Team Fortress 2 Community - A free-to-play dress up game for grownups, gameplay fully automated! Waiting to be mercy killed...

[Cat Hyde Boots]

Unfortunately, as how Artifact and Underlords being abandoned showed, it would be a massive pipe dream for Valve to update TF2 again. Even DOTA 2 is seeing signs of Valve slowing down on updates, to point that it may go into maintenance mode as well, just like TF2. The TI 2022 Battle Pass has been criticized for lacking content, the level grind in this BP is even slower than past BPs, and a lot of the BP's content will be in Part 2, which starts after TI 2022 concludes. Also, only BP purchases made before TI 2022's conclusion will go into the prize pool, so only 2 months of the BP will count towards that. Combine that with other factors such as Russians not being able to purchase things on Steam (aside from time-consuming workarounds), rampant inflation, the global economic slowdowns, and the fears of recession, gives the impression that even Valve knows that this year's TI prize pool will be lower than TI10's prize pool of $40 million.

VALVe would never completely abandon their big multiplayer games (CS:GO, Dota, TF2) unless they create successors that can replace them. Even if by themselves they are unprofitable, they still attract millions to download Steam. That is why they're F2P. They serve the same purpose that YouTube does to Google. They attract users into the VALVe ecosystem.

They might slow down their development, spend less to promote events, etc. But ultimately, their value to VALVe is too much to lose.

 

[WULULULULU]

VALVe would never completely abandon their big multiplayer games (CS:GO, Dota, TF2) unless they create successors that can replace them. Even if by themselves they are unprofitable, they still attract millions to download Steam. That is why they're F2P. They serve the same purpose that YouTube does to Google. They attract users into the VALVe ecosystem.

They might slow down their development, spend less to promote events, etc. But ultimately, their value to VALVe is too much to lose.

Honestly I wish they'd just go back to paid games instead. It provides a barrier (payment required to join the game) of players before they even try to ruin the experience. Its why Counter-Strike: Source still has a small yet active community.

 

[Nauseated Courgi]

Honestly I wish they'd just go back to paid games instead. It provides a barrier (payment required to join the game) of players before they even try to ruin the experience. Its why Counter-Strike: Source still has a small yet active community.

Provides a barrier for what kind of players exactly? Free or not, money isn't going to stop the wrong kind of players from playing a game. At best, they'll just be less of them.

 

[vertebrae]

An infamous TF2 cheater that goes under the alias "Dashie" has recently been arrested for multiple charges of possession of CP

Jail roster site, search "Kyle D"

Someone joined Dashie's Discord to see when his last messages were sent, which match up with the booking date. (I'd add more chat logs but keffals troons are hitting the site hard and I can't even upload photos that are a couple megabytes. I'll update with archives in a bit.)



He's hated even in the niche community of TF2 cheating, much like Twilight Sparkle he's a massive degenerate who's been caught sharing CP multiple times inducing having over five Discord accounts deleted for sharing of said material. This neurodivergent faggot has been cheating in TF2 for well over 7 years now, I'm not here to discuss the ethics of cheating in video games, but fucking that much time of your life away consistently while having asperger delusions and a deep mental investment of being a "famous" cheater (for all the wrong reasons) in a dying 14 year old f2p video game is quite possibly the most mentally retarded shit you could possibly do. You can check his YouTube channel where he has a variety of videos of him cheating in video games including Left 4 Dead 2 (?????) that date back 5 years ago. Just that statement alone should show how high on the spectrum you have to be to cheat in an A.I zombie game.
His steam profile showcases just how deep in the hole he is: Steam profile

 

[I.C. Weiner]

The TF2 trading community has always been filled to the brim with scalpers who try to treat their beta NFT grift as a full time job, but it has reached critical mass within the past year over discontinued items, particularly with old Halloween Unusuals.

In all of these price changes, the ones with the red outlines are the most recent prices because backpack.tf doesn't like to sort chronologically for some reason. backpack.tf also doesn't like to cooperate with archives, with some pages requiring a Steam account to view, so I resorted to screenshots instead of archives. For reference, one key is roughly equal to $1.6-$1.8, depending on how the TF2 economy is going.

Spoiler: Puglist's Protector

https://backpack.tf/unusual/Pugilist%27s%20Protector

Knifestorm (Scream Fortress 2012), went from ~70 keys to 350 keys over three years, with a current scalper going for 550 keys.





