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Team Fortress 2

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Team Fortress 2
The Team Fortress 2 title art.
Team Fortress 2 is bundled as part of The Orange Box.
Developer(s)Valve Corporation
Publisher(s)Valve Corporation
Designer(s)Robin Walker, John Cook
Composer(s)
EngineSource engine
Platform(s)PC, Xbox 360, PS3
ReleaseMicrosoft Windows
& Xbox 360 (Retail):
[1]



Microsoft Windows (Steam):


PlayStation 3:



[2]
Genre(s)First-person shooter
Mode(s)Multiplayer

Team Fortress 2 (TF2) is a multiplayer team-based first-person shooter, developed by Valve Corporation as part of the game compilation The Orange Box.

The game was announced in 1998 as a sequel to the original Team Fortress mod for Quake, but has since been through various concepts and designs. In 1999, the game appeared to be deviating from the original Team Fortress (and Valve's own Team Fortress Classic, a mod for Half-Life) by heading toward a more realistic and militaristic style of gameplay, but the design metamorphosed further over the game's nine-year development. The final rendition of Team Fortress 2 bears more resemblance to the original Team Fortress and Team Fortress Classic games, and sports a cartoon-like visual style, based on the art of J. C. Leyendecker[4] following a popular trend in recent CGI films (in particular, films recently made by Pixar/Disney, such as The Incredibles).

The lack of information or apparent progress for six years of the game's development caused it to be labeled as vaporware, and it was regularly featured in Wired News' annual vaporware list among other ignominies.[5] The game was officially released on October 10, 2007.

Development history

Origins

Originally planned as a free mod for Quake, development on Team Fortress 2 switched to the GoldSrc/Half-Life engine in 1998 after the development team Team Fortress Software - consisting of Robin Walker and John Cook - were first contracted and finally outright employed by Valve Corporation.[6] At the point of Team Fortress Software's acquisition production moved up a notch and the game was promoted to a standalone, retail product;[6] to tide fans over—since, as well as time issues, much of the Team Fortress player base had purchased Half-Life solely in anticipation of the free release of Team Fortress 2—work began on a simple port of the game which was released in 1999 as the free Team Fortress Classic (TFC).[7] Notably, TFC was built entirely within the publicly available Half-Life SDK as an example to the community and industry of its flexibility.[8]

Walker and Cook had been heavily influenced by their three-month contractual stint at Valve, and now they were working full-time on their design, which was undergoing rapid metamorphosis. Team Fortress 2 was to be a modern war game, with a command hierarchy including a commander with a bird's-eye view of the battlefield, parachute drops over enemy territory, networked voice communication and numerous other innovations.[9] This initial design for Team Fortress 2 is quite possibly the only game to have spawned a thriving sub-genre without ever being released itself.

File:Tf2box.jpg
A logo for the 'old' Team Fortress 2.

E3 1999

The new design was revealed to the public at the 1999 E3, where it earned several awards including Best Online Game and Best Action Game.[10] By this time Team Fortress 2 had gained a new subtitle, Brotherhood of Arms, and the results of Walker and Cook working at Valve were becoming clear. Several new and at the time unprecedented technologies on show: Parametric animation seamlessly blended animations for smoother, more life-like movement,[11] and Intel's Multi-resolution mesh[11] technology dynamically reduced the detail of on-screen elements as they became more distant to improve performance[11] (a technique made obsolete by decreasing memory costs; today games use a technique known as level of detail, which uses more memory but less processing power). No release date was given at the exposition.

In mid-2000, Valve announced that development of Team Fortress 2 had been delayed for a second time.[12] They put the news down to development switching to an in-house, proprietary engine that is today known as the Source engine. It was at around this time that all news ran dry and Team Fortress 2 entered its notorious six-year radio silence, which was to last until July 13, 2006. During that time, both Walker and Cook worked on various other Valve projects—Walker was project lead on Half-Life 2: Episode One and Cook became a Steam developer, among other tasks—raising doubts that Team Fortress 2 was really the active project that would be repeatedly described.

The game's styling has changed drastically over its development.

"Invasion" design

When the Half-Life 2 source tree was leaked in late 2003 three Team Fortress 2 models were included, along with direct references to the game in the stolen source code. They consisted of an alien, Combine-like grunt and a very cartoon-like and out-of-proportion soldier. The code was interpreted by fans as making references to the Seven Hour War, an integral part of the Half-Life story; however, the two leaked player models did not look Combine or human.[citation needed]

The Source SDK was released with the Half-Life 2 source code, and also provided references to the game.[13] Some code merely confirmed what was already believed, but other segments provided completely new information, such as the presence of NPCs in multiplayer matches, the possibility of the game taking place in the Half-Life 2 universe, fixed plasma gun and missile launcher emplacements, and more.

