So, where's 1.4? This has been a pretty hectic week in the Land of Updates. Our planned roll-out had to be stopped because internal testing turned up issues with the installers that could affect some players. The folks at Activision are trying to get these worked out as quickly as they can - they will let us know as soon as they have a solid estimate for getting the fixes in and tested. We'll pass that information on to you right away when we get it.

On a brighter note, we've also been hard at work on an updated version of the Enemy Territory: QUAKE Wars demo. This new demo incorporates all the improvements we've made to ETQW in the three months since its release, including the new training mode we’re introducing in 1.4. The training mode is a great introduction to the unique gameplay concepts and mechanics featured in Enemy Territory: QUAKE Wars, so this is a fantastic way for those still on the fence to experience the latest and greatest version of the game.

But that's not all!

We know you're all waiting eagerly for the 1.4 update to be released and I've got a brief status update for you. Quality Assurance testing has turned up a few issues with 1.4 that need to be addressed before it can go out the public. One of them is specific to ATI cards, so we're working closely with the guys over at AMD / ATi to get this resolved as quickly as possible, while also making sure that the rest of the update is as solid as can be. We don't expect this to be resolved before the new year, so we're now aiming to release 1.4 in early January 2008.

Despite the update not being out in time, we here at Splash Damage and id Software would like to wish all of you fantastic holidays and we hope you have a great 2008!

Christmas is coming up and what better way to spend the holidays than with a brand-new, featured packed game update for Enemy Territory: QUAKE Wars? That's exactly what we thought and we've been hard at work on the 1.4 update for the game ever since wrapping up work on the previous update.

Wait, 1.4? What happened to 1.3? Don't worry, you haven't missed an entire game update. 1.3 is a smaller update that's limited to the Korean release of ETQW. All other versions are moving on straight on to version 1.4. So, let's have a look at what we have in store for you:

Earlier in the day we found a configuration exploit in the Ranked Server code that awards players on that server several tens of thousand XP points per spawn. The exploit has now been addressed and a hotfix is being rolled out across all Ranked Servers at the moment.

We're also checking the accounts database and any account that is found to have gained XP via this exploit is being rolled back to its pre-exploit state. The ETQW Stats Site will reflect the rollback within the next 24-48 hours and you'll be able to continue fighting over the Platypus crown unimpeded.

The integrity of the statistics collection system is very important to us and we will continue to monitor our incoming data closely for exploits and the like.

The reaction to the release of the Beta of the Enemy Territory: QUAKE Wars SDK has been really positive and both the Editing Forum here on the site and the #etqwmods IRC channel on QuakeNet have been really active with new map and mod projects getting underway and people figuring out all the neat things you can do with the Beta SDK. While we're continuing work on the next game update and our official competition mod (more on both of those items soon), we've also been working on a new revision of the Beta SDK. A lot of the changes in this new version are the direct result of your feedback, so please keep it coming. Here's the list of fixes and improvements: