November 1999

11/30/99
New creative Mini GL
Creative Labs has posted a new Mini-GL driver for Quake engine games (thanks Voodoo Extreme). The driver, which is intended for their 3D Blaster Voodoo 2 and Banshee cards, now supports Quake III version 1.09, and has the unique feature of supporting 512x512 textures on a 3dfx chipset.

From  Shugashack
Running a dedicated server? When asked about CD keys for such servers, Graeme Devine replied:

Dedicated servers don't need a CD Key if they run without bots enabled.

(I hate servers with bots you can play them offline that's my two cents)

Q3A FULL Soon? 
I was browsing through Shuga Shack and Steve G. said that Disruptor (from id.) stated that Quake 3 Arena could possibly be in stores next week.

It's not out in stores yet. To my understanding, Activision is wanting to do a simultaneous release in North America and overseas. Looks like next week sometime if all goes well.

11/29/99
Q3A .tga Renders 
Blue has posted the .tga versions of the tier 3 and 4 character renders.

Q3 Characters Wallpaper
Stomped has posted a wallpaper compilation of all the Q3 characters together. Check it out

Q3a  renders (Stomped) Redwood
Not like before but they are the last of the players.
Bitterman  Bones   Crash

11/28/99
I am back I know this is old news but I am posting it anyway:

Q3a Model renders (Stomped) Redwood
Hossman · The only body he'll be guarding is your dead one.
Lucy · Lucy will dominate you with her big guns.
Phobos · You'll face Phobos early on but that doesn't mean he doesn't have the skills to wipe the floor with you.
Gorre · Gorre has an ego check his cloned body can't cash.
Wrack · His vision may be a little fuzzy from the old software days but he can still hold his own.
Xaero  · Xaero is the end all and be all of bad asses. If you can beat out his zen master rail skills in the final match then you will be champion. Many have tried, few have succeeded.

11/23/99
Site happening I will be on vacation for the next four days so there will be no news until I get back. I planed on doing a review for the new demo test but since Q3A went gold I am going to wait. I am also thinking of starting some kind of contest with a prize of a Everglide attack pad. I need ideas for a contest email me. I'm still working on new site graphics to speed things up. And I will post new console commands when I get back remember to use a  \  first, most old commands still work. while I am away check out PlanetGecko cool site with timely news. PS. also Happy Thanksgiving

New Quake III Demo soon 
id's Graeme Devine updated his .plan with word that he's working on a new version of the Quake III Arena demo that should be released later this week. Here's what he had to say:

I’m working on updating the full demo today. We’ll bash on it a bit and get it out there over the next few days. Once it’s out there I’ll be updating the cdkey authorize server to the final version. Unfortunately this is not compatible with the demo test, so you’ll need to upgrade to either the full version of Q3A (woo hoo!) or download the new demo.

More Q3 Hi-Res Renders
Blues has tier 4 and tier 5 of the cut scenes displaying all your opponents. Tier 4 shows Lucy, Biker, Anarki, Patriot, and Tankjr. Tier 5 is Razor, Stripe, Uriel, Keel, and Visor.

New Q3A Server Configurator Release
There is a new Quake 3 Server Configurator out that supports the Quake 3 DemoTest and fixes various bugs.

Plan update  Christian Antkow
We're going to be off the net at 4am on the 23rd (read: In about 12 hours)
for an ISP switchover. No ETA on how long we'll be down. Just a heads up
in advance to let you know all the demotest clients will fail authentication
as a result of our outage.

-Xian

Plan update John Caramack
d:>mkdir research

Ahhhh....

I am very happy with how Q3 turned out. Probably more than any
game we have done before, it's final form was very close to its
initial envisioning.

I will be getting all the Q3 code we are going to release together
over the next week or so. I will write some overview documentation
to give a little context, and since you can do game mods without
needing a commercial compiler now, I will write a brief step-by-step
to modifying the game code.

I'm looking forward to what comes out of the community with Q3.

The rough outline of what I am going to be working on now:

We will be supporting Q3 for quite some time. Any problems
we have will get fixed, and some new features my sneak in.

I have two rendering technologies that I intend to write research
engines for.

I am going to spend some time on computer vision problems. I think
the cheap little web cams have some interesting possibilities.

I am going to explore some possibilities with generalizing 3D game
engines into more powerful environments with broader uses. I think
that a lot of trends are coming to the point where a "cyberspace" as
it is often imagined is begining to be feasible.

