**** v2.0.0 (Nov 2020)

Before we get into the bullet-point changelist, a general note:

Quakespasm-Spiked (https://fte.triptohell.info/moodles/qss/) is now the bundled Quake engine, rather than Mark V.

Mark V is no longer in development and has issues on some new maps with performance or even being able to run the map at all. QSS is better on those fronts, and has added bonuses like multi-gamedir support, unlocked-framerates support, and no dependence on an old DirectX runtime. Plus optional particle and HUD features for Arcane Dimensions.

One downside of QSS compared to Mark V is that its in-game menus are not as nice/useful. Another downside is that QSS is not compatible with some of the truly quirky older releases that Mark V supports; however the only one of those releases that had been included in the Quakestarter menus was Nehahra. Losing Nehahra support is unfortunate, but on balance QSS is still the right choice for bundling with Quakestarter now.

Of course even though QSS is now the bundled Quake engine, you will still be able to use Mark V or vkQuake or any other engine you prefer -- you'll just have to download and install that other Quake engine yourself, then configure Quakestarter to use it. More about that below and in the docs.

Because we can't depend on Mark V any longer, we can't use its features for downloading and installing mods. So that functionality has been moved into the installer scripts. One consequence of this: previously only the bundled Simple Quake Launcher 2 had a dependence on Microsoft .Net Framework version 4.5 or later, but now the installer scripts also have that dependence. So we have well and truly left behind any support for Windows XP. (Another consequence is that downloads are now faster!)

OK, let's get to the changelist.

- As mentioned above, QSS is now bundled instead of Mark V. QSS is made up of several files; see "qss_manifest.txt" for a list.

- The main script to run is now named "quakestarter.cmd" rather than "installer.bat".

- The "readmes" folder is now named "quakestarter_docs".

- Other files and folders have had name changes too, so if you are replacing an older version of Quakestarter you should generally just delete its files entirely (while leaving the rest of your Quake installation intact) and then put these new files in place. The doc about upgrading between Quakestarter versions ("quakestarter_docs\other_stuff\upgrading_quakestarter.txt") has more details.

- Option added in the main menu to just launch Quake. A nicety to set up initial config without having to go outside Quakestarter.

- The soundtrack installer can now find and copy existing files from other Quake installations on your computer, much like the pak installer does. It can still also download soundtrack files from the net, as before.

- Downloaded soundtrack files now include both ogg and mp3 versions.

- The number of installable mods has increased from 58 to 75. This comes from adding 23 new installables and dropping 6 that no longer qualify or have been superceded.

- Previously, recent releases had not been included in the installer menus because their ratings are still in flux. However that's now changed, with "The New Hotness" menus for recent highly-rated releases (with the understanding that they may later be dropped).

- Mods dropped from the main installer menus can now still be accessed/played/managed if you like. See the comments about "legacy" releases in "quakestarter_scripts\_quakestarter_cfg_defaults.cmd". Behind the scenes I've also made several changes that will make it easier for me to put out updated versions of Quakestarter more quickly, and also make it easier for users to update from version to version. So it should be more acceptable to have more frequent changes to the set of installables.

- The default configurations for many mods have been improved slightly. If you have one of these mods already installed, you probably don't need to worry about this if it is working fine for you, but the doc about upgrading between Quakestarter versions ("quakestarter_docs\other_stuff\upgrading_quakestarter.txt") has more details.

- You can create a config file to customize a few behaviors of Quakestarter now, as described in the "quakestarter_docs\other_stuff\advanced_quakestarter_cfg.txt" doc. One such customization is the name of the Quake program to run, if you don't want to use the bundled Quakespasm-Spiked.

- You can also customize whether mods that include a unique "startdemos" loop will run that demo loop when the mod is launched. This will work regardless of whether your Quake engine typically plays a startdemos loop (as Quakespasm variants do not, by default).

- See "quakestarter_scripts\_quakestarter_cfg_defaults.cmd" for other behaviors you can customize.

- When Quakestarter launches a mod, info about the Quake engine and launch args is now stored in "_last_launch.cmd" in the mod folder. Currently this is just informative, but it may be used by future Quakestarter versions.

- Support finding Bethesda.net installs of Quake (when looking for pakfiles).

- Slightly more robust search for GOG Galaxy installs of Quake (when looking for pakfiles).

- "autoexec.cfg.example" and the annotated version have been rewritten to be less Mark V - centric, and to include discussion of host_maxfps.

- In general the docs have been improved and corrected.

- Support for Windows Vista has been officially dropped. It probably still works though?


**** v1.10 (Mar 2020)

- Updated with the rest of the qualifying releases from 2018. Among "Latest episodes", added: the DLC patch for DM4 Jam, Halloween Jam, and Xmas Jam. Among "Other highly-rated maps", added The Grim Outpost. Will probably add 2019 releases soon-ish but I want to make sure scores have had time to settle.


