Thanks Creamhackered for this reminder that Quake III Arena is exactly 3 years old today!
Yes 3 years ago players were transcended into a total makeover from Quake II with many features and bug reports clamped as the result of the massive Q3test demo that went out in the summer before its release. Millions enjoyed the test which stayed popular long after the retail version shipped and gradually bugs were squished and features were added. Some of the more notable feature additions was the way the scores were handled and given out with an "assist" score added to CTF mode and a "Holy Shit!" (
So its hardly surprising that now in 2002 people still use Quake III Arena as a benchmark for their video-cards and systems, while it"s beginning to show that reviewers tend to give the disclaimer that "we know Q3 is getting on but..." bit now. Even so, it"s remained a valuable test bench for gamers all-round.
So Happy Birthday! on behalf of Neowin.net, don"t hold back on Quake IV ;)
The original .bin file of the last TEST version can be found here (49mb)