I am going to spend more time on some Free Software projects. I have
been stealing a few hours here and there to work on the matrox glx
project for a while now, and it has been pretty rewarding.
People with an interest in the guts of a 3D driver might want to look
at the project archives at http://glx.on.openprojects.net/.
The web pages aren't very up to date, but the mailing list covers some
good techie information.

sCary from the 'Shack received word from Zoid that there will only be four CTF maps. 

20 Deathmatch Maps: Q3DM0 - Q3DM19
6 Tournament Maps: Q3Tourney1-Q3Tourney6
4 CTF Maps: Q3CTF1-Q3CTF4

11/22/99
Update from Todd Hollenshead
Thanks for the mountain of congratulatory email. As of this very
moment, I don't have a confirmed shelf date or availability date
from 1-800 idgames. I'll post that information here just as soon
as I get confirmed dates for you guys and girls. As John indicated,
it may be a few extra days before we get confirmation on Linux and
Mac due primarily to logistics.

Q3A Render Downloads  from Blue news
As promised yesterday when posting the second set of Quake III Arena rendered images, here are the hi-rez Q3A renders in .tga format for download (1.5 MB).

Q3a Model renders (Stomped) Redwood posted more models he better hurry or we will have the game before we see them all. Well here they are: Doom, Hunter, Keel, Sorlag, Patriot, and Uriel.

Update from John Carmack

* fixed not-telefragging bug
* disabled flood protection with local clients
* fixed headoffset and gender on some model changes
* init cg_autoswitch cvars in cl
* fixed clearing of vm bss on restart
* fixed hang when looped part of song isn't found
* fixed two NAT clients connecting to same server
* fixed warning on random once only triggers
* added "g_allowVote 0"
* added developer background sound underrun warning
* move sound loading before clients so low memory
defer works across maps
* changed cgame load failure to a drop

Quake III Arena Went Gold  ( In Stores soon!!!!!!! )

Name: Kenneth Scott
Email: kenneth@idsoftware.com
Description: Artist

We're Gold!

I love you sweetpeach. :)

My two cents. Is it really ready I hope so, I hate buggy software that is rushed for x-mass shoppers.

11/21/99
Q3 Cut scenes
Blue has posted another set of cut scenes from Quake3. Check out the tier2 and tier3 group shots.

Powerups
Shuga has posted some screen shots of the power ups available in the q3testdemo. They include the battle suit, regeneration, invisibility, haste, med-kit and flight. He also eexplains how to activate them in the testdemo.

TGA2JPG and QircBC release! by  Borderfield 
After some time of inactivity  Borderfield Software returns with the release of 2 new programs:

-QircBC: Quake Irc Broadcaster is a program that sends live reports of ongoing clan wars to an irc server. QircBC supports both Quake2 as Q3A.

-TGA2JPG: convert TGA's (for example Q2 and Q3A screenshots) to JPG. This has 2 advantages: JPG takes up much less space than TGA and you can view JPG's in your favorite browser (no need for a graphics editor)

Note: both these programs require the Visual Basic 6 runtime files which aren't included in the disitribution of the programs. Check the files page to download these runtime files seperately.

11/20/99
Linux Demotest is out grab a copy here.

Linux Quake III Arena Demo Test  (tar.gz - 52,300,058 bytes)  

Linux Quake III Arena Demo Test  (RPM - 52,308,176 bytes)  

Update from Graeme Devine
We're at RC2. Life is good. 

That means they are on release candidate 2 of the full version of Quake 3 Arena and could go gold soon. YES!!

No EAX Support 
Well for those of us with Live! cards it looks like we will be left in the dark by Creative refusal to support A3D. Will this be patched? I hope so I bought a live card three months ago I don't want to update already.

Trendkill has been shut down. First seen at PlanetGecko . Trendkill was shut down because they broke the EULA. Here is a post from c0re. 

Let me first just appologize for the millionth time. Truth be known I love this game. Many times my love for this game and my impatience to modify it have gotten me into trouble but I would have done it anyways. The EULA to me is another piece of paper I'm not going to read. Of course I knew the consequences of breaking it time after time would build, but I never imagined losing the ability to host trendkill at Mplayer. But then again I think Mplayer is a great company and I don't want to get iD pissed at them for my beliefs. Also I was never very good at running a site. I hate making webpages. I would rather program and make graphics for a mod. Of course every time this has happened I have bitched and moaned. Many have said that I was stupid for breaking the EULA and should not bitch about the fact that I got nailed. When in my perspective I say the EULA only exists because iD created it and that does not make it right. Either way I was starting to bitch again... I love breaking rules and whenever I see a game that's great I want to make it what I would consider the best game ever. I've been doing this since DOOM Hack (do you remember this?), Heretic (HerHack), Quake Test --- yeah I was making skins and putting the monsters into the multiplayer maps then too id. Quake2 I was afk.. ;) and now Quake3 I must once again (stupid and stubborn as I am) continue to oppose authority. c0re

11/19/99
Quake 3 movies 
The Shugashack has released a few more Quake3Arena character movies,

New Q3A renders  
Stomped has posted 4 character renders for Q3A. They include [Razor], [Tank Jr.], [Cadaver], and the popular [Klesk]. Make sure to check these out.

