Saturday, July 15, 2006 6:19 PM
I have been waiting FOREVER for this game. I used to play the crap out of the original TF when it was on the Quake engine. Then when Quake II came out, the TF team asked id software if the would help out with TF2 for Quake II. That didn't go so well, so the new up and coming software company VALVe said they would help get things going on the Half-Life engine. We were supposed to get TF2 at the time that HL1 was released, but that didn't go so well. So instead of leaving us all empty handed, VALVe gave us Team Fortress Classic. I played the crap out of that too. VALVe told us all they were working on a new version of TF2 that was so new, so revolutionary that it knock our socks off. They talked about Commanders and missions and all kinds of new stuff. They showed us hyper-realistic screenshots of soldiers and vehicles. So we waited. And Waited. And Waited. And then all talk just stopped.
So here we are, several years later, and VALVe drops a bomb: TF2 is almost ready! YEAH!! And they are changing the art style! YEA... Wait...What?? Yup, it's changing. More like Cel-Shading, cartoony. A have to admit when I read that, I damn near lost all hope. I LOVED TF it was one of the main reason's I'm a gamer. I had a TF clan (Wetworks). One of my very first websites was FOR my TF clan! Cartoony? What the hell are they talking about.
Imagine my suprise when I saw this:
click for the big pic. Thanks to http://www.joystiq.com for the images.
I LOVE the new art style. To me it INSTANTLY screams Team Fortress. They kept all the old classes, and they are all close to perfect (The Engineer needs a cigar). From this pic it looks like they are sticking to the old-school gameplay. No more Hyper-Realistic battles, with Commander and missions (Fine with me, if I want that style of gameplay, I'll just start up Battlefield 2). I am so hyped to play this game now. I guess they are releasing some ingame footage or something next week. Hopefully they'll give us some info on gameplay and modes too.
Oh yeah, TF2 will be released as the multiplayer portion of Half-Life 2: Episode 2. That should be out some time in the next few months!