None of the leaked information appears to have had any bearing on today's version of the game. This iteration was mentioned in an August 2007 interview with Gabe Newell by GameTrailers, in which he mentions "Invasion" as being the second-phase of Team Fortress 2's development under Valve Software.[14]

Final design

The next significant public development occurred in the run up to Half-Life 2's 2004 release: Valve's Director of Marketing Doug Lombardi claimed both that Team Fortress 2 was still in development and that information concerning it would come after Half-Life 2's release. This did not happen; nor was any news released after Lombardi's similar claim during an early interview regarding Half-Life 2: Episode One. [citation needed] Near the time of Episode One's release Gabe Newell again claimed that news on Team Fortress 2 would be forthcoming [citation needed] — and this time it was. Team Fortress 2 was re-unveiled a month later at the July 2006 EA Summer Showcase event.[15]

File:Tf2 engineerlaugh.jpg
The final design, sporting cartoon-style visuals.

Walker revealed in March 2007 that Valve had quietly built "probably three to four different games" before settling on their final design.[16] Due to the game's lengthy development cycle it is often mentioned alongside Duke Nukem Forever, another long-anticipated game that has seen many years of protracted development and engine changes.

The beta release of the game featured six multiplayer maps, of which three contain optional commentary by the developers on the game design, level design and character design, and provide more information on the history behind the development.[17] The commentary suggests that part of the reason for the intentionally cartoonish style was the difficulty in explaining the maps and characters in realistic terms -- questions like "Why would two teams put their bases so close to each other?" become more relevant when there is an emphasis on realism in a game.

The art style for the game was inspired by J. C. Leyendecker, as well as Dean Cornwell and Norman Rockwell[4]. Their distinctive styles of strong silhouettes and shading to draw attention to specific details were adapted in order to make the models distinct, with a focus on making the characters' team, class and current weapon distinct and easily identifiable.

The commentary also explains why the commander (a single player who sees a top-down map and is responsible for organizing the team) was not included in the final design: it was too hard to make the experience fun given a poor team and a good commander, or a good team and a poor commander.

Release

During the July 2006 Electronic Arts press conference, Valve revealed that Team Fortress 2 would ship as the multiplayer component of Half-Life 2: Episode Two. A conference trailer demonstrated the game's new graphical style featuring all of the original Team Fortress classes, pointed towards a more light-hearted and whimsical visual style as opposed to the dark, somewhat more traditional military simulation that had originally been shown. Gabe Newell, the managing director of Valve, said that their goal was to create "the best looking and best-playing class-based multiplayer game." The game is sold retail as part of The Orange Box. Newell also stated on a video interview with IGN that the game would be available via Steam on October 10, 2007.

A beta for Team Fortress 2 was released via Steam on September 17, 2007 for customers who pre-purchased the Orange Box and for those who activated their Black Box coupon, which was included with the ATI HD 2900XT Graphics cards. In addition to Orange Box customers, LAN gaming centers using the Steam for Cafe system have the game installed and ready to play.

Team Fortress 2 was released October 10, 2007 as both a standalone product via Steam and at retail stores as part of The Orange Box, a Half-Life 2 bundle pack priced at $49.95USD. The package also contains Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episode One, Half-Life 2: Episode 2 and Portal. Valve offered The Orange Box at a $5 discount for those who pre-purchased it via Steam before the October 10 release, as well as the opportunity to participate in the final beta test of Team Fortress 2.

Gameplay

Like its predecessors, Team Fortress 2 is built around two opposing but equal teams competing for an objective. These two teams are meant to represent construction companies: Reliable Excavation & Demolition (RED) and Builders League United (BLU). Players can choose to play as one of nine classes in these teams,[15][18] each with their own unique strengths and weaknesses. Although the abilities of a number of classes has changed from earlier Team Fortress incarnations, the basic elements of each class have remained.

