on your texture in the list to apply it to the material under your crosshair!
Undo Paint / Unpaint
Want to unpaint a surface? Look at the surface, then bring up the new Paint Tab on the Tab Menu and click the Reset Material button to undo any changes you made to the material & reset it back to its natural state.
Reset All Materials
Don't like your masterpiece and want to reset all the surfaces in your arcade back to their default? To do this, look in the Commands Tab of the Tab Menu for a new command "Painted Materials Reset" that will restore all the materials in your current arcade instance to their natural state. (Note that this button is in a different tab so that you don't accidentally click it while trying to paint.)
Custom Texture Palettes
You can have multiple custom texture palettes, very much like favorites lists. So be sure to organize your textures onto palettes that make it easy for you to find the stuff you like! I have one for Neon Retro Wave themed textures, and another for boring old regular architectural textures.
Texture Thumbnails
Until I am able to automate texture thumbnail generation perfectly, there is a button on the Paint Tab that lets you generate thumbnails for textures on-demand. So textures show up as fully functioning generic placeholders by default, but you can give them thumbnails by clicking on their camera icon.
Prop & Displacement Painting Support
Some props will behave perfectly with the new painting feature. Certain props might be hard to paint, as if your crosshair is not colliding with it. In these cases, trying to find another more easily collidable instance of the prop can help. Note that props that are truly non-collide cannot yet be easily painted or have their texture sampled.
If you are painting props that are not part of the world map, and upon returning to the map it appears as if the props did not get their custom paint job applied, you may have to go to the new Paint Tab in the Tab Menu and click Re-Apply All after your arcade has loaded in. (Note that this bug is due to the fact that only world textures get precached, while textures on props that you spawn get cached in on-the-fly.)
Displacements (ie. terrain) cannot be directly painted yet, but support for retexturing displacement surfaces will come in a future update!
ReShade Depth Support Improvements & Update
Today's AArcade update also brings the bundled ReShade up-to-date for everybody (including users who don't manually update it.)
Also, Discord user Howie Duhzit discovered an improvement to our default config that allows for proper ReShade depth effects. His improvement has been integrated into the default config for AA's ReShade.
Again, I want to give a shout out to Wolfen for pressing the issue of AArcade's compatibility with ReShade, which lead to this support in the first place.
Want Faster AArcade Startup?
If you are one of the people who launch AArcade multiple times throughout the day, you'll probably want to cut down its startup times as much as possible.
Today's update adds a new way to do that to the General tab of the Settings menu with an option called "Auto Rebuild Sound Cache." When you disable this, AArcade will skip the final step of starting up (Rebuilding Sound Cache), potentially cutting about 10 seconds off of your startup time, depending on how many addons you have. Just note that this could impact addon maps' ability to play custom soundscapes.
Also in the General tab of Settings you can find and disable "Detect Maps When AArcade Starts," this will cache your detected addon maps instead of auto-detecting them each time AArcade starts, also potentially cutting 10+ seconds off of your startup time!
Or, you could be like me, and only launch AArcade once when Windows starts up and leave it going the whole time. :) (Remember that AArcade has a highly optimized pause mode that releases its system resources.)
Dev Roadmap
A brief overview of the developments soon to come: inter-server teleports, a generic sit in chairs feature, in-game Steam Workshop consumption, custom map Steam Workshop publishing, VR compatibility improvements & comfort features, full Steam Workshop in-game arcade/object publishing support.
And, of course, tons of other fixes, improvements, and other new features that arise along the way. I hope you've been having fun using your computer w/ AArcade, and I'll see ya'll in the metaverse!
Change Log
Added a Paint Tab to the Tab Menu. Use it to retexture the materials in your instance how ever you wish.
Added Painted Materials Reset to the Commands Tab. Use it when you want to reset ALL of the painted materials in your instance.
Added console commands "paint" which paints the material under your crosshair with the last used texture, "pick_texture" which changes the texture to use to the one under your crosshair, and "unpaint" which removes any modified textures on the material under your crosshair.
Added the console command "repaint", which will re-apply all material modifications. Useful for props that didn't load in until AFTER map load to get their material modifications applied. (Until I can devise a good automatic solution for this.)
Added the bool convar autobuildsoundcache 1. When disabled, it will decrease startup times as the risk of custom sounds failing to play in addon maps.
Fixed ReShade preprocessor definitions for ideal depth effects. (Thanks to Discord user Howie Duhzit for sharing the proper settings!)
Launcher & Shaders - Client Update 5/21/2019
Good afternoon metaversers! Today's update is somewhat of a maintenance update, as it's purpose is to improve support with the popular ReShade.
If you have any questions about AArcade or how to get it working, you are welcome to join our community Discord at https://discord.gg/9FSCDuJ .
Advanced Post Processing Shaders
Does your beefy PC have extra cycles to spare? Do you want to make your arcades look heavenly with high quality bloom, depth of field, and other advanced & highly customizable post processing effects? Well then ReShade is right for you.
ReShade is a popular graphics mod that allows you to add pretty post-processing effects to **tons** of already existing games. A couple weeks ago AArcade users reported that using ReShade with AArcade was more difficult than it should have been, so today's update is about making it easy to use ReShade w/ AArcade.
Please note that ReShade is an independent open source project and does not endorse nor is partnered with AArcade in any way.
New Launcher
The first thing you'll notice is the new launcher. It's very similar to the old launcher, but now includes some extra options for you to set regarding ReShade. This is where you'll go to enable ReShade for use in-game.
Post-Processing Bug
If you choose to use ReShade w/ AArcade, please note that you will have to manually toggle off ReShade effects when you pause AArcade by pressing SCROLL LOCK (default).
