NS Radio will be broadcasting a live interview with Flayra this Saturday, February 1st at 3pm EST. Use "Open Location" in Winamp (control-L) and paste in this URL to listen http://www.natural-selection.org/listen.pls. If you have a question you'd like to hear answered, write Zazi.
Thanks to Tag and Nullsoft for donating a Shoutcast server to make NS Radio possible.
In other news, the map submission deadline for NS v1.1 has been set for Friday, February 14th. See this forum thread for details.
Natural Selection version 1.04 is now available, and all servers are encouraged to update. The features and balance have been tweaked extensively, so be sure to read this changelog for the final list of changes.
NS v1.04 includes all the changes in v1.01, v1.02 and v1.03 so only this file must be downloaded and installed to bring the server up to date. Players do not need to download this file unless they want to host their own games.
The next update will be v1.1, and will contain more significant feature updates and new content. NS is just getting started...
Read full changelog.
Download NS v1.04 now from Redphive.org MD5SUM: e221ffe39e5d7ad0b5d0d7b2f1c890b3 (no other mirrors are needed currently)
Lots of things are happening with NS right now. NS v1.04 is still in testing, and will include the changes listed below, plus linux optimizations, better logging for Psychostats support and more exploits fixes. Please don't e-mail anyone on the team about becoming a beta server, as no more are needed. Testing continues, and it will be released as soon as it's ready, probably within the next few days.
The marine and alien screenshots sections of the website have been updated, though more work still needs to be done here. If you have a flattering screenshot, feel free to send it along to the team (800x600, .jpg only) and it could be posted on the site. Finally, NS v1.1 has finally been announced. This will be the first client patch for NS, and will be a huge update. Here are some general details, though these certainly aren't all the changes you can expect:
- A couple new maps. Fixes and improvements to existing maps - HLTV support (to enable HLTV demos for competitive play, and to allow large-scale spectating of high-profile games) - VALVe Anti-Cheat (VAC) support - Improved demo playback functionality - Commander mode improvements (hotgroups, next-marine, select-all, order giving to minimap, etc.) - Tournament mode changes for CAL support - Gameplay changes to alien upgrades, to make them all equally viable in the early game - Alien resource model changes to speed up the early game and allow multiple gorges to be viable - Bug fixes and exploit fixes (bunny-hopping, ex_ variables, r_draw variables, more)
There is no ETA on v1.1 yet, but the team is actively working on it. NS is about to get a whole lot better...
It took a bit longer then desired, but v1.04 has been updated with more bug fixes and balance changes, and is now undergoing more testing. Look for servers with "v1.04" in their name to play it before it's released.
Here is the [file=changelogs/v104-changelog.html]updated changelog[/file] (note that the changelog posted on 12/23 is now outdated and should be ignored).