The first beta of a new Quake 3 mod called Maldavria, has been released. The screenshots look pretty cool actually, and info can be found here. It's a 40mb download.

It's been quite a while, but John Carmack updated his .plan file with his opinion on driver optimizations for Quake3 (like ATI did). As usual, Carmack gives us a brief one paragraph update. Of course I kid as it's another monster .plan update. Anyway, here's a snip

Making any automatic optimization based on a benchmark name is wrong. It subverts the purpose of benchmarking, which is to gauge how a similar class of applications will perform on a tested configuration, not just how the single application chosen as representative performs.

It is never acceptable to have the driver automatically make a conformance tradeoff, even if they are positive that it won't make any difference. The reason is that applications evolve, and there is no guarantee that a future release won't have different assumptions, causing the upgrade to misbehave. We have seen this in practice with Quake3 and derivatives, where vendors assumed something about what may or may not be enabled during a compiled vertex array call. Most of these are just mistakes, or, occasionally, laziness.

As promised, the Quake 3 mod Reaction Quake 3 has been released. This mod recreates the gameplay and levels from Action Quake 2, and offers some new levels of it's own as well. The download page has several mirrors listed, for the Windows, Linux and Mac builds. It's a 68mb download

Beta 1 Features:

All the Original Weapons and Items
Remember how it felt when you snuck behind a camper and launched the poor sucker across the map with the handcannon? Or remember the time you sniped the ears (and head) off the bunny-hopping auto-monkey? We do, and your MK23 pistol and all its friends have been faithfully re-created and await your return.

New and Ported Maps
Battle through new maps like the torn grounds of Chill and the shops of Reaction Mall. Return to the slimy confines of Sludge Inc. or the lush climate of Deep Canyon 2. Action happens everywhere.

Action Combat System
Aim is just as important in Reaction. Running and gunning makes for bad shots, while crouching and holding ground will get you more accuracy. Shoot someone in the legs and cripple him or her. A head shot is almost certainly fatal. Projectile wounds will bleed you to death unless time is spent to bandage yourself. All this adds up to another gameplay element that made Action what it was and what Reaction will be. ...

There's a Reaction Quake 3 interview on Jolt.co.uk, where they talk to Cloud, Blaze and Elder of the RQ3 team about their upcoming Quake 3 mod which recreates the mod Action Quake 2.

If you liked Action Quake for Quake 2, and still play Quake3, you might be interested in knowning that the Reaction Quake 3 mod is being released this Friday. Beta 1 of the mod will feature all the original weapons and items, the action combat system, action-style physics and of course ported as well as new maps. We received some media from the mod, 11 screenshots and two DivX videos (tequila.avi (5.1mb), country_club.avi (9.3mb) ).

[ more shots ]

A new version of Quake 3 plug has been released. There's now support for Tribes, Tribes 2, Return To Castle Wolfenstein and Quakeworld, and works in MS Internet Explorer 6.0 or Internet Explorer 5.5 SP 2 now with a registry hack.

HomeLAN Federation has an interview with Casey, the lead designer for the Quake 3 CTF mod Threewave. History of the mod, pressure to make the Quake 3 version of Threewave as good as the previous releases, making a good CTF map, the CaptureStrike mode, upcoming releases and a few topics.

Version 1.4 of the Quake 3 mod QFrag has been released. This version has a radar, jump boots and a grappling hook.

Beta 3 of the DOOMed2FRAG mod has been released. This mod tries to bring the action and speed of Doom 2 deathmatch to Quake 3, by adding 9 new weapons, new speed and physics and four new DM levels.

Corven of Q3Center sends word that a new version of the Eternal Arena mod for Quake 3 has been released. Public Beta 2 of Version 5 has several new features such as new effects and bigger explosions and two new rail types. The EA downloads page also has a Pumpkin Party edition of the mod.

Beta 1 of the Eternal Arena mod for Quake3 has been released. The mod is a mere 3.5mb download and offers a lot of features, which you can read about on the website.

A new version of the popular Quake 3 tournament mod OSP Tourney has been released. As always there are quite a few fixes and additions, listed here.

Shoduniverse has some images of the upcoming OSP v1.0 maps that will be included with the mod release when it finally hits that elusive v1.0.

The Mean Arena has been updated with new screenshots from the Unreal Arena project. According to Kiltron, "The project is going smooth thus far, and I'll have more info soon".

The long awaited Threewave Quake3 CTF mod / map pack release is upon us. It's a huge release which stacks up to about a 120meg download total, not for the faint hearted. Here's what is included with the release:

- Great new game mode called "CaptureStrike"
- 5 new Threewave maps and 3 refitted maps
- Classic CTF game mode with 8 classic maps
- Compilation Pak 1 maps (8 maps)
- Compilation Pak 2 maps (8 maps)
- Portal style voting on next map and game style
- Mini games in between maps
- 35 maps in all
- And much more!
Mirrors:
EXE: ExThree, Executable, FilePlanet, QuakeShit, XMission, BarrysWorldUK, Blues or Shack
ZIP: ExThree, FilePlanet, QuakeShit, XMission, BarrysWorldUK, Blues or Shack

For the Shack files we're experimenting a little bith with the new system, you must be a registered Shacker, it's currently temporarily throttled at 50k/s per user until our full file system is in place. These mirrors are for Shack users, bandwidth does not grow on trees or is at least currently out of season.

Version 2.0 of the Tribal CTF mod for Quake 3 has been released. You will need Quake 3 1.30 and the time to download a 65.9mb file. This is a standalone new release, you are advised to delete the older Tribal CTF.

The first version of the Quake 3 mod Full Metal Jacket has been released. It's a 67.7 MB download.

The Art of War team let us know they have released a new version of their mod. The new release has a whole new faction, sporting 5 more classes and 4 new abilities. Art of War is a Quake 3 mod combining Quake 3 teamplay with strategic class-based combat and assault.

Activision has posted a Gold Edition Key Fix generator for those who picked up the Quake 3: Gold Edition compilation. Activision's page changes the erroneous key to ones accepted by the game. Thanks Blues News.

The next big ThreeWave release date has been announced. October 11th at 4pm PST. There will be 5 new maps, 3 'refitted' maps, mini-games between maps, and of course the two 8map compilation packs. 35 maps total.