Even since the mention of QL 2.0 I allowed myself to expect a few things: ranked matchmaking (ladder, with rank shown or not) for duel and other mods, an automated tournament creation system, free freezetag (this one's edited in) or something else of similar importance, expecting that the developers understood that that was what the game needed.

Now, I can't be absolutely sure how this pertains to the idea of the QL 2.0, or even if it's associated. However, considering the relatively slow pace of development for QL, I wouldn't expect a standalone version to coincide with something else that's big, so it seems likely that this is the same thing.

So what can understand from this?
Well, it seems like they're forced to create a standalone version due to changes in plugin support. They're doing what they're forced to do, not creating something better with the ambition to revive the game.

The interface isn't going to be recreated. The same inherently laggy browser interface is going to be continued, describing their level of interest perfectly, I fear.

No game-breaking features are announced or even mentioned. The whole post is nearly void of any actual promises, and the magnitude of described day-1 features seems to confirm this.

What could actually give hope is this sentence, in two parts:

change will allow us to have greater control over the game environment

A more free system for maps, or mods perhaps? Can't read anything from this,

more tightly integrate the game with the online components going forward

At best, a gloriously anticipated automated tournament system. Or, more likely, some way to get more statistics from tournaments and an interface/page to follow their progress.

The problem with these two is that with the lack of the sense of ambition in the whole announcement doesn't allow us to expect anything big, so the more modest conclusions seem more likely. Leaving the standard practice of claiming excitement about your announcement to sound cheap, ironic and cruelly automated.

Alternatively, they're just announcing what they have to without giving out anything and they will actually get more people for a couple of months and develop the few fairly simple things the lack of which deemed the game a failure with it's release. Then they're going to make sure a rerelease of the game is not going to be dampened by its previous disappointing history, and promote it to get the same amount of people they got coming out of beta. Containing their promises within one sentence in the whole announcement is just there to make sure we don't expect it.

As I type this post though, SyncError is messing with my mind. But if it isn't QL 2.0, then why waste an opportunity to create a true rerelease, and why give away the impression that they're not ramping up development? Seems counter-intuitive, but I hope that's just me.

Of course, this disappointment of mine is wholly associated with my expectations for QL 2.0 - a healthy playerbase and Quake's entrance into the modern world of esports with money and spectators. I'm not saying I won't enjoy the few neat features, as frustrated at the ineptitude of a big company that couldn't realize it had something great as I may be.