It's worth noting that the person scalping this unusual is banned from backpack.tf for bribing people for reputation

Spoiler: Kolt bribing

bp.tf account




Initial exposure

Spellbound (Scream Fortress 2013), 40 to 220 over three years.


Darkblaze (Scream Fortress 2013), 45 to 300 for 3 years



Harvest Moon (Scream Fortress 2011), 50 to 120 keys over three years, which is the lowest one so far, but, there is a current scalper of 250 keys.

Spoiler: Company Man

https://backpack.tf/unusual/Company%20Man

Arcana (Scream Fortress 2013), went from 150 keys to 900 over 5 years.



Knifestorm, 200 to 700 over 3 years.



Harvest Moon (Scream Fortress 2012), 250 to 600 over 2 years.

Not even the undesirable hats are safe from this.

Spoiler: Towering Titanium Pillar of Hats

Hellfire (Scream Fortress 2013), 75 to 280 over 3 years.



Misty Skull (Scream Fortress 2012), 75 to 180 over 3 years.

Spoiler: Hot Dogger

Spellbound (Scream Fortress 2013), 250 to 540 within a year, with a current scalper of twenty five hundred keys, nearly quintuple its current price.





Chiroptera Venenata (Scream Fortress 2013), 100 to 480 in a year, current scalper of 975.





Cloudy Moon (Scream Fortress 2011), been priced at 135 keys for years, but there are two scalpers both going for 400.

Now who would spend this much money on virtual items like these??? Clearly anyone in the right mind wouldn't do so, outside of flipping a profit out of these people.









Meet one example (a) (a2), Incineroar, otherwise known as Billy, is an open vore fetishist that has an inventory grand total of $23k, featuring many heavily sought after items like a Golden Frying Pan (3,000 keys), Strange Nebula Captain Space Mann (8,000 keys), and many more super expensive and unpriced unusuals. He also owns four Self-Made Unusual Caps (given by Valve for having an unusual effect you put on the workshop added to the game), Phantom Crown, Ancient Specter, Infernal Wraith, Iridescence, complete with a degenerate name and description.





Just like any other vorefag, he is extremely open about his degeneracy, so much as to posting artwork on his profile and talking about spending several hundreds of dollars on vore commissions.

And just like any good degenerate furry, he lays his entire stash of art on FurAffinity for the world to see.
Gallery
Journals
Favorites

Spoiler: ISLAMIC CONTENT

On top of shiny pixels and vore commissions, Billy here is really fond of showing off his PC rigs and costumes.
My Rig


What's in the Box?


"Is it magic?

Is it a pet rock?

Is it a bomb?

No,

IT'S A LUCARIO COSPLAY/MASCOT COSTUME!


320$

Will it live up to its name???

FIND OUT THIS SATURDAY!"

GTX 1080 ASUS STRIX OC: "OOOH YEAH BB <3"


Even back in 2016, he was still unashamed to be a degenerate, even if not as big as he is now.


You'd also think that someone with over twenty thousand hours in a game would be a god at it, right? Apparently not, because Billy is friends with known cheaters.




The TF2 economy and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

 

[Off Brand Soup]

Was trawling through old VNN vids for a post in the VNN thread, and was reminded of the Invasion update drama through this video.

So on the 7th anniversary on what has remained the last community made update, I thought I'd look back on exactly why that might be.
If you were around at the time you probably remember something allegedly going on behind the scenes, something about money and it getting delayed. You might have more recently seen posts briefly, and very vaguely, stating what happened.

As anon's aren't particularly reliable, I went to find out exactly what happened, and how much of Tyler's video was truthful and verifiable. Shockingly someone made a reddit post with most of the info making it pretty easy, who knew having information all in one place would be so helpful? So I've just pasted it in with some edits and cuts. I cut out most things pertaining to stuff that would be in the update being leaked, and some information about delays, as its only relevance to the drama is that it happened.

