This outlines the next milestone and its estimated time to completion. Overall, I expect a final completed and debugged QS3 version to be released by Christmas 2005. In between expect regular alpha and beta releases. The feature list is shorter than the actual. There is almost 12 months between QS3′s conception and this upcoming milestone release – so lots of developments, backtracks, and even rewrites have been omitted.

Milestone 1
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Version: Quantum Star SE 3.0.0-0.6a
Branch Version: 0.0.6
Due Date: 31 May 2005

Details:
0.0.6 will be the first all-round playable version of Quantum Star SE 3. It all started in May 2004, so our release will mark the anniversary of QS3′s conception by myself and Hades. It will have taken 4 months of reseach and proof-of-concept coding, 2 months of experiments with the Shadows Rising RPG game, and another 4 months of work on the backend, frontend CMS, and other "invisible" components that make the game tick. 0.0.5 was written in the space of just 5 weeks, so expect fast-paced progress from hereon in.

This version will be playable, supporting turn-based play with mining. Clans are not yet implemented at this stage (remember I am using NO code from QS2 – everything is written from scratch). Planets are barely functioning and will be finished for the next version. Simplistic gameplay perhaps, but this is one huge stride forward from QS2.

Features:

- QS3 play is completely intuitive to any QS2 player (the details may have changed but the same game features remain!)
- new UniGen process (kindly donated by MJac)
- multiple homeworld support (number set in game variables)
- new attribute based ship system to enable future dynamic growth in ship properties and abilities
- homeworlds now support ship shop, equipment shop, devices shop and fighter shop
- all shop processes updated and hardened against potential cheats
- fleets are now an integrated element of gameplay – not an after-thought addition
- page loading speed is now determined by no. of fleets – not ships.
- layout has been bumped from pure text and tables, to a clearly defined CSS layout – cleaner, neater and compatible with all browsers.
- layout is entirely template driven – expect multiple themes in the future!
- new Menu/Nav system enables dynamic menus, prevents url and backspace cheats, blocks url doping/editing
- new port system – ports have been completely updated and will soon support partial capacity buying/selling, trading, resource warehousing, and much more.
- database driven content – everything from ships to devices are stored on the database, as part of a Game Module. In the future, users will be able to run several different Game Modules on the same server.
- unified maintenance – built for speed, the unified maintenance is being designed to run every 10-20 minutes and handles all the functions normally requiring two QS2 maint files.
- new database design – suffering from 2.147E symptoms? tired of watching SS#1 take 5 minutes to load? The new database structure offers increased options for future development, supports more complete SQL querying, manages large numbers more dependably.
- integrated help, if enabled help icons will supply popup help on game functions and features.
- faster page loading. QS3 supports SQL caching, template caching, gzip compression of output, optimised sql querying, optimised data handling and simpler CSS styled pages which can lead to both shorter page execution and transmission times. Get pages from the server to the client up to 95% faster.
- dedicated Q-Site 0.5 Backend/Frontend. Q-Site is the games dedicated backend, bringing an advanced appset to bear on the game. From templating to SQL abstraction, XSS filtering to SHA256 password hashing Q-Site integrates these and many others into the game ensuring security, cheat protection and stability.
- alpha version of the Q-Site CMS – a light weight frontend for posting news, handling logins/signups, and displaying the game listing.
- total filesize is 45% less than QS2!
- newly updated installation process, with updated path detection and automatic error resolution.
- PHP register_globals off compatible

- Increased (in-progress) security protection including XSS Filtering, Form Fingerprinting, Encrypted Database Backed Sessions, Challenge/Response Login System, Session ID Regeneration, and SHA256 Password Hashing (upgraded from MD5).