Major Update Speculation V5: Somewhere over the rainbow

[ZGear]

Future + Car + Mad = Back to the Future ?

[ZVAARI]

[QUOTE=wickedplayer494;36911124]This time around, it involves gift wrap. That's all I can say otherwise I'd probably get the hammer here if I shared exact repro details. Doing so will get you trade banned, so don't even think about doing so if you find out through other means.[/QUOTE]

oh fuck
I did it by total accident yesterday
i'm serious

[Monokarhu]

[QUOTE=SLBros.;36914783]oh fuck
I did it by total accident yesterday
i'm serious[/QUOTE]
u gon git b&

[alsoodani]

[QUOTE=ned_ballad;36913998]I'm 100% just basing it on getting the similar Valve comic collection for 20[/QUOTE]

Wasn't the Triumph book also sold at comic con? If there was anything extra about it, wouldn't that have been revealed there?

[ned_ballad]

there's a big party for it tomorrow. I assume we're all waiting for that.

[editline]24th July 2012[/editline]

they'll probably announce the release day then also

[ZVAARI]

[QUOTE=ned_ballad;36914870]there's a big party for it tomorrow. I assume we're all waiting for that.

[editline]24th July 2012[/editline]

they'll probably announce the release day then also[/QUOTE]
? What's happening tomorrow?

[Monokarhu]

Didn't someone say that the paint prices were lowered by 50%? That's untrue (at least in Europe).

[ned_ballad]

[QUOTE=Kapellmeister;36914911]Didn't someone say that the paint prices were lowered by 50%? That's untrue (at least in Europe).[/QUOTE]

for some reason I thought team paint was 5 dollars originally and b/w were 10. They weren't.

[ZVAARI]

[QUOTE=Captain Chalky;36914932]WETA will host a tea party to celebrate the new Dr. Grordbort book, Triumph. Last time they released a book, we got the Soldier set.[/QUOTE]
But I don't even have all the weapons from the Pyromania Update :v:
I suppose we can wish though. That'd be neat to have a summer like the last one.

[VintageCat]

[QUOTE=Kapellmeister;36914911]Didn't someone say that the paint prices were lowered by 50%? That's untrue (at least in Europe).[/QUOTE]
-oh well, Mannconomy paints were cheap before sale-

[alsoodani]

I found this while trolling the Grordbort forums for more information about the release party:

[IMG]http://distilleryimage7.instagram.com/0afcdf54cfad11e1bea81231380fec8b_7.jpg[/IMG]

Very nice costume at Comic-con.

[COSTA]

Even in real life that beard looks like paper strips glued together.

[alsoodani]

Do we have any New Zealander Facepunchers going to the party? Also, the Triumph book seems to be $20 instead of $40, unless I am mistaking the book.

Edit: Also, according to New Zealand time the event starts in 13 hrs (Those victory and triumph books look really nice btw, I think I'll purchase them if I find a sale in the near future).

[Grimhound]

[quote]Yeah. They planned to do that. Space weapons, space stuff was for that. You might be thinking, "How does robots relate to space and stuff."
Because those robots were originally was going to be aliens. Why did it got removed? Because it didn't fit tf2.[/quote]

[img]http://wiki.teamfortress.com/w/images/2/2a/Triboniophorus_Tyrannus.png[/img]

[Monokarhu]

Now I want to see The Attack of the 50 Ft. Triboniophorus Tyrannus.

[HazzaHardie]

[QUOTE=Grimhound;36915389][img]http://wiki.teamfortress.com/w/images/2/2a/Triboniophorus_Tyrannus.png[/img][/QUOTE]

There is so much alien and space related stuff in tf2

[Psychopath]

[QUOTE=COSTA;36915141]Even in real life that beard looks like paper strips glued together.[/QUOTE]

Pretty sure that the real one was intentionally made of pieces of cardboard to most accurately simulate the appearance of shredded newspaper without the limpness of actual newspaper.