(Archive of original post)

Spoiler: Long mostly chronological Reddit post

To keep it all concise, I'm gonna try and make this with all the known rumors and drama surrounding invasion at the moment.
Blurred Chatlog floating about: http://i.imgur.com/9pAfkEp.png

Uncensored chat log: (Archive 1, 2)

Sexy Robots comments from Facepunch: http://i.imgur.com/zATr5cY.png http://i.imgur.com/DtQoZTD.png?1


There was a person who commented on Ronin and Bangs profile, stating "I"m sorry for any trouble I may have caused you or Bang(/Ronin, if on bangs profile.)"
The one behind the comment currently has their profile description as "Sorry. The chatlog is not to be trusted."
[insert image of that here]

The same person who commented on Ronin/Bangs profile, also said this.

Stop the hate. Invasion is still on. I respect Ronin and Bang. Above all, I don't want any more attention. I don't know anything else, except that I acted without thinking in posting the chatlog, leading to misrepresented information getting spread. I apologize to anyone effected, and as of now I am taking a brief leave of absence from Steam and Reddit until this all dies down.

Throwaway rumors: And it seems I missed the initial rumors surrounding bang/ronin.


http://i.imgur.com/IxYd6l9.jpg


More rumors about ronin from the Throwaway. http://i.imgur.com/FOFyU5D.png



Harry101UK has responded http://i.imgur.com/0NupZ7j.png?1


The throwaway has spoken once again. http://i.imgur.com/ErT5U2N.png and again http://i.imgur.com/zgyLlr8.png?1 and again http://i.imgur.com/KcBvUBK.png




Percentage List - I seemed to have left this out of the original version of this post (My memory is bad). It's from the throwaway. (Deleted, due to request.)
Harry101UK has said that list is misleading. Full comment from him as follows. "To clarify, this payment breakdown image is misleading. This shows the shares for a single asset in the update. We all have different shares depending on the assets we worked on."

The Throwaway sent me this about this list, saying it doesn't include things such as map stamps. http://i.imgur.com/Ssq1uTC.png?1 This seems to indicate maps will be included.

More information on way cuts go. http://i.imgur.com/LYc3JjZ.jpg


Youme's statement on it. He says the chatlog is real. http://i.imgur.com/qFiyytk.png?1


Ronin has taken notice. http://i.imgur.com/KVAuyfJ.png

Ronin says delay is caused by a coding issue and the webpage not being ready.
Throwaway also talks about the webpage, saying Bang was responsible for the page and failed to meet the deadline. http://i.imgur.com/tdjTMSr.jpg

EDIT: More from Ronin. It's a list of the workload, http://i.imgur.com/XiPeItS.png
The link is dead, I believe that this is the full image as featured in Tyler's video covering the drama.

and more information about how everything worked out. http://i.imgur.com/FOHwxFL.png?1

Throwaway has spoken on the Workload list. http://i.imgur.com/kQv8RHr.png?1

Throwaway lists what will/might be in the update. Also a bit on Bang/Ronin. http://i.imgur.com/cvqLpyv.png

Ronin confirms chatlog. http://i.imgur.com/RixRvJB.png?1

Throwaway confirmed legitimate. http://i.imgur.com/EKoiEyS.png

Throwaway stating more information about Map Stamps and where that money goes. http://i.imgur.com/sIJtEuJ.png?1

I feel as though I should remind people. Little to none of this is confirmed truth yet. It's a lot of speculation and one-sided accounts. Please don't assume everything is true until proven. Adding another bit to this. If any of this should not be listed, please do not hesitate to ask me to take it down.

So as you're probably not reading that shit, the short version is:
Things had soured behind the scenes for the Invasion development team, and someone going by Throwaway552888 (presumably little green void) was unhappy with whatever was going on. They took specific issue with the fact that the two project leads, Bang and Ronin, would be taking a substantially large cut of the profits. Harry101UK, another developer on the update, disputed this stating that the percentages that throwaway had provided were only for one asset, what asset though is anyone's guess. Throwaway also stated that the percentages did not include profits made from map stamps. Ronin went on to provide a spreadsheet showing what developers had done to earn those percentages, but the jobs listed for Bang and Ronin are pretty vague and flimsy.
Ronin also didn't say that the percentages were false, only that they were misleading. Further clarifying that the developers had agreed to these percentages, but given things probably weren't so good behind the scenes, I can't imagine that the agreements were made under the best conditions.

So really, in the end, the story of the two leads taking most of the invasion update profits, is probably true. Certainly not all the profits, but I would agree it was probably an unreasonable cut.

It killing community updates however?

