aabicus – Page 45 – The Daily SPUF

Killing Floor 2: Now With More Fire and Stuff Blowing Up

September 10, 2015 aabicus 0 Comments criticism, killing floor, Not TF2, suggestion

I’m going to be honest, I’ve been pretty ticked at Tripwire. Ever since Killing Floor 2 was first released in Early Access back in April, Tripwire had succeeded in adding a single map and no other game-changing alterations for over four months. I hate to be one of those people who clamor for new content, but when a game is released into beta you kinda expect additions and stuff since the whole point of a beta is to allow the devs to change and tweak content without worrying about needing to commit to anything. Even the graphs where they reminded everyone that developing new content takes… [Continue Reading]

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Pestilential Pumpkin Presents Part Two

September 7, 2015 aabicus 2 Comments cosmetics, halloween, scream fortress, update

“It’s pretty safe to bet that new cosmetics will have something to do with the next generation of presents, due to a “Scream Fortress 2014″ Workshop tag being the only clue we’d received up until the recent blog post, but for more specifics, we’ll have to wait and see. I just hope Valve’s execution doesn’t cause too many complaints.” ~aabicus, as Scream Fortress 2014 approached Valve’s execution caused many complaints. Honestly it was the worst possible interpretation of the present system yet. For those who weren’t there (or blanked the experience from their memory banks) Valve’s first clue as to how… [Continue Reading]

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TF2’s Unlock System is Truly Unique

September 5, 2015July 27, 2017 aabicus 0 Comments analysis, balance, comparison, unlock, weapon

Can we take a moment just to explore how revolutionary TF2’s unlock design is? Think back to the days before the Gold Rush Update. TF2 was a complex and nuanced game, with 9 classes and 25 weapons, and then Valve announces that there will be unlockable weapons added, starting with the Medic class. What would you predict these weapons will be like? Taking the standard dev theme for designing alternate weapons for a slot, probably something like this: I’m running through a list in my head of shooters with swappable inventory unlocks, and I’m seeing a very tedious trend where the closest thing to… [Continue Reading]

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The Cutting Room Floor

September 3, 2015 aabicus 0 Comments beta, history, medic, TFC

Not everything Valve playtested for TF2 made the cut. From the moment Brotherhood of Arms and then its replacement Invasion was completely excised, Valve showed themselves committed to the possibility of axing whatever needs to be axed in the name of quality. Through avenues such as item schemas and the TF2 Beta, us players have had the ability to witness a lot of these ideas get introduced and later bite the dust. Thing is, we don’t always get to hear the rationale behind why they didn’t make the cut. For every Repair Node and Facestab Knife that got a blog post… [Continue Reading]

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Some other spots to get to (that aren’t that hard!)

August 28, 2015 aabicus 0 Comments demoknight, engineer, Filler, maps

This article’s existence is more of the culmination of a running gag than a legitimate article. It’s the Frankensteinian surgery of two articles that both sat laboriously in my Drafts folder for ages, silently judging me every time I opened up WordPress and viewed my dashboard. The earlier article began its life as “Good Offensive Teleporter Spots on Non-Payload Maps”, intended to be a sequel of sorts to this article. It’s only candidate was the first spot on this list, I added it and then continued playing TF2, confident that more would present themselves to me in time. Now here we are… [Continue Reading]

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Which Way Does the Wind Blow on Your Favorite Map?

August 26, 2015 aabicus 0 Comments Filler, spy, taunts

Cause there is wind. You may not have known that, but now you can see for yourself. That there is the Buy a Life taunt, added during the Love & War Update. Spy, being the cocky dick he is, pulls out a wad of cash and flings it derisively while taunting his poor & Irish foes. It was the subject of the highest-rated screenshot I ever posted to Steam. But what’s important is that the money always blows in the same direction! No matter what direction you’re facing, no matter how many times you crank the map up. It’s not randomized in… [Continue Reading]

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Early Impressions and Strategies for the Beta PASS Game Mode

August 25, 2015January 28, 2017 aabicus 0 Comments beta, game mode, guide, pass, pass time, strategy, tips

Let me start by saying that PASS is a hell of a lot of fun. It’s one of the first beta modes that feels like it should be in beta; it’s bizarre and completely different from anything TF2 has tried before, but it’s addicting and condones itself to all sorts of strategies and playstyles that really makes it stand out as a game mode. I genuinely hope this develops its own tournaments and things because it’s just as much fun to watch as it is to play. Everybody is still learning the ropes of this new game mode and there… [Continue Reading]

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Sharks and Minnows (aka You)

August 18, 2015 aabicus 0 Comments analysis, Depth, Not TF2, shark!

Unless you play on tc_meridian, TF2 has a depressing absence of sharks. This holds true for the rest of my Steam library as well. Luckily, Depth recently had a free weekend, and I got to fill this void, just like the sharks in that game got to fill themselves up with me. I’ve always had an intense fascination with underwater combat in video games, partly because I’m mildly terrified of water in real life. I dedicated a whole article to what little of it exists in TF2, I can’t resist leaping into bodies of water whenever my gameplay crosses them, and… [Continue Reading]

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On Accuracy

August 16, 2015January 15, 2017 aabicus 0 Comments accuracy, Left 4 Dead 2, On Shooters, payday, strategy

Hitscan guns in shooters often have two major qualities that people care about; how much damage they do and how accurate they are. (How quickly they fire is also relevant but in this article I’m focusing on the first two.) Which seems simple enough, because at the end of the day you want to know how fast your guns can kill things. But lots of shooters have been making the question a bit more difficult by introducing accuracy-affecting mechanics. Ways for a player to use positioning, modifications, skills, or game mechanics to manipulate the likelihood of a fired bullet hitting the… [Continue Reading]

Featured The Competitive Corner

What the Gun Mettle Contracts Could Mean For Competitive TF2

August 5, 2015 aabicus 0 Comments competitive, dlc, matchmaking

In my recent article about the weapon-dropping mechanic and specifically its affect on Ubercharges, I mentioned that it could be seen as a sign that Valve is attempting to alter the meta of the game, probably for the sake of revitalizing competitive and keeping things fresh. Part of the reason I think this is because a lot of Valve’s recent decisions have been rumored to be competitively-motivated, and ster (also known as Niichts and STAR_) said a lot of interesting things in his July 2nd Twitch broadcast that went on for 8 whole hours. Considering I can’t ask you to go… [Continue Reading]