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It’s been a big week for Team Fortress 2‘s modding community (well, specifically a big eight days, but let’s call it a week for convenience). Last Tuesday, Valve finally released The Team Fortress 2 SDK, updating the Source SDK with all the netcode gubbins from its 2007 shooter, thereby enabling players to “build completely new games based on TF2.” Now, one of the best existing Team Fortress 2 mods is formally coming to Steam, making it easier to play than ever.
Team Fortress 2 Classic is a professional-grade mod that reimagines the shooter’s early years, before the hats and the bots. Commencing in 2014, it initially released in 2020 in non-vapourous form, and has been consistently updated since. Developer Eminoma announced the move to Steam in a short, daft Steam update: “‘Steam’ is a mysterious resource created when coal is burned in certain situations — a harrowing thought to coal-lovers like the civilian, to whom burning coal is like setting one’s own children on fire. But maybe a foray into the Steam industry is just what the company needs to capture new eyes.”
The civilian is TF2’s Classic’s bespoke playable class, based on a character of the same name from the VIP mode of Team Fortress Classic. It’s one of numerous features the mod adds to TF2’s pre-2010 skeleton, alongside reverse-engineered versions of TF2 prerelease weapons like the Nailgun and Dynamite pack, and a chaotic “four-team” mode that adds green and yellow factions alongside red and blue.
As well as these “new-old” features—ideas inspired by or excavated from Team Fortress’ past—TF2 Classic also adds “new-new” features, including weapons like flak cannons and “chains wrapped around your fists” as well as custom modes like VIP Race, where each team gets a civilian who must capture control points in enemy territory. It’s basically an alternate history for Team Fortress 2, imagining a more traditional update path for Valve’s shooter.
Eminoma hasn’t announced a specific date for the Steam release, but it does explain that this milestone is far from the end for TF2 Classic. “A team full of contributors is working nonstop on content, balance changes, and bug fixes,” writes Eminoma on the mod’s fancy new Steam page. “Anticipate new weapons, modes, and characters as Team Fortress 2 Classic grows.”
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Kurt Indovina
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