Wonder if this upsets the staunch nVidia/AMD gamer cronies.

No they didn't maliciously record anything.

It was a joke How can one use gameplay stats in a malicious way? (other than the crazy ideas Riley thought up, that is)

... since you've never done anything but flame Valve for every little thing they have ever done...even when that "thing" didnt even happen (ie Steam being spyware).

Don't you remember? Steam IS spyware -- they maliciously record the number of times you die on every level in EP1. Riley gave us a good paranoid rant on that already.

For the record, I also don't understand people that use wasd instead of esdf.

I just sat here and imagined playing with it for a moment. While I completely agree with your logic, the reason I wouldn't use esdf is because my pinky doesn't have nearly the dexterity of my index and/or middle finger, so I wouldn't benefit from any keys freed up to the left.

I imagine some use wsad differently than others -- I use my pinky on A and my ring finger on W. My middle finger sort of hovers over D and my index finger's home is on F with an easy reach all the way out fo U, J, and N (V is my default "use" key since lean left/right take Q and E all too commonly these days). Some probably use their middle finger for W...but that just seems weird to me.

Can't imagine that would EVER happen in the Portal for Valve!

Nope.

While the wall of portals in thin air is not possible in Portal, it is possible in the 3rd party Prey mod where portals open up a fixed distance away from the player. Just watch the video on youtube.

He looks more like he's going to pull out a tongue depressor than a shotgun.

I thought he looked like he was going to check my prostate.

It's called civilized discussion... most discussions really don't matter, but people still have them.

You might think its civilized now, but wait until Riley gets here.

You can have a realistic setting, like Brotherhood of Arms, and NOT be a realistic game, is what I'm saying.

Shoulda, woulda, coulda -- but BoA is dead This is what you're getting...so it doesn't really matter.

This is far more like TF originally was than what TF2:Brotherhood of Arms (or whatever it was) was supposed to be. It's clear that they scrapped that project entirely (which is really no big new news: we've all known it was vaporware for years), and there's no sense in crying over it now that that game direction has been done to death. At this point, returning to what made TF so fun is a welcome direction.

At first I was with everyone else whining "oh, wtf?!?" about the style change, but honestly, speechrut is right. If TF2 is going to be remotely successful it needs to be more different from its competition.

That said, I do see this being mostly a TF (and I pray God not TFC) rehash, but we'll see. I like the models and animations (the demo's demo toss), and I surprisingly like the style as well. For those who say TF was "realistic" I can't really agree...sniper bullets that disintegrated a body in one shot, medics healing people with the swipe of an axe and poisoning people the same way, soldiers and heavies that survive multiple rocket shots, maps that never felt like they were anywhere but in fantasy (castles, futuristic forts, arena-style forts....ok, ok, Border1 was sort of realistic

While I don't simply want a TF re-hash I'll gladly take it over the other games available right now. TF has needed a new engine ever since the Q1 source was released and the nail was put in that coffin. I don't think TF ever died -- it was just forced into early retirement.

I think it looks fun -- definately not catered to your average FPS player, but maybe that's a good thing. Basically a 3D version of the low-tech 2D puzzle games that have been around for ages, but with a lot of potential. There's potential here for them to lure some people to the FPS genre if the stand-alone version of Portal is priced relatively cheap on Steam.

I just hope the sniper's lasersight is more like TF and less like the watermelon-sized one Valve gave us in TFC cause they were too lazy to make a new one (they used the rpg lasersight).

No, TF had a grapple hook built in. 4fort4 used it, if you remember that map. It was a per-map setting.

I remember 4fort4, and I remember it without a grapple. There may have been a serverside setting to enable a grapple, but I honestly don't remember ever hearing about it. Maybe it temporarily existed during one of the earlier versions?


EDIT:

Yep, you're right...it was there. Apparently I never played on a server with it enabled.

http://www.planetfortress.com/teamfortress/versions.html

Version 2.5 Beta G - Released 21/5/97
--------------------------------------
Features Added:
- Players using the "saveme" impulse now yell "Medic!"
- "id" impulse, allowing you to identify players

Changes:
- Detpack's explosion size lowered.
- Frag for killing an enemy sentry gun.
- Engineer's Railgun used nails instead of metal.

Bugs Fixed:
- Detpacks exploding outside the map in QW fixed.
- Number of Special Grenades limited to 4 of each type.
- Number of Detpacks limited to 1.
- Napalm grenades not removing themselves underwater.
- Pipebomb counting tweaked.
- Server's not being able to enable the grapple with the
"serverinfo g on" method fixed.
- Grenades exploding in player's hands hurting teammates
when teamplay is on.

This comment was edited on Jul 14, 00:21.

In reality, eventually graphics will peak ( probably not for a while ), and subside, thats when gaming will get really good because tech is no longer an excuse to sell a game ( unless the tech is some wacky peripheral, which I'm sure will happen more and more as we get near this peak. )

That would be such an awesome day...imagine, seeing a game preview and not wondering "how much will it cost me to upgrade to play this?" or "wonder when I'll have a machine that can actually handle this game?"

War Rock is a Free2PlayTM massively multiplayer online, modern tactical first person shooter (FPS) where players have the option to purchase a wide variety of gameplay enhancing items, services, and products.

Looks like its worth giving a try...not very likely I'll actually purchase features though.

Was the grappling hook even in the original TF? I thought it wasn't added in Mega TF... maybe I'm thinking about the rocket pack...

In MegaTF the spy had a grapple hook and the scout had a jetpack, but "Ambush,MD." was the "dev", if you want to call him that, for MegaTF (www.backblast.com/mega-tf/), and completely detached from the original TF dev team.

This all just sounds like a retarded April fool's post by someone who doesn't know what day it is. This brief description of TF2 totally turns me off and makes me wish TF2 would just remain vaporware.

I am not an Army expert by any means but do the Special Forces really go tearing through towns in tanks and jeeps? I thought they were more of a sneak up and kill you kind of group which is more like how the game is designed.

From what I've read from interviews and heard from beta testers the only drivable vehicle is going to be a Humvee with a mounted remote-controlled turret (this is to coincide with real-life changes to the Humvee load-out due to gunner fatalities from rollovers and enemy fire). The Army strives to make AAO very in tune with current Army and Special Forces operations (both in weapons and in vehicles). The OpFor AI will have the T-62 Tank, BMP-1 IFV and BTR-80 APC, but those vehicles are not usable by players. I have heard nothing about the addition of an Apache or any air vehicles to the game.

I'm interested in seeing drivable vehicles in this game since they've been talking about it for years.

This comment was edited on Jul 12, 09:34.

The screen shots looked far better than the video. The video looked way too fast, like unreal, rather than realistic (ish) game speeds like BF2 and Tribes 1 and 2.

I thought the gameplay videos looked really really fast, too. There's no way I'll be able to play it drunk