Doing Most of the Things in Team Fortress 2

The other day, I thought to myself that I should probably play Team Fortress 2. After all, it’s the game that properly got me into PC gaming and it’s a big part of my online presence. I owe a lot to Team Fortress 2 and maybe I should take a break and play it for a while. See what I’ve missed.

But as I loaded up TF2, I realised that I hadn’t really missed anything. The last time I played was during Scream Fortress 8. I made myself a lot of fake internet points on Reddit by making fun of how lackluster the update was, by creating my own fake update page. It was a 10/10 quality shitpost, made better because I ‘get’ how the TF2 team writes.

Since that update, had anything new really happened? No. I could have done contracts during the event, but I pretty much did all that last year in Scream Fortress 7. Yeah, that bare-chested Medic cosmetic was pretty awesome, but there was no way I’d be able to obtain it without spending money, and I’ve always been a person with very bad luck.

Sitting there, staring at the main menu, something occurred to me. I’d done most of the things one can do in Team Fortress 2. Obviously I hadn’t done everything, after all, I haven’t done all the achievements yet, and there are achievements that are now impossible to obtain. I don’t own every single weapon in the game. I haven’t played every single map TF2 has to offer. But I’ve got the gist of it all.

Let’s go back to those weapons. I don’t own every weapon in the game. I’ve tried them all though. The gameplay-effecting ones at least, things like the Robo-Sandvich I could not care about. Either I owned them at some point and I used them or traded them or scrapped them, or worst case scenario I rented them from the Mann Co. store. Most weapons have their own little niches, but aside from the occasional balance changes, the only new weapons we’d had recently were things like the Panic Attack or the Persian Persuader. And neither of those are particularly… good.

Then there was the whole Meet your Match update. I could play either casual or competitive ‘matchmaking’, but I don’t see much point. Casual matchmaking is just like playing in any other server, but more likely to end up with lopsided teams. Competitive matchmaking, I played it during the beta and had a bit of fun but I’ve already gone and done that, what new experiences would the non-beta version bring apart from frustration? It’s not like anything’s changed or anything.

On top of that, I’ve already had my fill of the community’s version of competitive. To be honest, it wasn’t my cup of tea. I just wanted to join a team, scrim a few times a week and have an official match every Friday or whatever, but I ended up running teams and all that and it sucked the life out of me. That and the all-round unreliability of everyone involved put me off big time. Granted, I genuinely enjoyed 4v4 but I’m not in the mood for competitive any more.

So that leaves the casual side of things. Unfortunately (and this is partly my fault), most of my regular servers are dead. There’s always Fast Co. but that means playing at three in the morning and I need my sleep. Not to mention that I’m a shit, grouchy player when I’m sleepy.

I could play other game modes. There’s always Versus Saxton Hale, or Freak Fortress, or Prop Hunt, or TF2Karts, or the billion other alternate game modes. But I’ve played most of them as well. I could play other game modes, but how many variations of 5cp, Attack/Defend, CTF, whatever, can I really sit through? I could play other classes, and I have done, but I like playing Medic, Soldier and Pyro. I even try and mix up loadouts, but I always end up falling back to what’s efficient.

Even outside of TF2, things are slow. The next two parts of the comic will never come out. The Pyro update will most likely be horrible. There’s no signs of other updates. There’s not even a hint of other Team Fortress 2 media, like videos and stuff. Everthing has ground to a halt.

Really, there’s only so much one can do in Team Fortress 2. Which is why I’ve been looking out and getting stuck in other games. Skyrim has always been there for me, and Warframe has really grabbed my attention. I’ve also got plenty of other games to play as well.

It seems that my lack of Team Fortress 2 will continue, for now.