Besides weapons, there are now many more power-ups available. The Quad damage has been replaced by the "toned-down" triple-damage (I really don't understand why, it kills in 1 hit anyway). Invisibility is VERY cool… sporting the predator effect; if you remain completely still, you are almost undetectable. The regeneration power-up acts like the AutoDoc in Quake II CTF, slowly bringing you up to 200life/200 armor, which is the maximum in the game. And last is the health pack, which is like the MedKit in Duke3D, boosting your life back too 100 in sticky situations. There is also a personal teleporter, allowing you to instantly press a button and teleport to a random respawn area. In a tough spot? Just press a key and instantly teleport back to your base!

But gameplay isn't the only important factor which will make Q3A a breakthrough. John Carmack and the rest of the id team have worked very hard on improving the Internet code. Besides, the gameplay can be the most innovative ever seen, but the game will still be crap if everyone gets a 700ms ping! (Sorry AOL users... no one can save you). So not only have the graphics been redone, but the network code as well.

Because of all the optimizations to the code, this will most likely be the smoothest and fastest online game yet. Most effects have been moved to the client side, such as weapon switching, muzzle flashes, and firing sounds. Another advancement is the movement of objects. Since most projectiles and other objects tend to move in a straight line, sent data can be saved by simply giving each object a set path and a start time, instead of mapping out the whole trail. Not only will this smooth out the lag, but also keep stray movements from occurring (ever notice how that rocket sometimes seems to "pause" and skip every once in a while?).

But what about players? They don't move in straight lines (unless you play with a gamepad), and make highly erratic movements, making it difficult to properly map their motion. So instead, the client will take educated guesses in predicting what the player will do next, and just where they can move. This will cut down on bandwidth, and also reduce the amount of "jitter" you can experience if you move in several directions in a short period of time. And since we all know that Quake II performance was already almost perfect, this is simply icing on the cake. And the last improvement would be the interface. You don't need Gamespy any more. Q3A has its own server pinger built in. The major plan is to be able to get into a game "within 3 clicks of the mouse."