Team Fortress 2 top secret project to be revealed this year, Meet the Pyro on the way
A new post on the Team Fortress 2 blog sketches out Valve’s 2012 plans for the shooter, which include mention of not one, but two secret projects. We can so far confirm that the first will not be a hat, or a map, or as the blog post suggests, a freakish map-hat hybrid. The second will have something to do with this year’s Saxxy Awards, which rates the community’s best video replays.
TF2 crafting minigame teaches you recipes (and makes you want to play TF2)
Team Fortress 2′s loot drops crept in to my brain. At first, random items were enough. Then I had a stint of trading with friends. Then those friends became random internet men. Eventually I replaced “trade” with “buy” and “drops” with “purchases.” I started buying hats and name tags and paint and… DAMN you Valve and your clever ways, exploiting my weak brain and its desire for virtual loot.
As highlighted by Reddit, this fan-made game uses your Team Fortress 2 crafting knowledge for good. You’re tasked with creating rare stuff from an ever-expanding inventory. It’s both educational and fun.
Don’t know your Refined Metal from your Reclaimed Metal? Start here.
Steam mobile app now free to all
Last week Valve released the Steam app beta into the wild. Within hours hundreds of Steam users were receiving messages through Steam chat on their PCs saying things like “OMG I’m sending this from my mobile can u tell?” except with more spelling mistakes, because their fingers were shaking with raw, on-the-go excitement.
It’s now freely available to everyone with an iPhone or Android device on the App Store and Android Market respectively. It’ll let you access Steam chat and buy games through Steam on the fly. A vital tool for Steam sales to come.
Team Fortress 2 video shows ten spectacular kills
Here are ten TF2 kill clips to make you go “whaaaat,” courtesy of CommFT. They’ve taken the best of all the kill replays submitted to the Extelevision site during December and ordered them according to their awesomeness. The list features some blinding kill streaks, a jammy but spectacular reflected grenade triple-kill, a remarkable string of headshots and a stunning three-rocket juggle kill. The list demonstrates how TF2′s calamitous physics can result in some baffling mid-air encounters. Only the very best players can exploit these to earn game-winning ubers and vital kills. It’s fantastic to watch.
28,000 fans to play Half-Life 2 this Saturday, why not join them?
This Saturday the 28,000 members of this Steam group are planning to play Half-Life 2 together. It’s single player, of course, but there’s nothing stopping fans from getting together to stroke their chins and nod slowly in mass mutual appreciation for one of the best shooters ever made.
The group hopes that the massive play session will shoot Half-Life 2 up the Steam most-played list and let Valve know how many people are still waiting for Half-Life 2: Episode 3. Valve certainly know this already, and probably receive dozens of emails every day asking “WHERE AM HL3?” but the group hopes to deliver the message in a more appreciative way.
Steam app coming to iOS and Android
Valve have just announced that a Steam app is incoming for iOS and Android. It’ll support chat, groups and screenshots. You’ll even be able to purchase games when on the move.
Lord of Valve, Gabe Newell seems keen: “Seeing which of your friends are online and playing a game, sending quick messages, looking at screenshots for an upcoming game, or catching a sale – these are all features customers have requested. Mobile is changing way people interact, play games and consume media, and the Steam app is part of our commitment to meet customer demands and expand the service functionality of Steam to make it richer and more accessible for everyone.”
Video – comparing Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
We’ve dug into Valve’s sorta-sequel Counter-Strike: Global Offensive to try and gather some data on the only question we (and probably you, too) care about—what’s different? Within, we compare map segments, weapon animations and audio, smoke grenade opacity, bomb planting time, and other elements from all PC versions of Counter-Strike.
Tell us what other aspects of CS you’d like to see scrutinized, and we’ll get crackin’ on them.
Steam is doing quite well: 100% sales increase, 40 million registered accounts
We know that Steam’s on the grow, the five million concurrent users earlier this week indicated as much. Valve have released some more info to prove that their digital distribution service is still expanding at an impressive clip.
Sales have grown by 100% for the seventh year in a row in 2011. There are now 1800 games on Steam. 40 million people have registered for accounts (though not all will be active), and 780 Petabytes of data has been distributed to customers over the course of the year. 19 million items have also been traded. Valve don’t mention how many of those were hats.
Steam hits five million concurrent players
Happy new year! We’re back of from two weeks of balancing dutiful shifts of family time with prolonged periods of PC gaming. From the look of Steam’s player stats page, we’re not alone. Steam has just broken the five million concurrent users barrier.
League of Legends – PC Gamer UK’s free game of the year
Do you remember the tail end of 2010? We all wore rags and lived in dirt-floored shacks, dinosaurs ruled the Earth, and ‘free to play’ was still a dirty set of words. 2011 saw those words climb into the word shower and wash themselves clean, courtesy of League of Legends.
Portal 2 – PC Gamer UK’s co-op game of the year
In most co-operative games, players don’t work together so much as work beside one another. The closest you’ll get to real teamwork is pulling the trigger at the same time. Portal 2 doesn’t work that way. Its co-op problems are impossible without a friend, and each reality-twisting solution forces you to share a brain.
Left 4 Dead fan film features some surprising cameos
This is the full length version of the Left 4 Dead fan film that was teased two weeks ago. With Bill’s tragic demise, the Left 4 Dead crew are a member short. On the way to a safe room three blocks away they find a replacement. And then another one. And then another, until everything’s gone a bit mad. Which one would you pick to become the crew’s new fourth member?
Ladies, brace yourselves. Secret wedding ring item added to Team Fortress 2
A sly Team Fortress 2 update yesterday added a secret wedding ring as a craftable item. It’s called “Something Special for Someone Special” and is described as being a “level 100 ring.” The item wasn’t revealed in the patch notes. Players posted their discovery on the Team Fortress 2 wiki after digging through the file changes made by the update.
Gigantic Steam holiday sale stuffs stockings with games, coal
Hey, wait, didn’t we just get done shaking off the cruel shackles of poverty after the last one of these things? Oh well, unnecessary luxuries like roofs, walls, and food are largely inconsequential in the face of really great videogame deals. And man, if day one’s deals are any indication, this will be quite the hall-decking holiday haul. I mean, using my patented Raving Lunatic advocate scale, Portal 2 at $7.49 is a “BUY IT,” Just Cause 2 at $4.99 is a “Buyitbuyitbuyit,” and Orcs Must Die at $3.74 is a “[Violently collapses and begins foaming at the mouth]“.
The holiday sale’s also hosting a meta game that involves collecting coal. Basically, if you complete daily objectives, you’ll walk away with free games. But if you commit the naughtiest act of all – failure – you’ll receive a lump of coal. That coal, however, can be used to enter the Epic Holiday Giveaway. And if you win? Well, you’ll find every game on Steam waiting under your virtual tree. So then, make with the indiscriminate purchasing. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to fish my beggar’s clothes out of the dumpster. And probably some days-old pizza. May as well get a head start.
Team Fortress 2 Australian Christmas event adds new map, new items, doubles drop rate
The Team Fortress 2 Australian Christmas celebratory extravaganza is go! The free update adds a new control point map called Foundry which, according to the achievements list, will feature a big, deadly cauldron fire. Pyros and Engineers get new class packs and 50 items are 75% off in the Mann-Co store. The update is detailed on the Australian Christmas page on the Team Fortress 2 site. “But what about the new hats?” you’re perhaps asking, clawing at your unhatted head with eager fingers. Read on and all shall be revealed.
