Wait slow down, what is Parsec?

Have you ever wanted to play a local multiplayer game and can't get all your buddies together in one room? Parsec is the answer! It's a free application, which lets you host games on your PC. Your friends can join with their gamepads remotely through a private link you give them, and you can all play together!

You can sign up for a free Parsec account HERE!

You can download Parsec HERE!

Click the video below for more information:

Unfortunately, Parsec discontinued their Arcade service, which was a directory of publically available rooms. Thankfully, Smash Soda now uses a new service I developed called Soda Arcade! https://soda-arcade.com

...gotcha, so what's Smash Soda?

The Parsec application's built in hosting tools are...servicable, but they lack a lot of very useful features for moderating everything (especially if you want to make your room open to the public!)

That's where Smash Soda comes in! With it you can swap gamepads for your guests, moderate room chat and remove troublesome players, play funny sound effects...all kinds of things!

The host would use Smash Soda instead of the Parsec application to host their game, whilst your guests will still use Parsec to join your room. Smash Soda is pretty easy to use...just click the big play button to start hosting, and be sure to check out all the extra features!

So what is "Parsec Soda", is that the same thing as this?

Smash Soda is actually built upon Parsec Soda, a brilliant tool developed by Flávio Freitas and made open source. There is another version called "Parsec Soda V" by v6ooo that some users use, but he has since made his version private.

You will see other hosts on Parsec use these different versions of Parsec Soda, so pick the one that's best for you. Smash Soda and Parsec Soda V are experimental versions of Parsec Soda and can be unstable. v6ooo offers no support for his version of Parsec Soda. I (MickeyUK) do offer support for my version...but expect lots of bugs! Download the original Parsec Soda if you want the most stable, simple and safe version:

https://github.com/FlavioFS/ParsecSoda

Wait, I have to build it myself? Can't you just do it for me?

When Parsec discontinued their arcade service, they also discontinued support for their public SDK (something Soda uses). Parsec do not want applications that still use their SDK to be closed source...but this is actually to protect the end user. Parsec can't verify developers or validate use cases of this old SDK, and so the end user might open themselves up to malicious use of their Parsec credentials with closed source projects.

Smash Soda is open source, and with permission from Parsec, I have provided a build guide for Smash Soda here:

https://mickeyuk.com/blog/smash-soda-build-guide

Note that Parsec will ban users they catch distributing builds of Smash Soda.