**** v1.9 (Jul 2019)

- Replaced broken soundtrack links.


**** v1.8.2 (Jul 2018)

- Launch Mark V in windowed mode for downloads. This has some extra importance currently because fullscreen Mark V has slow startup on latest version of Windows. Will still be a nice thing though even once that is fixed.

- Fixed a typo in autoexec.cfg.example that could cause a console warning message.


**** v1.8.1 (May 2018)

- Included a refresh release for Mark V 1.99 with various fixes.

- Minor tweaks to readme files. Mentioned that the winquake Mark V variant can't handle alpha-masked textures.


**** v1.8 (May 2018)

- Added mod uninstall support in the installer utility.

- Cosmetic improvements to the installer menus.

- Included version 1.99 of Mark V. This new version has expanded limits to allow playing ad_sepulcher, XInput gamepad support (with the -joystick argument), touchscreen support, co-op savegames, and other goodies. Updated docs where necessary.

- Note that mark_v.exe is now the DirectX variant; the OpenGL variant is gone. This means you will need the DirectX 9 Runtime (see "readmes\basic\1_setup.txt"). And if you have an older version of dx9_mark_v.exe laying around you can delete it.

- The installer utility has been rewritten to take advantage of improvements in Mark V's "install" feature. One side effect of this change is that you do not need .Net Framework 4.5 for the installer functionality now. (It is still required if you use Simple Quake Launcher 2.) This does however also mean that the new installer WILL NOT work with the older versions of Mark V.


**** v1.7 (Apr 2018)

- Included Simple Quake Launcher 2 instead of the original Simple Quake Launcher 1.x, and changed the readme-files discussion to be appropriate for SQL2. Note that this new version now requires the .Net Framework 4.5 instead of 3.5.

- Changed the installer to do Arcane Dimensions 1.7 rather than 1.5. Note that 1.7 will go into a different folder than 1.5, so if you want to clean up an existing 1.5 install you will have to handle that manually.

- Fixed the installation of the Arcanum mod to also include the required Drake mod in the same folder.

- Added 30 or so additional things to install, as a result of re-interpreting "highly rated" and also picking up newer releases.

- Added the ability to launch into Quake directly from the installer.

- Documented r_viewmodel_quake in autoexec.cfg.example. Works for both Mark V and Quakespasm.


**** v1.6 (Sep 2017)

- Updated some minor comments here and there.

- Rewrote the discussion of "quake.rc" a bit, to reflect the new behavior of Quakespasm 0.93.0.

- Included a newer version of Simple Quake Launcher.


**** v1.5 (Aug 2017)

- Moved a lot of autoexec.cfg commentary into a separate file autoexec-cfg-example-annotated.txt, because of traditional engine limits on cfg file sizes.

- Tweaks to some messages that the installer prints and to readme file content.

- Fixed bug where installer would not look across multiple disk drives for pak files.

- Fixed issue of a dialog window sometimes popping up during installer run if a CD drive had been recently used but is now empty.


**** v1.4 (Feb 2017)

- Fixed issues in the pak-finder script affecting multi-disk systems and older Steam installs.


**** v1.3 (Feb 2017)

- Unified the batch files under an "uber-installer" so you only need to run one script.

- Did an editing/tweaking pass through the readmes.


**** v1.2 (Jan 2017)

- Fixed files in the release zip to have Windows-style line endings again.

- Added install_pakfiles.bat installer to find pak files on the local computer and copy them.


**** v1.1 (Jan 2017)

- Included build 1036 of the Mark V engines. This also includes the new DirectX 9 variant.

- Moved autoexec.cfg to autoexec.cfg.example. Don't want to stomp on any existing autoexec.cfg file when this package is unzipped. This also required a few changes to the basic/3_configuration.txt readme.

- Removed the included config.cfg. Moved the sv_aim setting to autoexec.cfg.example.

- Added more discussion of config files/settings in autoexec.cfg.example, and a few other additions and corrections to comments about specific settings.

- Added example setting for water warp effect strength.

- Changed a couple of installer batch files (install_modern_episodes.bat and install_other_picks.bat) to print messages about required basegames.

- Added a comment about DX9 runtime requirement (for DX9 engine variant) in the basic/1_setup.txt readme.

- Changed the basic/2_running.txt readme to mention autosaves and the DX9 engine variant.

- Changed the maps_and_mods/3_explore_more.txt readme to describe how to make Quake Injector and Mark V share the same downloaded-zipfiles folder.

- Changed the other_stuff/no_launcher.txt readme to add discussion of quake.rc.

- Added mention of the Linux Mark V build to the other_stuff/not_windows.txt readme.


*** v1.0 (Dec 2016)