TF Team

For general feedback about the game.

Steam Support

Visit the support site for any issues you may be having with the game or Steam.

We have you surrounded, at least from this side.

August 4, 2009 - Mike Booth

We've been shirking our updating duties here, so we thought it'd be a good time to do some quick housekeeping:

• We recieved a bunch of positive responses to the release of the .vmf source behind our official TF2 maps. As a result, we've decided to go ahead and release the source behind all the player character models, as well as associated animations. We hope this will make it much easier for custom modellers to design new character models, and for machinima makers to have more control over how characters animate in their movies. Look for that SDK update in the next week or so.
• The folks over at tf2maps are running a new competition to make a map using their nifty new Swamp Theme. Go take a look, maybe you'll make a popular map and we'll end up knocking on your door asking to include it in the next TF2 update.
• We've been super impressed by Waar's detailed post on the forums describing how to get into the more competitive side of TF2. If you think you're reaching the point where you're ready for more of a challenge, check it out.

More dot-commy mumbo jumbo for you bunch of women

July 15, 2009 - The Soldier

At ease, you worthless sons of mothers!

I've been asked to present our internet blog-reading public with this handsome collection of avatars, which I'm told you can use on Steam. I don't mind telling you I have no idea what any of the words in that last sentence meant. This is the problem with the youth of today: too much time inventing nonsense words, not enough time taking a bullet in the lung defending a hill. I don't have to know what the hell twitters and texting and body sprays are to understand that they're not the sort of thing men should be engaged in. Like conversations, or painting things that aren't a house.

The following is a short list of things men should be engaged in, at all times:

1. Getting a haircut
2. Yelling
3. Digesting ribs
4. Hill defense

At any rate, enjoy your pretty portraits, Fried Green Tomatoes. Don't cry all over 'em when you're painting pictures of poems tonight, or you might electrocute yourselves.

Get 'em, boyos!

June 15, 2009 - Dave Riller

Today we're releasing an update to the Source SDK that includes the .vmf source files for many of the official TF2 maps. This is something we've wanted to do for a while, especially as we've been growing the range of game modes in TF. Here's the list of maps that are included in the update: Lumberyard, Ravine, Badlands, Dustbowl, Granary, Gravelpit, 2Fort, Badwater, Goldrush, and Hydro.

For the beginner map makers out there, we hope this gives you an easier entry point by allowing you to alter or edit an existing map, as opposed to being forced to start from scratch. For example, you could start by fine-tuning cover in Goldrush, alter the layout of Granary, or tweak the amount of health and ammo in Gravelpit. Or maybe you just have a ton of ideas on how you think you could improve Hydro or 2Fort. We'd love to see what you come up with.

For the experienced map makers, we hope this gives you a variety of examples of how we design and construct levels, the tools we use to finish the aesthetic/thematic elements, and some specific implementation solutions to performance and networking problems. We also hope that it'll reduce the amount of confusion around the game logic and entity setup required for the various TF game modes.

Our plan is to get more of our TF content source out in the SDK, so look for more maps & model sources in the future.

Some Manner of Grid-based Cipher Code

June 8, 2009 - The Soldier

The men at TF2maps.net have devised some sort of box puzzle that they thought you'd enjoy. Let me clear this up right now: They are incorrect in this thinking. I have stared at this blasted thing all morning and I can't make heads or tails of it. This is the problem with today's youth, if you ask me. Spending all their time devising clever boxy word puzzles instead of doing something constructive, like pushups, or jumping on a live grenade, or sitting in a foxhole cradling a man in your arms and watching the blood run out of him and the life drain from his eyes, or sit-ups.

At any rate, here's the puzzle. There are only twenty-odd letters in the alphabet, so presumably it's just trial and error picking which ones go where. When you're finished, why not celebrate with some pushups?

Every one of you deserves a medal!

May 22, 2009 - Erik Johnson

First off, a quick note: We put so much stuff into this update that we didn't manage to cover it all on the internets before the update went live, so we made a special Bonus page. In addition, our merchandising crew had as much fun coming up with Spy & Sniper themed merchandise as we did making the update, so make sure you go and check it all out.



Secondly, we wanted to take a moment to talk about the new item drop system in the update, since we're getting a lot of questions about it.

Why did we build a new system?

• With our first four class updates we were tying the new weapons for each class to a set of achievements. Our intention was to make a set of achievements that eventually all players would get, and would be fun to get along the way. In some cases we did a good job at this (Scout), and in some cases we did a bad one (Medic). Across all of the class packs we were disappointed in the number of people that got to play with the new weapons, and feedback from the community was generally not favorable with this approach.

What did we do?

• For the last number of months we've been working on using the Steam Cloud to store a player's inventory. With that finally in place, we were able to deploy a new system focused on the giving of items to players. That new system watches the amount of time that players are playing TF2, and gives them a chance to find items at regular intervals. They aren't guaranteed to get the item at those points, but they have a pretty good chance. We based the system on granting items on the amount of time played because we don't want players to have to do weird things like join achievement grinding servers to get new content. Basing it off time also has the benefit of ensuring that if you play a lot of TF2, you're going to get more items than players who don't.

How long do I have to play to get an item?

• When we were tuning this system we first looked at the average amount of time that players spend playing TF2 daily. From there, we set the goal of most players having around 20 items in their inventory after a couple of weeks of play. If you're someone who plays a lot of TF2, you're going to get items a lot faster than that. In the first few hours after the release yesterday, we had some issues that prevented the system from working properly, so that timeframe was not indicative of the system as it's designed.

Is this the way we'll find items from now on?

• Like everything else we build, we'll be iterating on this system for a while, and have a lot of features planned. Some of the next things we have planned are:
  
  - Item trading. This is why you're finding duplicates.
  
  - Giving players a method to influence the system so they   can work directly toward getting specific items.
  
  - Adding more rare items like the hats.
  
  We're going to be working on and rolling these out while we're also working on the next class pack, with the goal being to get it all released before then.

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