Bugfix release 0.6.2 planned [UPDATED!]

EDIT: Sorry everyone, I was concluding too quickly. After writing to our project leader hiker, I got this answer:

If we get confirmation that the 'sudden crash' bug is fixed, and Auria and myself have time, we'll do a .2 release.

Thus, don't count on it, and I am very sorry for this incident. I did not intend to create hopes for something that might not happen. Next time around, I will make sure if a new branch means a new release.
Let's hope 0.7 will come soon to replace your disappointment with joy.

ORIGINAL MESSAGE:

Because of some minor bugs, one of them regarding the plunger item, a new bugfix release has been suggested by the SuperTuxKart team. One of the reasons behind this decision is the upcoming version of the popular Linux distribution 'Ubuntu'. 0.6.2 will probably become the last version of the SuperTuxKart 0.6 series.

"STK w/Irrlicht": Race details

Okay, I'll admit that the previous blog post wasn't that informative, so this time I'll try to give more info, and less blah blah.

In-race GUI

As you can see, the timer, kart positions, minimap and lap counter have been added, as well as FPS reporting and countdown at start, and so forth.

Another thing is the boxy and ugly look of the track. This is because karts/tracks/objects now need to be exported with normals included in order to get proper smoothing, which most stuff doesn't have at the moment. So for all modelers wanting to create for 0.7 and beyond: export everything with the normals included in your b3d file - if you have questions about this, please look at the wiki pages or ask at the forums.

Also, xapantu has made a kart exporter for the Irrlicht version of SuperTuxKart, which can be found in this forum thread, together with details on how it works.

Lastly, but not leastly, we have got some help with the plunger and cake by david, making them easier to use with success in the game.

Now it might seem that SuperTuxKart got more than enough contributors, but that just isn't the case - there are only two main contributors at the moment (maybe more in some time), so we are always looking for more programmers, modelers, musicians, donators or simply useful feedback.

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Note: As the "STK w/Irrlicht" branch is still in a very unstable state, the general public is recommended to use the latest stable version (0.6.1a) of SuperTuxKart.

"STK w/Irrlicht": Player math

Welcome to the first update this month. There have been so many changes since last time that I'll give you some of the news now, and the rest of it later, so stay tuned. :)
You may wonder what "Player math" was supposed to mean. It doesn't have with "Oliver's Math Class" to do, but good guess.

"Players" screen

Here we do the math: adding and subtracting and multipl(a)ying... erm, at least the first two. It impacts the kart/profile selection screen now as well.
Not only that, it's now possible for another controller to join the game as another player, though work has just been started on the complicated matters of offline multiplayer. Online multiplayer is, as you might know, not scheduled for SuperTuxKart 0.7.

In other news, there's been a lot of code cleanups, work on the new driveline system and animation support, optimizations in the menus and so on. Most of this is quite a work in progress, but as I said, there's more news to come.

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Note: As the "STK w/Irrlicht" branch is still in a very unstable state, the general public is recommended to use the latest stable version (0.6.1a) of SuperTuxKart.