The Oxygen Tank has posted an extensive review of the Quake 3 Arena demo test. A cool read.

Update from John Carmack
Linux version isn't going to make it tonight. We got
too busy with other things. Sorry. Tomorrow.

* shrink zone, grow hunk
* flush memory on an error
* fixed crash pasting from clipboard
* test all compiler optimizations -- 5% speedup
* fixed major slowdown in team games with large
numbers of players and location markers

11/18/99
When you use the console (you know the "~"key) in the Q3demo you have to use a Backslash first "\"  Example \cg_DrawFPS  1 (this turns on frames per second) most old commands still work just add \ and sometimes cg_  I am working on the new console commands list should have them posted in a few days if I quit playing the game long enough to finish.

Quake 3 Arena soundtrack news . Sonic Mayhem has announced on their official web site that they will be contributing music to Quake 3  In addition they will release a separate CD titled "Quake III Arena NOISE - Music from and Inspired by the PC Game" which will mix the songs from the game soundtrack with new music found only on the CD. There is an official web site for this CD cool flash effects and sound on start page only right now.

The Shugashack has a video of the biker guy In Quake 3 its a 6 meg download but its cool. Go Here or here to download

Update from  Graeme Devine
I'm debugging some stuff on the authorize server (and using you guys as testers on it).
If you can't authorize for the next few hours please be patient!

Mac Demo Is out get it here:

http://www.quake3arena.com/demo/index.html

more mirrors soon.

Update from John Carmack

The mac version is out. Go to www.quake3arena.com for links.

The mac version going out has the executable fixes that we
have made in the last couple days, but most of the fixes
have been in code that runs in the virtual machine, and we
can't update that without making it incomptable with the
pc version.

The game remains very marginal in playability on 266mhz imacs
and iBooks.

A 333mhz imac should be playable for a casual gamer if the
graphics options are turned down to the "fastest" setting.

There is still a lot of room for improvement on ATI's side
with the RagePro drivers. Almost all the effort so far
has been on the Rage128 drivers.

The G3 systems run fine, but a little slower than a pc of
equal mhz

The rage128 cards in the G3s are only clocked at 75mhz, so
you can't run too high of a resolution, but you can get
very nice image quality. I usually play with these settings:
r_mode 2 // 512*284 res
r_colorbits 32 // 32 bit color
r_texturemode gl_linear_mipmap_linear // trilinear filtering

I haven't played on one of the new iMacs or G4's but they
both use the rage128 driver, which is fairly high quality
now, so they should perform well.

We found a fairly significant problem with inputSprockets and
mouse control (motion is dropped after 40msec). I have done a
little working around it, so mouse control should be somewhat
better in this version, but it will hopefully be fixed
properly by Apple in the next IS rev. It isn't an issue if
your framerate is high enough, but iMacs never see that
framerate on their very best days...

Linux version tomorrow night, if nothing horrible happens.

Some advance warning about something that is sure to stir
up some argument:

We should be handing off the masters for all three platforms
within a day or two of each other, but they aren't going to
show up in stores at the same time. Publishers, distributers,
and stores are willing to go out of their way to expedite the
arrival of the pc version, but they just won't go to the
same amount of trouble for mac and linux boxes.

THE EXECUTABLES FOR ALL PLATFORMS WILL NOT BE AVAILABLE FOR
DOWNLOAD UNTIL AFTER CHRISTMAS. This means that if you want
to play on the mac or linux, don't pick up a copy of the pc
version and expect to download the other executables.

Our first update to the game will be for all platforms, and
will allow any version to be converted into any other, but
we intend to hold that off for a little while.

We are doing this at the request of the distributors. The
fear is that everyone will just grab a windows version,
and the separate boxes will be ignored.

A lot of companies are going to be watching the sales
figures for the mac and linux versions of Q3 to see if
the platforms are actually worth supporting. If everyone
bought a windows version and the other boxes sold like crap
in comparison, that would be plenty of evidence for most
executives to can any cross platform development.