[Rigged237]

confetti beard

[SonicMushroom]

[QUOTE=testinglol;36912032][IMG]http://i.imgur.com/ebsh4.png[/IMG]

a small teaser of upcoming update. my gift to fp :p[/QUOTE]

Oh man so soho is a chinese/japanese/panese map must play!

[PimpinDemopan]

[QUOTE=SonicMushroom;36915631]Oh man so soho is a chinese/japanese/panese map must play![/QUOTE]

Oh God....this can only mean one thing...

FINAL COMBAT

/sarcasm

[ZVAARI]

[QUOTE=SonicMushroom;36915631]Oh man so soho is a chinese/japanese/panese map must play![/QUOTE]
"Upcoming update" is as clear as "The Summer Sale will be this summer"

[turing]

where does testinglol even get this stuff?
is he a valve employee doing viral marketing?

[alsoodani]

[QUOTE=Turing;36915777]where does testinglol even get this stuff?
is he a valve employee doing viral marketing?[/QUOTE]

testinglol explained earlier that he just has close connections.

[ned_ballad]

also today is the official release date of Cold Stream for L4D2

[Erfly]

[QUOTE=ned_ballad;36916177]also today is the official release date of Cold Stream for L4D2[/QUOTE]

I completely forgot that it was still in beta. How long has it been?

[ned_ballad]

A year and a few months

[editline]24th July 2012[/editline]

SPUF interview with a TF2 Team member

[QUOTE=Huff;31922431]So, as I said in [url=http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2791663]this thread[/url], I went to Valve yesterday.

I built up the courage to go inside. Right when I walked in, I talked to the receptionist, who offered me a tour right away! I asked her if I could talk to someone on the TF2 team, so she sent off an email to me. She also put a bunch of shorts and trailers on the big TV. Meet the Pyro looked awesome on it.

Valve trip awesomeness level: [II ]

So I dilly dallyed around in the lobby for a bit, in which a few thigns happened.

First, the receptionist turned to the guy sitting next to her and said "I'm hungry. Will you go get me a plate of bacon?". The guy then got up and got her some bacon.

[COLOR="Red"]Valve has bacon on hand[/COLOR] and they have employees awesome enough to just ask for a plate of it. [COLOR="Red"]If you read this, Ms. Receptionist, you are amazing.[/COLOR]

Valve trip awesomeness level: [IIIIIIIIIIIIIII ]

Next, after just two minutes of looking around, she placed a bag with the Valve logo on the table next to me. Freaking Valve. Goodie bags. Best. Inside was a Dota 2 neck chain, a Portal T-Shirt iron on design, a Portal 2 water bottle, and a pack of TF2 trading cards. I love them.

Valve trip awesomeness level: [IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII]

So I was told I was allowed to take some pictures of anything in the lobby and the connected hallways. Here's what I got.

[url=http://i.imgur.com/eXNVN.jpg]The main sign.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/zPbyc.jpg]The lobby.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/0nAwx.jpg]Some Portal stuff.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/YkS4Q.jpg]Sandvich.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/dMMzk.jpg]Soldier statue.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/6RFh2.jpg]Atlas.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/P1tZ4.jpg]An ASHPD.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/Hinqy.jpg]A big Aperture Science vista poster.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/nb1mW.jpg]Some 3D prints.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/Garat.jpg]The bathrooms are amazing. And there I am! Hi, SPUF![/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/JuEtG.jpg]The Sacrifice.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/TeO2p.jpg]And it's a signed copy![/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/Pbelu.jpg]The golden crowbar.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/B62ht.jpg]Is this a Cthulhu or something from Dota 2?[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/TfFl8.jpg]Companion Cube.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/OcGam.jpg]Some L4D concept art. Note heavy Rochelle and casual Bill.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/78r7e.jpg]GLaDOS mirror. And it's my sexy face again.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/XEmy4.jpg]Saxton Hale.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/u2uTE.jpg]A Headhumper.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/tyK0r.jpg]Earrings, I think.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/S2jmC.jpg]Lemons.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/cTDEk.jpg]More lemons.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/fUxvZ.jpg]A Tank.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/JN0A7.jpg]Turret.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/wxOAM.jpg]The valve.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/AAtfS.jpg]Medic statue.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/mfln7.jpg]Scout[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/wOZgd.jpg]Soldier[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/DLD3l.jpg]Pyro[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/HiwrF.jpg]Demoman[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/YNpEd.jpg]Heavy[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/o6qhI.jpg]Engineer[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/TCrvT.jpg]Medic[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/XPikP.jpg]Sniper[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/y4Nr6.jpg]Spy[/url]

