This year's Team Fortress 2 Halloween event features a real cursed Scout cosmetic

The Scout carries the torso of a second, screaming Scout
(Image credit: Valve)

Valve continues running annual Halloween events in Team Fortress 2, with the latest edition, Scream Fortress 13, now live. As has been the trend with Scream Fortress for a while now, the focus is on community-created content, adding six maps, five taunts, 13 war paints, 28 unusual effects, and 20 cosmetics, all made by members of the Team Fortress 2 community.

And yes, one of those community-contributed cosmetics is incredibly cursed. Called the Corpse Carrier, it makes the Scout look like he's carrying the severed torso of a second Scout, who remains alive enough to emote, shoot, and even dance. That's because, to spoil the magic, it's supposed to be one of those pick-me-up costumes that make you look like you're being carried off by an alien or a large man in lederhosen or whatever. That means only the front Scout is real, and is the one you should be shooting at.

Funny thing is, the Corpse Carrier isn't Halloween-restricted like most of the cosmetics players earn during Scream Fortress. You'll be able to disturb people with this baby all year round. Meanwhile, I can only wear my Horseless Headless Horsemann's Head during the spoopy month, or if it's a full moon.

Scream Fortress 13 runs through November 7, and all Halloween contracts have been reset so players can complete them again. Though anti-bot patches have been deployed to cut down on the number of bots plaguing the game, in my experience they're still common in quick-play mode and joining community servers remains the best way to avoid them.

Jody Macgregor
Weekend/AU Editor

Jody's first computer was a Commodore 64, so he remembers having to use a code wheel to play Pool of Radiance. A former music journalist who interviewed everyone from Giorgio Moroder to Trent Reznor, Jody also co-hosted Australia's first radio show about videogames, Zed Games. He's written for Rock Paper Shotgun, The Big Issue, GamesRadar, Zam, Glixel, Five Out of Ten Magazine, and Playboy.com, whose cheques with the bunny logo made for fun conversations at the bank. Jody's first article for PC Gamer was about the audio of Alien Isolation, published in 2015, and since then he's written about why Silent Hill belongs on PC, why Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale is the best fantasy shopkeeper tycoon game, and how weird Lost Ark can get. Jody edited PC Gamer Indie from 2017 to 2018, and he eventually lived up to his promise to play every Warhammer videogame.