Several people have written in with an idea that has merit. And Jason Skomorowski has written a fine article explaining some of the ideas behind using Linux as a video game OS. The thought is that Linux is provided with new games, and you could boot Linux from the CD to play games. Sound brilliant? Lame? Read on and see what you think.

Robin V. Stacey has written an excellent feature on installing an alternative operating system, and the troubles he encountered while doing it.

ron writes "Dave Taylor (worked on doom and quake, started crack dot com, etc.) has posted an interesting new processor design, dubbed "The Pinky Processor" a nice read, check it out: " He also linked Slashdot (via TCWWW^TM) in his plan file. We got a lot of hits yesterday, I suspect that's why. Openly developed processors are definately a new frontier. Interesting to see what will come of it.

Andrew Taylor wrote in to tell us that Blizzard is at again. This time they are suing Micro Star for using the Campaign editor to design and sell new levels, which violates the license agreement. Wolf3D/Doom/Quake became legends because of exactly what companies like Micro Star is doing. Seems depressing that Blizzard needs to sue companies for it. Gamespot has details.

Eric Clark wrote in to tell us that Carmack has updated his .plan (finger johnc@idsoftware.com) for damage control on the recent stuff about ID Software's backdoor onto Quake Servers (You can read A security advistory if you are unfamiliar with the mess). Similiar to Blizzard's recent StarCraft mess, they say it was just a debugging thing. I still haven't made a decision on this stuff, what do you guys think?

Josh Plautz writes "Don 'Onethumb' MacAskill from Ritual Entertainmenthas updated his .plan file with the news that Ritual might just be looking for someone in the Dallas area who is willing to work on porting/maintaining SIN (Ritual's upcoming FPS) on Linux/BeOS. Read his comments at Planet Quake". I also got an email from Thad Parker of M8bius World Studios who talked about Millennium Diner, a sci fi edutainment game that they would like to try to port to Linux. If you would be interesting in helping that venture, go to the games's site, fill out the 'help us' form, and mention Linux. We all know Linux needs more games, perhaps a few brave souls can lend a hand filling that gap. Some (ahem) other companies could learn a lesson from these guys.

Kurt Gray wrote in to show everyone This link, where you can snag a Newton port of Quake! I'm quite amazed actually, and jealous. Never before have I so desired a Newton.

Nir Arbel writes " Some guy calling himself Phooky actually took the time to program a Tetris mod for Quake II. It's available at this site. I didn't quite know what to expect, but eventually it turned out to be a plain vanilla Tetris game, making minimal use of Quake II engine features , such as light-sourcing for the blocks and a few sound FX. Nevertheless, a fine example of how mad the world we live in is. "

David Navarro wrote in to tell us that PlanetQuake is running an article discussing 3D gaming on Linux. It's nothing that a veteran Linux user needs to read, but its interesting to see how much positive energy comes towards Linux thanks to Id's Doom and Quake ports. Great games have made the switch to Linux a lot more bearable for a lot of people.

Razvan Jianu sent us a couple of tidbits. First, Linux Quake 3.13 is out. This was first mentioned on Freshmeat. Even cooler is a collection of New 64 Player Maps. Apparently a PPro 200 bogs down at 64, but it still will be fun to try!

Rob Huffstedtler sent me an editorial piece on Linux and its future in the gaming market. It features comments from Crack.com's Dave Taylor, so everyon must definately hit the link below and read it.

dolphin sent in another tidbit of interest to Quake fans. As everyone knows by now, I'm fascinated by Tamagotchi's. Not good fascinated, but sort of fascinated like those people that pull over and look at car wrecks on the side of the road. Anyway, this link Talks about teh Quake Tamagotchi. Wierd world.

Dan Moore sent in a really cool note telling us that John Carmack has decided to donate the $20k he won at Blackjack in Vegas to the FSF! Absolutely awesome. We should go buy extra copies of Quake just to say thanks. Read more at John's Finger File.

Shaw Terwilliger asked me to plug The Linux Quake Page's new Logo Contest. You've got 10 days left to submit your entry. Special consideration given to Free Software. IMHO "Special Consideration" is a bad idea. If Free Software needed special treatment, I wouldn't have created all the images on Slashdot in The Gimp.

Wow! I haven't seen that active of a channel since #Quake the night the original came out. We had 150 or so people chatting away during 20/20 on the East Coast. Way cool. We have some logs here for those who missed the party. The best part was the page after page of screaming during Bill's 'Solo'. Very funny.

Hopefully #slashdot will remain a regular thing. We've got a bot now and hopefully we can have another party again soon.

Quake 2 is vulnerable to an attack posted on rootshell.com

Last Christmas, Riven was the big seller, with Quake II coming in second, and Myst still sitting at number 4. I still haven't touched Riven- wish it ran under Dosemu. Thanks go to Minga for sending us this story over at Bootnet.

Tim Newsome was the first to report that Quake II for Linux is apparently now available on iD's FTP Site. Grab it and play till you get paranoid and try to shot your neighbors head off with your snow shovel.

While most of the rest of the world was passed out from partying away 1997, some diligent hackers broke in to Quake2.com the popular Quake web site and replaced the homepage with first a pornographic image, and then this image sent to us by Alan Bailward.