The objective of the game is defined by the game mode in use. In capture the flag maps, the objective for both teams is to obtain a briefcase of intelligence from the enemy team's base and return it to their own base, at the same time as preventing the opposing team from doing the same.[19] Control point modes are more varied in their objectives, but share the common aim of capturing a particular point on the map.[19] In some maps, the objective for both teams is to secure all the points on the map. On other maps, one team already holds all the points and must defend them from the other for a set amount of time. A third variation, introduced with the map Hydro, is based on territory: each team must capture the other team's single control point to secure the section of the map. Once all sections have been captured by one team, they are then able to attack the other team's base directly.

Team Fortress 2 is the first of Valve Software's multiplayer games to incorporate detailed statistics for players. These statistics include the time spent playing as each class, average point score and the most captures or objectives achieved in a single round. Persistent statistics tell the player how they are improving in relation to these statistics, such as if a player comes close to their record for the damage inflicted in a round.[20] Team Fortress 2 also features numerous "achievements" for carrying out certain tasks, such as scoring a certain number of kills or completing a round within a certain time. Both achievements and statistics are displayed on the player's Steam Community profile page.

Classes

The nine playable classes have all returned from the original Team Fortress, although new classes may be added after the initial release.[21] The overall class structure is designed for balance, with effective strategies resulting from using a variety of the different classes in different strategies. Some classes are specifically designed to work well in conjunction with another class, such as heavies and medics.[22] To help new players understand class roles, classes are classified as offense, defense, and support, but any class can be played in any role.[20] Hand-thrown grenades, a controversial feature of previous Team Fortress versions, have been removed from every class in an effort to avoid unbalancing the game and to place more emphasis on class-specific abilities.[20]

Characters respond to the environment dynamically with dialogue, such as when on fire, destroying enemy structures, or at the start of a round. Each character also possesses unique taunts that can be used through the course of the game.

File:Tf2Scout.jpg
The scout.
Scout

The scout is lightly armored and is displayed as a young man with a Brooklyn accent,[citation needed] wearing running shoes, a baseball cap with a thin headset, dog tags and carrying a messenger bag over a team-colored t-shirt and armed with an underlever sawed-off shotgun, a pistol and an aluminum baseball bat. The fastest class in the game, the scout's role is to capture objectives once enemy defenses have been disabled.[22] Scouts are able to double jump, giving extra height to a leap and allowing a change of direction in mid-air.[22]

Soldier

The soldier is a slow moving class used for spearheading offensives through firepower.[22] Soldiers have a high damage tolerance and can boost themselves to higher platforms by rocket jumping. Speaking with a barrel-chested military drawl,[23] the soldier wears a team-colored American World War II army uniform and carries a rocket launcher, a shotgun and can use an entrenching tool for melee attacks.

In the advertisement series "Meet the Classes", a RED soldier is shown talking to BLU players about military strategy, involving a misinformed lecture on the role of Sun Tzu as the inventor of combat and zoos, as well as being involved in a variation on the life of Noah and a sport fighter. At the end of the lecture it is revealed that the BLU "players" are only severed heads of enemies that he has killed in the preceding battle.[23]

Pyro
File:Pyrotf2class.jpg
The pyro.

The pyro is an offensive class with average damage tolerance, equipped with a short-range flamethrower, a shotgun and a fire axe and wearing a team-colored fire retardant suit with a gas mask. It is near impossible to distinguish the class's nationality as the gas mask the pyro wears renders his speech nearly incomprehensible. The pyro's flamethrower is one of the most powerful short range weapons in the game, designed for ambushing enemies[22] and capable of setting other players alight.

Demoman

The demoman is a defensive class with average damage tolerance. Speaking with an intoxicated Scottish brogue,[24] the demoman wears a skull cap, an eyepatch and a team-coloured EOD suit. Armed with a grenade launcher, a remotely detonated sticky bomb launcher and a bottle of Scotch, demomen use their equipment for indirect fire onto targets and setting traps.[22]

The demoman received a video in the "Meet the Classes" advertisement series in October 2007. In it, the demoman is shown as a severe alcoholic with an annoyed attitude, noting bitterly that as a "black Scottish cyclops" he is quite rare.[24]

Heavy
File:Heavyclasstf2.jpg
The heavy.