I know there are a lot of people that play in both windows
and linux, and this may be a bit of an inconvenience in
the short term, but this is an ideal time to cast a vote
as a consumer.

Its all the same to Id (I like hybrid CD's), and our continued
support of linux and mac (OS X for the next title) is basically
a foregone conclusion, but the results will probably influence
other companies.

* fixed getting your own dropped / kicked message
* added developer print for all file open write's
* fixed occasional bad color on connecting background
* fixed occasional telefrag at start of skirmish game
* fix not being able to ready at intermission if
you were following a bot
* never timelimit during tourney warmup
* fixed local timer on map_restart
* offset sorlag's head model for status bar
* added g_gametype to the votable commands:
map, map_restart, kick, g_gametype
* changed sound registration sequence to fix losing
default sound
* "sv_floodProtect 0" to turn off flood protection
* converted sequenced messages to static arrays
* fixed custom skin reassignment on all LOD

A word from: Graeme Devine Mac demo soon!!!
Okay, the Macintosh Test build is going up real soon now. It's all built and working well. I'm
really happy with the way we're working on the Mac. I've been building the new id servers
on a G3 using Java and it's been a real nice change from the PC.

You'll need the newest version of OpenGL for the Macintosh, which came out today. It's
available at http://asu.info.apple.com/swupdates.nsf/artnum/n11545. Go download that
while we're coordinating on getting the Mac build out there through Sandpiper.

A word from: Todd Hollenshead
We just received a report that tells us that there have already been
at least 1,000,000 downloads of the demo test in less that 3 days. WOW!
A tremendous thanks to the Quake III Arena (or soon to be) community.

11/17/99
New  GLSetup
Ok, yet another version of GLSetup has been released.  They are using Sandpiper now for distributed driver downloads and have some new GL drivers for ATI users. Hopefully this will help a few of you having driver problems with Quake3.

New Q3A Character Renderings (Thanks stomped)
I like Mynx (sweet)
Angel · With the bright light reflecting off her, you'll think you're headed to heaven but this Angel is about to send you straight the other way.
Mynx · Based on her looks, you're probably guessing where Mynx gets her pleasure, but in reality she gets it from your suffering in an explosion of gibs.
Biker · Biker may be too big to do a backflip like some of your opponents but as his tattoos indicate, he's suffered through pain and he knows how to make others feel the same.

I have said this before but I am going to say it again don't run servers with bots. If I wanted to play bots I could do that offline.

Yes a new update from the main man John Carmack.

The demo servers have general purpose flood-protection that has
caused some confusion.

Clients are only allowed to make one command a second of any kind.
This prevents excessive flooding by chats, model / name changes,
and any other command that could possibly be exploited. The
command streams are stalled, so it doesn't have any effect on
processing order or reliability.

This means that if you issue two commands immediately after one
another, there will be a one second stall before the second
command and all movement clears. You see this on the lagometer
as yellow spiking up for a second, then dropping away.

Hitting tab for the scoreboard sends a command, so you trigger
the flood protection if you bang tab a couple times. This has
been fixed so that the scoreboard will never send more than
one update request every two seconds, but you will need to
watch out for it in the existing demo.


The defered model loading has also caused some confusion, but
that is a feature, not a bug. :-)

In previous tests, you hitched for a second or two whenever a
client with a new model or skin joined a game.

In the demo, when a client joins the game they will be given
the model and skin of someone else temporarily, so there is
no hitch. The only time it will hitch on entry is if it is
a team game and there isn't anyone on the team they join. I
make sure the skin color is correct, even if the model isn't.

These "defered" clients will be loaded when you bring up the
scoreboard. You can do this directly by hitting tab, or you
can have it happen for you when you die.

The point is: you died BEFORE it hitched, not as a result of
the hitch.

The scoreboard header is up, but it is still a bit easy to miss.


* fixed high server idle cpu usage
(it was spinning in place until maxfps was used!)
* fixed g_password, which is crashing in the demo
* moved svs.snapshotEntities to the hunk
* enable lagometer whenever running a non-local game
* cg_drawTeamOverlay cvar, set to 0 by default
* finished authorize work
* better reporting of unused highwater memory

11/16/99
Update from Graeme Devine 

We've got a debug server up on 192.246.40.115, if people could connect to it and bash on it
that would be great.

New WickedGL Driver For 3dfx cards
Wicked GL driver 

Having trouble finding servers in the demo do what I did use Gamespy,

Q3TestDemo Mousewheel Fix
The guys at q3a.stomped.com have found a solution to mouse wheel problems in the new demo:

If you alt/tab to another windows application or the desktop and then alt/tab back into the game again the mouse wheel activates. Now it and can be used to scroll through weapons as per usual.