Maybe. Valve being Valve, I think the more realistic reason is that they don't work well with any group outside the company, and only 4 months prior to invasion's release they added map support to the TF2 workshop. So I think that invasion being the last community update is simply because it was already in the works and they weren't gonna cancel it, and all future community made content would just collected from the workshop, as it has been for the 7 years since.

Links that might be of interest​

Facepunch - Major Update Speculation XXVII: The Day MUS Stood Still
Facepunch - Major Update Speculation XXVIII: The Speculation Zone
TF2 Invasion | Behind the Scenes
TF2 - Invasion Credits

 

[lemonsarebetter]

That Incineroar vore fetishist fag really needs his own thread. Imagine revolving your entire persona over a fictional character. I'd MAYBE give some credit if it was original, but it's not. He posts "RP ads" on every server he joins and–if I remember correctly–he runs a discord with plenty of underage children that has a vore channel for the public to see.

There's another person similar that basis their entire profile off a "mommy fetish". Absolutely horrendous to look at, they have their artwork full of porn, and have 500+ friends. Of course, majority minors, and the comment section is full of actual minors. I unfortunately cannot find their profile, but they were called "Big Tiddy Mommy" or somewhere along those lines. If someone has it, it's definitely worth linking. I hate the Steam community.

 

[I.C. Weiner]

That Incineroar vore fetishist fag really needs his own thread. Imagine revolving your entire persona over a fictional character. I'd MAYBE give some credit if it was original, but it's not. He posts "RP ads" on every server he joins and–if I remember correctly–he runs a discord with plenty of underage children that has a vore channel for the public to see.

There's another person similar that basis their entire profile off a "mommy fetish". Absolutely horrendous to look at, they have their artwork full of porn, and have 500+ friends. Of course, majority minors, and the comment section is full of actual minors. I unfortunately cannot find their profile, but they were called "Big Tiddy Mommy" or somewhere along those lines. If someone has it, it's definitely worth linking. I hate the Steam community.

Do you mean this person?

I also looked at Incineroar's comment section, and noticed someone responsible for some of this year's Halloween items commented on his profile,
and has been for the past several months.

Not even three years on Steam and he already has nearly 10k hours in TF2 alone.


Horsemann's Hack


Bonzo Gnawed Skin


Neither one of these items hit 10k views or even 100 likes, both of which were created not even a month before Scream Fortress 14 dropped, and the creator only has 25 followers on the workshop. Maybe Zesty Jesus was right when he was talking about there being a cabal responsible for most of TF2's new content.
https://youtu.be/DnWzGs6b0UA (Video is too big to be uploaded here sadly)

 

[Kanuckski]

Do you mean this person?

I also looked at Incineroar's comment section, and noticed someone responsible for some of this year's Halloween items commented on his profile,
and has been for the past several months.

View attachment 3735158
Not even three years on Steam and he already has nearly 10k hours in TF2 alone.


Horsemann's Hack
View attachment 3735148

Bonzo Gnawed Skin
View attachment 3735146

Neither one of these items hit 10k views or even 100 likes, both of which were created not even a month before Scream Fortress 14 dropped, and the creator only has 25 followers on the workshop. Maybe Zesty Jesus was right when he was talking about there being a cabal responsible for most of TF2's new content.
https://youtu.be/DnWzGs6b0UA (Video is too big to be uploaded here sadly)

Wouldn't be the first time an unusual cabal influenced the content added to Valve's games from the workshop. Given that a decent chunk of items added to the game and the fucking DotA anime are the pet projects of a crown prince of Saudi Arabia and this has been the case for years. Can even see them (and all his anime shit) on his steam profile.

 

[Toolbox]

Do you mean this person?

I also looked at Incineroar's comment section, and noticed someone responsible for some of this year's Halloween items commented on his profile,
and has been for the past several months.

View attachment 3735158
Not even three years on Steam and he already has nearly 10k hours in TF2 alone.


Horsemann's Hack
View attachment 3735148

Bonzo Gnawed Skin
View attachment 3735146

Neither one of these items hit 10k views or even 100 likes, both of which were created not even a month before Scream Fortress 14 dropped, and the creator only has 25 followers on the workshop. Maybe Zesty Jesus was right when he was talking about there being a cabal responsible for most of TF2's new content.
https://youtu.be/DnWzGs6b0UA (Video is too big to be uploaded here sadly)

Not even sure if it's that secret. In crow's comments alone at least one guy

whose gotten items in as well, in this same window too, congratulated him and crow did the same.