The heavy is physically the toughest class in the game. This large character speaks with a thick Slavic accent[25] and wears a Kevlar vest over a team-colored shirt. Armed with a minigun, a shotgun and his fists, the heavy is used for both offensive power and defensive fire support.[22]

The heavy was the first class to receive a video in the advertisement series "Meet the Classes". In it, the heavy is seen as very obsessed with his weapon, citing its enormous costs of maintenance and use, naming it "Sasha" and becoming extremely angry when he believes someone else has handled it.[25] This video was later translated and revoiced into the heavy's native Russian language.[26]

Engineer

Engineers are a lightly armored support class, wearing a construction hat and team-colored overalls and speaking with a Texan accent.[27] Engineers can build a number of structures in the game: upgradable sentry guns for defending strategic areas, dispensers to resupply the team with health and ammunition and teleporters to allow quicker team mobility. Engineers are armed with a shotgun, a pistol and a monkey wrench.[22]

The engineer was the third class to be covered in the advertisement series "Meet the Classes". In it, the engineer is shown as a laid-back and intellectual "Good Ol' Boy", sitting around a fire in the dark, drinking beer and playing a 6-string acoustic guitar while his sentry guns kill numerous enemies attempting to attack him.[27]

File:Spytf2class.jpg
The spy.
Medic

Medics are tasked with keeping other players alive. A German character[citation needed] dressed in a doctor's lab coat and team-colored rubber gloves and armed with a healing "medigun", a syringe-firing flechette launcher and a bonesaw, medics are able to continuously regenerate a teammate's health and temporarily boost it to 150%. The medigun also allows medics to make themselves and a teammate invulnerable for a number of seconds after the device has been used for a specific amount of time.[22]

Sniper

Snipers are a support class. An Australian[28] character with low damage tolerance, the sniper wears an Akubra of the Australian military[29], a team-colored shirt, and yellow tinted shooter's glasses. Snipers are armed with a bolt-action sniper rifle, a submachine gun and a machete[22] and are used for attacking targets at long ranges.

Spy

The spy is a lightly armored character speaking in a Franco-Spanish accent,[citation needed] dressed in a team-colored pin-stripe suit and a full-face balaclava and with a ubiquitous cigarette. Spies can disguise themselves as other players and are armed with a revolver,[22] a butterfly knife, an electric sapper and a rechargeable cloaking device. Using their covert abilities, spies are able to infiltrate enemy positions and assassinate key enemy players with their knife. They can also use the sapper to sabotage enemy structures.[22]

Maps

The game ships with six maps[20] released by Valve as well as multiple community produced levels. The official maps are commonly themed with an evil genius mentality, with secret bases being concealed within industrial warehouses and exaggerated super weapons such as laser cannons and missile launch facilities taking the role of objectives. Valve is planning to release more maps in the future.[20] The maps included in the initial release are:

  • 2Fort, a capture the flag map.
  • Dustbowl, a control point map.
  • Granary, a control point map.
  • Gravel Pit, a control point map.
  • Hydro, a territorial control map.
  • Well, a control point map.

An introductory video shows how to complete map objectives.[20] Map player limits are 24 on the PC, although this has been raised to 32 by the community[citation needed], and 16 on the Xbox 360 console and Playstation 3 console.[30]

Graphics

Team Fortress 2 does not support the naturalistic graphical approaches taken by the official Valve mods Day of Defeat: Source and Counter-Strike: Source. Rather, it uses a more stylized, cartoon-like approach "heavily influenced by early 20th century commercial illustrations"[4] The effect is achieved using a special Valve in-house rendering and lighting technique making extensive use of Phong shading.[31][18] The game debuts with the Source engine's new dynamic lighting, shadowing and soft particle technologies, among many other unannounced features, alongside Half-Life 2: Episode Two. Team Fortress 2 was also the first game to implement the Source engine's new Facial animation 3 features. The stylised graphics have been praised by critics.

Critical reception

Charles Onyett of IGN awarded Team Fortress 2 an 8.9, praising the quirky graphics and fun atmosphere, but criticizing the lack of extra content, like bots, as well as the removal of the per-class grenades, which were one of the defining features of the original Team Fortress.[32] By contrast, PC Gamer UK praised Team Fortress 2 for removing the grenades, continuing to compliment Valve Software for the unique nature of each of the game's characters. Despite some mild criticism over map navigation and the medic class, PCGamer UK awarded the game 94%.[28] X-Play awarded The Orange Box with its highest rating (5 out of 5) and had nothing but good things to say about Team Fortress 2. Review aggregation site Metacritic gave Team Fortress 2 a "universal acclaim" rating of 93 out of 100, based on 11 reviews by game critic sites and a 9.6 of 10 rating based on user ratings. [33]

As of November 18, 2007, the Orange Box has a gamerankings score of 95.8% on the Xbox 360, making it the highest ranking Xbox 360 game, and a score of 96.2% on the PC.