Update from the main man John Carmack.
The way vertex lighting is working in the existing demos is that
only two pass shaders (lightmap * texture) were collapsed to a
single pass, all other shaders stayed the same.

Xian added some chrome and energy effects to parts of q3tourney2,
which changed them from two pass to three pass shaders. We felt
that that 50% increase on those polygons was justified in normal
play, but as people have pointed out, when you are playing with
vertex lighting, that three passes stays three passes instead
of collapsing to a single pass, resulting in a 300% increase
on those polygons over the way it was before. Still faster than
lightmap mode, but a large variance over other parts of the level.

Today I wrote new code to address that, and improve on top of it.

Now when r_vertexlight is on, I force every single shader to a
single pass. In the cases where it isn't a simple light*texture
case, I try and intelligently pick the most representative pass
and do some fixups on the shader modulations.

This works our great, and brings the graphics load down to the
minimum we can do with the data sets.

Performance is still going to be down a couple msec a frame due to
using dynamic compilation instead of dll's for the cgame, but that
is an intentional tradeoff. You can obviously slow things down by
running a lot of bots, but that is to be expected.

I am still investigating the high idle dedicated server cpu utilization
and a few other issues. The server cpu time will definately be
higher than 1.08 due to the dynamic compiler, but again, that is
an intentional tradeoff.

A set of go-fast-and-look-ugly options:
r_mode 2
r_colorbits 16
r_texturemode GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_NEAREST
r_vertexlighting 1
r_subdivisions 999
r_lodbias 2
cg_gibs 0
cg_draw3dicons 0
cg_brassTime 0
cg_marks 0
cg_shadows 0
cg_simpleitems 1
cg_drawAttacker 0


* icons for bot skills on scoreboard
* r_vertexlight is now "force single pass" for all shaders
* modified cd key check to be fire and forget on the client
* file handle debugging info in path command
* network address type of NA_BAD for failed resolves
* better command line variable overriding
* cache scoreboard for two seconds
* sync sound system before starting cinematics
* fixed many escapes disconnect from server exiting the game
* fixed shotgun pellets underwater expending all temp entities

11/15/99
Added more mirrors in my  the Q3testdemo page god the demo rocks.

Q3Testdemo out! (Thanks oxygen Tank)
The official Quake3Arena page has been updated a cool new look, and most importantly, a (test) demo for Quake3Arena with aid from Sandpiper's "unlimited" bandwidth. Here's a list of mirrors:

[id]
[Avault]
[Stomped]
[FilePlanet]
[BluesNews]
[Meccaworld]
[3D-Unlimited]
[Gaming Group]
[Stayne's House]

A pile of updates today. Yes the demo is out well the first demo anyway. 

Graeme Devine

It's out there. We're aware of some issues which are documented in the readme, otherwise
I expect a lot of you to be missing many hours of sleep tonight!

Quake 3 Arena demo test should be out tonight. Watch the skies!

Just so we’re all sure. This isn’t the general demo. If all goes well we’ll
upload the general demo in a few days.

The demo contains four maps (q3dm1, q3dm7 (q3test1), q3dm17 (q3test2)
& q3tourney2 (q3tourney) and six characters (Sarge, Visor, Major, Grunt,
Daemia, & Stripe). Bots are in there on five difficulty settings (from “I can win!”
to “nightmare!”).

Christian Antkow
Ok, known issues so far;

Server browser is fux0red. Will look into that tommorow

Problems binding and using the mousewheel

Can't resolve authorize.quake3arena.com. God only knows why. I've been losing my mind
over this. Some people can resolve it fine, others can't. If someone can e-mail me with a
definitive reason why this isn't resolving for some people, I'll be ever so greatfull. I've done
digs off of various nameservers and most can resolve this just fine. *sigh*

Zzzz.....

Todd Hollenshead

Demo Test notes:

As Graeme indicated, this is a preliminary release. We are
retaining the prohibition on physical media distribution until we
release the final or "gold" demo. That means that magazines will
NOT be allowed to distribute this version of the demo on coverdisks.
This is marked all over the test, however I would appreciate it if
all of the Quake 3 and game site webmasters that are mirroring or
covering the release would lend me a hand and make sure our friendly
neighborhood game and computer magazines understand this.

Rest assured, we will allow physical media distribution of the final
demo, once it is released, but not yet.