So after looking around the lobby at all the cool stuff, I looked at the books on the table for a bit until [COLOR="Red"]Dario Casali[/COLOR], a guy on the TF2 team, showed up to give me a tour!

So we walked around everywhere, heading straight to the TF2 office after checking out the snack bar ([COLOR="Red"]no big pink cookies! Sorry guys![/COLOR]). On the way I saw that on a random wall they had a poster of the broken texture checkerboard which was funny.

So while Mr. Casali and I chatted about Valve, we made out way to the TF2 office, where I saw the fabled hat wall. I was allowed to take pictures!

[url=http://i.imgur.com/ojnRy.jpg]In all its glory.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/uMY04.jpg]Note the tinfoil hat.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/AbPkL.jpg]Dat Pyro.[/url]

and then I noticed something on the lower left corner of the wall...
[SIZE="4"]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/iRxLH.jpg]There are ponies[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/Jwu6N.jpg]In Vavle HQ :3[/url][/SIZE]

Also around the TF2 office (With the Monkeynautics logo gracing the door) I saw some more 3D prints of the classes, a fanmade lego Minisentry, a 3D printed Saxxy, and some other neat tidbits. And more hats, of course.

The TF2 team (about seven people were there when I looked in) was hard at work on their stuff. I wasn't allowed to look at anything, but they did say hi, which was nice of them. The room was really cool. There were plush stickybombs everywhere, and the computers were really nice.

So we moved on to look at the other offices. The L4D one was kind of dead, but the Portal 2 Team was busy on things like the recently released DLC, and the Dota 2 Team was pretty busy too. [COLOR="Red"]I think he mentioned they were working on something neat for Dota, don't remember what it was[/COLOR]. We also passed the movie office, which was really neat.

After that, there wasn't much left to go around and look at, so we just went up a floor on the elevator (the stairs to the second to top floor are being remodeled) to see the WETA sentry.

[url=http://i.imgur.com/7fgGB.jpg]Angled shot. Mr. Casali said that it's to scale with the ingame model.[/url]
[url=http://i.imgur.com/tan6L.jpg]For reference, I'm about 6'3" standing up.[/url]

I also saw one other tidbit next to it that amused me. [url=http://i.imgur.com/1SM1J.jpg]I don't think I've ever been this amused by a trash bin.[/url]

So after that, Mr. Casali and I returned to the main lobby so I could ask him some questions. I couldn't record exactly what he said, but I took some basic notes!

Interview

Q: How often does the TF2 team read SPUF's TF2 board? Do you have any opinions on us as a whole?
Casali: We read the Steam forums every day, actually! We mostly pay attention to the Beta Forums for balance disscussion, as it's more likely that more knowlegable players post there. We actually look at the main forum for information on trading and the TF2 economy. We look for trends and overall likes and dislikes in the community while developing our decisions.

Followup: Do you know any of our injokes?
C: No, I don't, but I think some of the other guys might.

Q: In what ways can we on SPUF improve our input? Basically, what can we do to help Valve?
C: You guys are already doing very well in helping us out! We usually read through the majority of threads and determine what most of the people posting think. Instead of directly responding in threads or saying what we're doing, we usually try to respond with results- through updates and stuff like that. We try to be very calculated with what we do. Overall, patience on both sides would be good- the forums can get very emotionally charged, so objective reasoning is required on our part. But pretty much continue on with what you guys are currently doing!