To me it seems like they have clearly communicated before this and Neavlof, having more connections, likely helped crow. Both of them have clear furry bait items in their workshop content on their profiles. As does another creator that's communicated with neavlof. Steam does leave your comment and general posting history on the platform public, at least steam forum stuff, so it probably wouldn't be that hard to confirm this. Just too lazy right now. But I'd bet that these guys maintain some form of connection with whomever publishes the items, or whomever publishes the items is one of them and not an actual dev. But I wouldn't doubt the actual dev is a furfag for letting all of what's gotten in, in. Archive.ph is being a slow ass for me right now so no archives. This appears to be the item that neavof got published.

 

[ABE LINN COHN]

Maybe Zesty Jesus was right when he was talking about there being a cabal responsible for most of TF2's new content.

Oh for sure, it's the emporium fags.

 

[Toolbox]

Oh for sure, it's the emporium fags.

Is that one the trading website or one of those attempts at making a 'competitor' to casual servers?

 

[ABE LINN COHN]

Is that one the trading website or one of those attempts at making a 'competitor' to casual servers?

Nope, it's a steam group for the workshop that's been responsible for a few community updates. Most items that get in come from emporium members.

 

[Toolbox]

Nope, it's a steam group for the workshop that's been responsible for a few community updates. Most items that get in come from emporium members.

Not a lot of activity in the steam group despite member count, I assume they all jumped ship to the listed Discord?

 

[ABE LINN COHN]

Not a lot of activity in the steam group despite member count, I assume they all jumped ship to the listed Discord?

I believe it used to be a forum before they moved to discord, can't find the website so I think they deleted it.

 

[Bardin Goreksson]

I believe it used to be a forum before they moved to discord, can't find the website so I think they deleted it.

They had threads on Facepunch mainly before it died. I found an archive of the threads here.

 

[John Freeman]

They had threads on Facepunch mainly before it died. I found an archive of the threads here.

This item cabal seems to be worth a threat themselves. Super lulzy and very under the table.

 

[Off Brand Soup]

Not even three years on Steam and he already has nearly 10k hours in TF2 alone.

On the one hand getting that many hours during 2020 and 2021 as a high schooler isn't out of the question, especially if you're the kind of person to never close a game and never turns off their computer. On the other, the number of level 5 badges and expensive items is in under 3 years is a bit suspicious, and he has also now hidden his games and in-game hours.

Horsemann's Hack

This was made as part of, or at least just submitted to, a community event (A) posted on the TF2 blog (A). Out of the 177 items in the collection (A) the 4 that got added to scream fortress were 4 unusual effects, which is depressing.

IMO the TF2 emporium item workshop cabal thing is just symptomatic of heavy centralization. If you need help creating something for TF2 you have to go to the discord now. Facepunch is dead so you can't search for information from that, the Valve Developer community wiki is unlikely to have pertinent information in fixing problems and youtube isn't much help either. Just looking up "tf2 particle tutorial" doesn't pull up anything I would say helps getting beyond just starting. Join the discord or good luck.

 

[John Freeman]

On the one hand getting that many hours during 2020 and 2021 as a high schooler isn't out of the question, especially if you're the kind of person to never close a game and never turns off their computer. On the other, the number of level 5 badges and expensive items is in under 3 years is a bit suspicious, and he has also now hidden his games and in-game hours.

This was made as part of, or at least just submitted to, a community event (A) posted on the TF2 blog (A). Out of the 177 items in the collection (A) the 4 that got added to scream fortress were 4 unusual effects, which is depressing.
View attachment 3740641
IMO the TF2 emporium item workshop cabal thing is just symptomatic of heavy centralization. If you need help creating something for TF2 you have to go to the discord now. Facepunch is dead so you can't search for information from that, the Valve Developer community wiki is unlikely to have pertinent information in fixing problems and youtube isn't much help either. Just looking up "tf2 particle tutorial" doesn't pull up anything I would say helps getting beyond just starting. Join the discord or good luck.

Agreed. It’s probably not intentional but the people involved are still hilariously out of touch. And also pretty awful degenerates.

 

[Monk Amen]

The TF2 youtuber Vorobey, who is known for the "hacker police" series, has made a community post where he baits known fag VenusianRapper into being a teaser for his next video.