Second, although the 1-800-idgames number is on the screen, we (id) aren't
accepting orders yet. Also, please remember that number is not for
technical support for Quake III Arena, the demo test, or any other id
game. Feedback, bugs, etc., in the demo test should still be sent to
feedback@quake3arena.com

Finally, before the crazy speculation starts, we aren't done with the
game yet. We will be finished "when it's done!" Again, anyone besides
id claiming to have the official release date is just pulling your chain.

Enjoy!

Unreal Tournament goes gold; in stores on Friday
Blue's News and Avault have been contacted by Epic Games' Mark Rein with the news that Unreal Tournament has gone gold. It will be in stores on Friday in the U.S

11/14/99
Hi-Rez Q3A Renders  
As (repeatedly) promised, here is a zip file with the high resolution .tga originals of the Quake III Arena renders (1.33 MB) posted the other day in .jpg format (Thanks Blue)

New 3dfx drivers 
3dfx has released some new drivers today:
Voodoo3 2000/3000 Version: 1.03.04 drivers (5297KB)
Voodoo Banshee Version: 1.03.04 drivers (2.3MB)

11/13/99
Update from the main man John Carmack. Seems like the finishing touches to me.

* graphic for defer
* don't set any systeminfo vars from demos
* A3D fix
* spectator follow clients that disconnect
* stop follow mode before going to intermission so you can ready
* use (fullbright) vertex lighting if the bsp file doesn't have lightmaps
* auto set demo keyword on servers
* finished cd key authorization
* fixed symbol table loading for interpreter
* reconnect command
* removed limit on number of completed commands
* changed default name to "UnnamedPlayer"
* awards over people's heads in multiplayer
* fixed global powerup announcements

I added search Gamespyder in my search page

11/12/99
Stomped has posted three more models, Ranger , Major, and  Anarki, I was surprised that it wasn't Kelsk and Hunter. And by the way the hover board that Anarki is holding is only for the pic. he is always on it in the game.

Kenn Hwang over at  Firingsquad has posted a little story about there trip to Id to beta test Quake 3 Arena. New changes to the lighting gun and a new console. Read all about it here

New GL Setup 
A new version of GL Setup the program that detects your 3D graphics card and installs the OpenGL drivers for it. The new version includes fixes and new drivers. (Thanks Blue's news)

11/11/99
Yes a new update from the main man John Carmack.

* teamplay menu comment
* shrank and moved "RECORDING demo:" text
* identified and worked around Apple input queue issue
* properly send configstring resets on map_restart
* don't clip sound buffer on file writes
* don't draw scoreboard during warmup
* auto load added bots in single player
* swapped order of map_restart and warmup configstring
* disable dynamic lights on riva128 due to lack of blend mode
* put frags left warning back in all gametypes
* removed joystick button debug prints

11/10/99
I found a q3test theme go here to grab it

Grip of the day I just received the Wal-Mart flyer and Quake III Arena is in there for $49.99 so I called them guess what they don't have it yet (not a big surprise)

Stomped has posted two more models The Orbb and Visor dam no new ones yet. Redwood has set up a separate page for all the models here

Quake III Arena Renders   Blue has scored some Quake 3 Arena renders from Paul Steed

Yes a new update from the main man John Carmack.
* fixed spinning barrel on respawn issue
* clear eflags before intermission
* shutdown menu on starting a cinematic
* mask name colors to 0-7 range
* fixed jpeg loading alpha channel
* try for not-nearest spawn twice instead of once
* made unzoomed exactly identity mouse modifier
* cl_debugmove [1/2]
* m_filter
* fixed time warnings
* allow timelimits to hit with only a single player
* filter local games with different protocol versions
* fixed bad arg 0 after sysinfo configstring
* removed unneeded svc_servercommand at start of command strings
* fixed redundantly loaded level bug
* fixed journal playback from demo build
* removed background image from viewlog window

11/09/99
I'm working on changing the site graphics' because it takes to dam long to open stay tuned.

John Carmack on No Q3A Skeletal Animation Stomped fired off a letter to John Carmack asking about skeleton Animation here is the response:

The game fits in 64 megs without it, so we are probably going to ship that
way.

John Carmack

I have a gripe last night I played Unreal tournament on the net and every server I went to had bots in it, how dumb If I wanted to play bots I would do that off line. I have a Idea put one bot in the server then when two real people show up kick the bot out. If that can't be done don't use any bots, I hope Quake 3 servers don't do the same thing.

New Klesk Screenshot
At Loonygames they posted a new screenshot of the Klesk with a Railgun. 