References

  1. ^ "Orange Box Goes Gold". GameDaily BIZ. 26 September 2007. Retrieved 2007-10-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  2. ^ "The Orange Box". GameSpot. Retrieved 2007-10-22.
  3. ^ "EXCLUSIVE: Half-Life 2 The Orange Box System Requirements!". YouGamers. 2007-08-22. Retrieved 2007-08-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ a b c Mitchell, Jason; Francke, Moby; Eng, Dhabih (August 06 2007). "Illustrative Rendering in Team Fortress 2" (PDF). Valve Corporation. Retrieved 2007-10-12. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) Video summary (WMV, 75.4MB)
  5. ^ "Vaporware: Better Late Than Never". Wired News. 2006-02-06. Retrieved 2007-05-23. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  6. ^ a b Dunkin, Alan (1998-06-01). "Team Fortress Full Speed Ahead". GameSpot. Retrieved 2006-06-12. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ^ "Team Fortress Classic (overview)]". Planet Half-Life. unknown date. Retrieved 2006-12-02. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. ^ "About Team Fortress Classic". PlanetFortress. unknown date. Retrieved 2006-12-02. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  9. ^ Dawson, Ed (2000-11-11). "Team Fortress 2 Q&A". GameSpot.com. Retrieved 2006-12-02. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  10. ^ "Past Winners". gamecriticsawards.com. unknown date. Retrieved 2006-07-16. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  11. ^ a b c "Team Fortress 2: Technology". PlanetFortress. unknown date. Retrieved 2007-04-05. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  12. ^ Park, Andrew Seyoon (2000-06-21). "New Engine for Team Fortress 2". GameSpot. Retrieved 2006-07-12. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  13. ^ "Team Fortress 2 snippets". Steam User Forums. 2005-10-08. Retrieved 2006-07-12. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  14. ^ "Orange Box Interview". Game Trailers. August 29 2007. Retrieved 2007-08-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  15. ^ a b "Half-Life 2: Episode Two - The Return of Team Fortress 2 and Other Surprises". Gamespot. 2006-07-13. Retrieved 2007-08-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  16. ^ Berghammer, Billy (2007-03-26). "The History Of Team Fortress 2". Game Informer. Retrieved 2007-04-05. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  17. ^ "Team Fortress 2 audio commentary". Retrieved 2007-09-25.
  18. ^ a b Berghammer, Billy (2007-03-28). "Team Fortress 2 Hands-On Preview". gameinformer.com. Retrieved 2007-04-13. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  19. ^ a b Bramwell, Tom (2007-05-22). "Team Fortress 2 First Impressions". eurogamer.net. Retrieved 2007-05-23. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  20. ^ a b c d e f Berghammer, Billy (2007-03-27). "The Team Fortress 2 Interview: The Evolution". gameinformer.com. Retrieved 2007-04-13. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  21. ^ "1UP Show: Inside Valve Software". 1up.com. 2006-09-08. Retrieved 2007-04-13. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  22. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Goldstein, Hilary (2007-05-23). "Team Fortress 2: Class Warfare". IGN.com. Retrieved 2007-09-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  23. ^ a b "Team Fortress 2: Meet the Soldier". Valve Corporation. Retrieved 2007-11-10.
  24. ^ a b "Team Fortress 2: Meet the Demoman". Valve Corporation. Retrieved 2007-11-10.
  25. ^ a b "Team Fortress 2: Meet the Heavy". Valve Corporation. Retrieved 2007-11-10.
  26. ^ "Team Fortress 2: Meet the Heavy (Russian)". Valve Corporation. Retrieved 2007-11-10.
  27. ^ a b "Team Fortress 2: Meet the Engineer". Valve Corporation. Retrieved 2007-11-10.
  28. ^ a b Francis, Tom (November 2007). Team Fortress review. PC Gamer UK. pp. pages 56-61. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Check date values in: |date= (help)
  29. ^ "Photograph of an Akubra infantry hat". ANZAC History. Retrieved 2007-10-12.
  30. ^ "Team Fortress 2 Interview". IGN. 2007-04-10. Retrieved 2007-08-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  31. ^ Roper, Chris (2006-07-14). "Team Fortress 2 Teaser Impressions". IGN.com. Retrieved 2006-07-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  32. ^ Onyett, Charles (2007-10-10). "IGN: Team Fortress 2 Review". IGN. Retrieved 2007-10-09.
  33. ^ "Metacritic: Team Fortress 2 (pc: 2007): Reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved 2007-11-22.
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