Major Update Speculation V35 - A Distinctive Lack of Communication - Games

[QUOTE=Lord Exor;51587297]I would take this argument seriously if the multiplayer gaming market didn't already sustain itself quite well prior to the invention of skill matching.[/QUOTE] It didn't. You're ignoring the fact that for most of the 90s and 00s, PC gaming, especially competitive shooters, was a small niche market. Games like Quake and Unreal Tournament weren't made for the mass market, because the mass market just bought SNESes and Playstations. It was a small, self-sustaining market, because the games were made small for a small playerbase. Knowledge was shared between these small, close knit communities on a personal level. But that's not the case anymore. It's only become a large market in the past few years, so now companies like Valve need to start embracing the average consumer. Trying to treat the market as if it's the exact same as it was fifteen years ago is a death sentence.

Obviously they were profitable, or companies wouldn't have continued producing the games. I never said they were as profitable as they are today, but if I had to choose between hoisting the genre into the mainstream consciousness and retaining what I loved about the scene, I would go with the former. With broader appeal brings in geater amounts of idiots that force the developers to dumb down their products.

[QUOTE=GuntMyFries;51587023]He could have at the very least spelled it all correctly and used Grammer. Does he really even care at this point, because it sure doesn't sound like it.[/QUOTE] its twitter, not the official blog

[QUOTE=GuntMyFries;51587023]He could have at the very least spelled it all correctly and used Grammer. Does he really even care at this point, because it sure doesn't sound like it.[/QUOTE] To be fair, the comics ought to have been run through spell-check at least once for all the work and time that goes into creating them. These two panels still haven't been corrected since 2014. [t]http://i.imgur.com/ab9PPTZ.png[/t] [t]http://i.imgur.com/ZtiGaSZ.png[/t]

the replies to his tweet are... nice

[QUOTE=lefur;51587625]the replies to his tweet are... nice[/QUOTE] How Nice?

Hope you're ready for the overwatch fan-comic because he doesn't even mention tf2 in that tweet

Hell, i would have rather been disappointed that the comic didn't come out. That would have just made me sad but seeing that tweet pisses me the heck off

What if january has the comic and the pyro update and it is not-suck?

[QUOTE=Sheer Visor;51588351]What if january has the comic and the pyro update and it is not-suck?[/QUOTE] [t]http://i.imgur.com/lhTbicY.png[/t] I think that's clear enough that TF2 will not experience the 10th birthday of it's own [sp]atleast that's what Valve are trying to implement with those "updates"[/sp]

I don't think Jay knows exact dates. He just posts because things look like as they are that moment but get delayed due to matters that he cannot simply do anything or speed up the process. So don't hate the guy, and cool your jets for a while.

There are three possible outcomes I can see with this: (Overly Optimistic) - Comic is chained to the large Update that was delayed, thus the large Update is coming alongside it in January. (Optimistic) - Comic remains to be it's own thing and just releases in January. (Realistic) - Comic will release 2018

If i would have to guess for the next year schedule, would say that the pyro update launches in february with the comic. Feb, mar, april, may - there's ~4 months for the update to last and ~1 month cooldown period between big updates. Update propably includes a pass too. The jungle update will be the summer one, launching with the steam sales and for the rest of the year, there is of course halloween coming, which celebrates the 10 year anniversary with new valve map. That leaves december, a smismass update which rewards players for being with the game for long time, with the heavy update. Time will tell how wrong or correct this prediction is.

[QUOTE=ics;51588481]If i would have to guess for the next year schedule, would say that the pyro update launches in february with the comic. Feb, mar, april, may - there's ~4 months for the update to last and ~1 month cooldown period between big updates. Update propably includes a pass too. The jungle update will be the summer one, launching with the steam sales and for the rest of the year, there is of course halloween coming, which celebrates the 10 year anniversary with new valve map. That leaves december, a smismass update which rewards players for being with the game for long time, with the heavy update. Time will tell how wrong or correct this prediction is.[/QUOTE] That seems like a pretty logical release schedule assuming we get our missing major update early next year and Valve won't skip it for the summer update. I still have to wonder if Cactus Canyon and Asteroid somehow tie into the comic and that's why we haven't gotten the final versions even though Valve has shipped multiple other finished maps. I would love to see Valve make a new Halloween map next year. I would love to see an evil snowman or Santa boss, have Valve reskin a snow themed map (or maybe add snow to upward and reskin that) and call the update The Nightmare Before Smissmas. One other nice thing would be Valve to snap up some of the Iron Gauntlet stuff and put out an MvM update (along with the air raid MvM map they seem to be working on based on MvM code updates) though I don't know when a good place to for that in would be since I doubt Valve would ship a normal major update and MvM update in the same update, but you never know. I also hope Valve announces sometime next year that they're going to work on a Frontline themed update like they did with Jungle this year.