Stomped has worked out a little deal with id software to post 29 exclusive Quake3Arena character shots throughout the next few weeks.

Quake II for Macintosh
The ultimate frag fest blasts its way to the Mac, so now everybody's happy!
Insane death-match action and more for only $44.95.
http://gamedealer.ugo.com/primary.asp?product_id=4504

11/08/99
I finished my review of the EverGlide attack mouse pad. Go here to read it all. Save time just go buy one they are great.

Yes a new update from the main man John Carmack.  God I hope the demo comes soon, It looks like it. Here is the whole update on his work load.

* check for bad weapon number in non-3d ammo icon on death
* fixed plane catagorization
* error command does an ERR_DROP if given a parm
* don't load high LOD models if r_lodbias
* nobots/nohumans options for player spawn spots
* prevent voice rewards on frag that enters intermission
* dissallow native dll loading if sv_pure
* loaddefered cgame command, issued on addbot
* drop the weapon you are changing TO if you only had a
MG or gauntlet
* fixed bounce pad event prediction for all angles
* allow empty tokens in map files
* fixed infos exceeded warning on bot parse
* warning on mismatched mipmap/picmip/wrapclamp image reuse
* fixed pain echo sound after predicted falling damage
* move sound to hunk
* move vm to hunk
* restart game vm in place for map_restarts
* avoid all lightmaps entirely when using vertex light
* pretouch all images after registration
* pretouch all known in-use memory before starting a game
* on error, shutdown client before server, to be more likely
to get out of fullscreen before a recursive error
* new pre-allocated memmory manager to crutch up mac
* meminfo command replaces hunk_stats and z_stats
* adjusted scoreboard titles
* no guantlet reward on corpses
* fixed snd_restart when paused
* PRE_RELEASE_DEMO hack

11/07/99
I found the Oxygen tank site again all this time I thought it was gone.

The New Stomped 
The Stomped website has been redesigned and a news comments system.

The message boards are open so go post something!!

11/06/99
Update from  Graeme Devine
I asked everyone to come up with Tips Of the Day for Q3A, it was a serious endeavor
to get some cool tips into the product (a fun game is trying to match the id employee
with the quote).

Here are some gems from the masters:

Often there are secrets hidden below the hellfog.

Every map has a special exit. Chat with the bots to find it.

If you get negative 10000 frags something cool happens.

Save money by calling our tech support from the office phone.

To open secret level press the reset button immediately after completing Tier 5.

Run over the armor backwards to obtain optional armor pants.

Ain't nothin' like four bare feet in a bed. Unless you have five bare feet in a bed in
which case one belongs to an amputee not a freak with three feet.

Save water. Shower with a friend.

Never eat spinach with a stranger.

You call me Francis, I'll kill ya.

Don't look at the glass eye.

Try and keep Klesk from getting the railgun on q3tourney3

Q3A ownz jooo!

Strafe to the right, strafe to the left... now everybody jump around, jump around.

Monkey thinks bandannas more ripe at top of the tree.

Take the blue pill; you aren't the one.

Complain a lot about lag, LPBs, and packet loss; you'll still lose, but you'll sound
smarter.

Bind forward to control, jump to alt, and attack to delete. Then amaze everyone
with your running jump shots!

When about to lose a big game, throw the Big Red Switch then come back on
and bitch about your ISP.

Always hit your enemy and never let them hit you.

Never tell Adrian that you hit his Viper.

The Red Fog is bad for your health.

11/05/99
Name Maker Studio v4.13 Released

The new version adds some awesome features that will make NMS a heck of alot easier to use. I added GameSpy® support to NMS. This means all you need to do is create your name click 'Save to GameSpy' and select the name from the GameSpy profiles list! I fixed the support for NMS and CFG files. Now it adds the commandline to the file instead of overwriting it. NMS v4.13 uses the v4.05 menubar, so you don't need to get and update for the interface. If you already have a version of Name Maker Studio installed, just download the update! Also the full install is now only 1.1mb instead of 1.7mb!  Download the full  here.

Actinic from overseas was kind enough to compile some Q3 info from a few Euro magazines and send it along to the Shugashack. Here's his summary (pardon his English):

Single Tournament Mode
this campaign consist of 6 parts with 4 levels each, which can be played in any order + difficulty. each part is a bit "difficulter" as the one before...

