Back in February we talked about a new ioquake3 engine was forthcoming that would deliver a number of enhancements, but this week that new version (1.36) has finally gone gold.

This update to the ioquake3 engine, which is originally based upon the open-source Quake 3 engine, now introduces support for off-server data downloads, OpenAL surround sound rendering, Ogg Vorbis audio decoding, IPv6 networking, full x86_64 support, new JIT compilers for various architectures, PNG support for textures, and many other fixes and improvements.

The game engine update itself isn't particularly beneficial to gamers, but in due time this new build will hopefully find its way into Urban Terror, OpenArena, World of Padman, Tremulous, and other games that utilize the ioquake3 engine. The full details regarding the new ioquake3 engine release can be found on their project web-site.

• Ports to new platforms
• Off-server data downloads (http redirection) via HTTP and FTP with cURL
• OpenAL sound rendering allowing for surround (5.1 and 7.1) speaker layouts and generally improved sound quality.
• Ogg Vorbis audio decoding.
• In-engine VOIP support, with optional Mumble player-location support.
• IPV6 Networking. We’re ready to frag on the net of the future!
• SDL backend for the OpenGL context, window management, and input. This also improves portability.
• Anaglyph stereo rendering (for viewing with 3D glasses)
• Full x86-64 architecture support
• Rewritten PowerPC JIT compiler, with ppc64 support
• New SPARC JIT compiler, with support for both sparc32 and sparc64
• Compilation with MinGW and cross-compilation for Windows from Linux
• Improved console command auto-completion
• Persistent console command history
• Improved QVM (Quake Virtual Machine) tools
• Colored terminal output on POSIX operating systems
• GUID System
• Multiuser support on Windows systems (user-specific game data is stored in their respective Application Data folders)
• PNG format support for textures
• Numerous security fixes