Using a HalfLife thing wont work as the formats are still completely different.
I just got back from another 2 week absence, but anyway, I've got some texture animation decoded aswell, though still very unsupported, but it's getting there.
As for betas, I'm not sure. I think I'm just going to eventually release a near-completed application. You never know though. And yes, SkippyJr had discovered the compression algorithm.
I also have Material Subsets coded... meaning models such as the MP2 Multiplater suits (which are differnent colors) are actually just one single model, that has material subsets. These have been all read nicely and are now able to hop to different subsets (another example is her In-Game arm cannon, its actually a single model, but uses material subsets)
I've found diffenent types of alphas for the models (some are ADDed, some are 50% opaque, etc).. however I still need to code my viewer to be able to handle these types of alpha