Levels (included)
- 31 levels in 3 categories; Gothic, Space & Hightech
- classic DM arenas, 1:1, + 5 CTF maps as bonus

Models
[not sure if these are models, i guess pre-defined players, but they wrote] "20 heroes (wireframe) with 71 skins" (...) "... general soldiers in different sizes and weigths..." each "model" has 3 different "death scenes/anims"

Bots
47 variables to set the "intelligence, behavior, efficiency of the 9 weapons"... quote: note about Unreal Tournament bots: "UT bots using nodes, waypoints to walk through a map" (John Cash) "Q3A bots dividing each map in 4 parts and calculate which "way" is the best between the areas. Also they're using some techniques of 'fuzzy logic' which occur some human like actions. You can give the bots commands via the console like 'Defend Base' in the CTF mode, they are 'understanding' those commands. There will be a database of around 80.000 words...

Last words
Quake 3 Arena is now in its beta version, all models + bot intelligence are ready, ID is working on the leveldesign and on the menu/GUI. There will be a "parent-mode" (password) in Q3 which will deactivate the blood, ID did this according to the Littleton-massacre...

There might be some inaccuracies in there, of course.

Update from Todd Hollenshead

There hasn't been a formal announcement about this that I'm aware of, so
I wanted to make sure that everyone knew that several retailers are
running Quake III Arena pre-order programs with the limited edition
tin box. There will be less than 30,000 of the tin box editions
available world-wide, so if this is something you want you probably
need to get your order in ASAP. I don't have a picture to post, but
if you were at QuakeCon and saw the metal box in the black display
case, you know what the box looks like.

Just to clarify a few things that may be confusing:

We won't be selling these direct from id - it's purely a retail promotion.
There is no difference in the game content, only the box is different.
Some retailers are charging more for the tin box, and some are charging
the same price. The actual retail price of the game is something that
is out of our direct control, but we aren't charging the retailers more
for the limited edition box. I don't have a full list of all of the
retailers world-wide, but in the U.S. EB, Babbages, and CompUSA are
all participating at a minimum. Availability may vary by store, however.
The release date for Quake III Arena is, as you know, "When it's done!"
Retailers are notorious for posting "official" release dates, but unless
it comes directly from id, it's just speculation.

11/04/99
ShugaShack Q3 Pics 
sCary's ShugaShack has posted some brand new Q3:Arena screen shots.

11/03/99
Quake3 For $33.95 pre order it thru this page at sCary's shugashack

From 3dfx
Gigapixel? What the Hell?
A look at this ground-breaking technology. Yep, you heard it right. 3dfx will be the first graphics company to deliver hardware capable of drawing one billion pixels per second on screen. Click on the link to read more.

John Carmack makes a update again.  Demo soon I hope.
* cd check in single player
* removed drop shadow on console input line
* swapped mynx pain sounds
* fixed cleared music buffer on track loop again
* force skins on spectators in team games to prevent having a
default waste memory
* only defer to a model with same team skin
* fixed grenade-disappearing-at-floor bug when about to explode
* draw reward medals during gameplay
* added "humiliation" feedback for gauntlet kills
* spread respawn times to prevent pattern running:
#define RESPAWN_ARMOR 25
#define RESPAWN_TEAM_WEAPON 30
#define RESPAWN_HEALTH 35
#define RESPAWN_AMMO 40
#define RESPAWN_HOLDABLE 60
#define RESPAWN_MEGAHEALTH 120
#define RESPAWN_POWERUP 120

11/02/99
A plan update from Graeme Devine
Email: zaphod@idsoftware.com

The MOTD server and master server will be up and down over the next few days, if you don't
get a response that's probably the reason why.

Sorry for the lack of updates yesterday my server was down all last night.

11/01/99
John Carmack makes a update again. where's the demo?
* play chat sound during votes
* draw 2D icon for ammo if cg_draw3dicons 0
* fixed losing input on menu vid_restart
* made "vote" and "callvote" completable
* remove mac about dialog
* fixed demos skipping inital time due to loading
* fixed timing on timedemo startup
* don't flash attacker when damaging self
* display capturelimit instead of fraglimit on score tabs in ctf
* recursive mirror/portal changed to a developer warning
* fixed bug with follow mode spectators
* battle suit shader
* notsingle spawn option
* separated torso and legs priority animation coutners
so gesture doesn't mess with legs
* adjusted value to prevent missed launch sound
on accelerator pads
* setviewpos x y z yaw
same parms as viewpos command
* stop sound on file access
* fixed developer prints from renderer
* defered client media loading, only load models and sounds for
new players when you die or bring up the scoreboard
* fix for double colliding against same plane and getting stuck
* dropped LG damage to 160 pts / sec
* don't snap predicted player entity, smooths deaths and movers
* all sine movers are instant kill on block
* fixed items riding on bobbers