Q: Are there any plans to further the use of the TF2 Beta?
C: Well, the Beta is tough to use. We were even hesitant to turn on item drops there, fearing some kind of consequences. We do want to use it for more experimentation and item balancing, like what we did with the Equalizer.[b] We do think we're going to use it more sooner than later[/b], though. We really like the element of surprise, though, and publicly releasing changes in the Beta kind of ruins it.

Q: Will the workshop expand in the future to include things like maps or other additions?
C: [b]We are actually very interested in integrating maps into the TF2 workshop! [/b]The only thing is that we don't know exactly the best way to go around it. The Portal 2 guys are currently working on that with the Perpetual Testing Initiative, but we need more data before we attempt TF2 maps. Of course we don't want to charge for maps, and we're striving for perfection before we release anything. But keep in mind that we're very interested and are figuring it out!

Q: The community has developed a lot of model, bug, performance, sound, and other assorted fixes, many of which have not been implemented. Are there any reasons they haven't yet? (I mentioned things in the workshop like the Airborne Armaments fix and the accepted Last Breath fix a an example.)
C: Well, we usually see things like these as they naturally rise up through the Workshop and community. We really want to implement things like these, but we're both limited on time and manpower. [b]We are very interested in doing on giant update full of community bugfixes, though. We have a lot of community fixes on our radar, though, so just keep notifying us of fixes and wait for us to get to them. It takes time![/b]

Q: Now that Meet the Pyro has been released, is there any hope for future official TF2 videos?
C: Actually, we're currently working on something! We like to use videos and trailers as an integral part of introducing new concepts. We're going to continue to use videos for promos and introducing new concepts!

Q: Any plans for further optimization and bugfixes?
C: We do have a list of major issues that we need to fix, but again, it takes time, and [b]we're already down to the eleventh hour on what we're currently working on.[/b] Fixing bugs and improving performance is one of our top normal priorities, though! You guys can actually help us out here. [b]We really find gigantic bug megathreads helpful in finding what's wrong![/b]

Q: Are there any big plans for the community as a whole?
C: Basically, we just want to keep you guys as happy as possible! We look for trends in what the community wants, and mix it with our own vision to try to create the best solutions possible. Overall, we just want to keep gamers invested, happy, and stay connected with our fanbase!

Q: Any plans for modification support like custom weapon stats, modeling, and mapping? (I mentioned ned_ballad to him, saying that he's one of our top techies, and that he requested this kind of thing. I think.)
C: I don't really know anything about support like that, sorry! But your question reminds me of suggestions for official weapon stats. One of the best ways the community can contribute weapon ideas is through the Workshop. [b]If they comment on weapons with ideas for stats (keeping in line with the class and weapon slot), we can see those directly. [/b] Also, if you guys want support for developing modifications, a good way to get our attention would be to gather up a big group of like-minded players, collect all the ideas and data beforehand, and send us the results. If we see that enough people see value in an idea or feature, we consider it!

Q: Any opinions on Robots?
C: Well, let's just say that the robot heads that were in SFM may or may not mean something. But yeah, robots are pretty neat.

Mr. Casali also told me about the pricing change while I was there, but that was already patched in!

Also, on the possibility of a SPUF-themed item, Casali said to keep asking and get passionate if we want to grab Valve's attention!

One more important thing! [b]Mr. Casali said that they're going to be start releasing a new project very soon! This project is the reason they've been so quiet lately, and to keep a sharp eye our for hints! This Thursday may be a big day, guys![/b]

So after that, I bid Mr. Casali farewell and walked out of the building. I'd like to thank Mr. Casali so much for taking time out of his day to see me, and to the rest of Valve for being so awesome! You guys made this day one of the best I've ever had <3 [/QUOTE]

[Huff]

Oh, I was just about to post that, ned!

It was a fun trip :)

[ned_ballad]

oh sorry, I didn't even know you had a FP account :P

[Huff]

Well, as you can see, I don't use it much.

[testinglol]

its probably saxxies with koth_soho and a backstory that leads to robots somehow.