[QUOTE=MrBump;51586951]Comic update. [IMG]http://i.imgur.com/FWkZF7c.png[/IMG][/QUOTE] Fucking hell. I'm getting tired of Valve viewing the TF2 community as nothing but sentient wallets who will buy anything and accept whatever small amount of shit we're given. from [URL="http://makanidotdot.tumblr.com/post/149762367641/i-really-didnt-want-to-bother-you-with-this"]makani's tumblr[/URL] (3 months old but still relevant) [QUOTE]releasing [the comic] sooner would have required not contributing to any other projects for TF or Dota or VR[/QUOTE] As you can see they've been putting the 1 and a half year late comic on a backlog to focus on other projects. I don't know if it's a lack of commitment and care from the artists/writers, or if valve is actually pulling employees from their workstation to do VR and Dota stuff instead. Either way, I honestly don't think that Valve deserves TF2. Absolutely [I][B]any[/B][/I] game company in the world would cream their pants over having the consistently top-5 played game on steam in their hands, but for valve it's just chump change.

[QUOTE=riki2cool;51588627]Fucking hell. I'm getting tired of Valve viewing the TF2 community as nothing but sentient wallets who will buy anything and accept whatever small amount of shit we're given. from [URL="http://makanidotdot.tumblr.com/post/149762367641/i-really-didnt-want-to-bother-you-with-this"]makani's tumblr[/URL] (3 months old but still relevant) As you can see they've been putting the 1 and a half year late comic on a backlog to focus on other projects. I don't know if it's a lack of commitment and care from the artists/writers, or if valve is actually pulling employees from their workstation to do VR and Dota stuff instead. Either way, I honestly don't think that Valve deserves TF2. Absolutely [I][B]any[/B][/I] game company in the world would cream their pants over having the consistently top-5 played game on steam in their hands, but for valve it's just chump change.[/QUOTE] If TF2 was given to anyone else we'd be having a game that was made to "rival" Call of Duty and die a month after release like a lot of fps games were at the time which I'd rather not have thanks.

[QUOTE=Joshii;51588669]If TF2 was given to anyone else we'd be having a game that was made to "rival" Call of Duty and die a month after release like a lot of fps games were at the time which I'd rather not have thanks.[/QUOTE] So let's not give it to activision then? I'm talking about devs like the ones who made the passtime gamemode, or the rocket league devs, or Overkill, or maybe even Tripwire. Obviously they're gonna have to take some Italian speaking lesson to be able to understand all of the spaghetti code.

[QUOTE=Upgrade;51587607]To be fair, the comics ought to have been run through spell-check at least once for all the work and time that goes into creating them. These two panels still haven't been corrected since 2014. [t]http://i.imgur.com/ab9PPTZ.png[/t] [t]http://i.imgur.com/ZtiGaSZ.png[/t][/QUOTE] Atleast the in-game typoes are fixed [T]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/263841416549362829/B28D02EA00A069781D21D78F35C2A8BE63A9E706/[/T]

[QUOTE=ComodoreBluth;51588545]That seems like a pretty logical release schedule assuming we get our missing major update early next year and Valve won't skip it for the summer update. I still have to wonder if Cactus Canyon and Asteroid somehow tie into the comic and that's why we haven't gotten the final versions even though Valve has shipped multiple other finished maps. [/QUOTE] I'm thinking they will release the update early next year. Sell a pass for it and it will include asteroid and cactus canyon as finished versions. The maps may or may not be tied to the comic. But i doubt those will be the only maps the pyro update will ship. Maybe 1-2 more from the community. I would like to see more Valve made maps because those add materials, models, sounds, etc to the game that mappers can use. Most community maps do not have that much custom stuff and if they do, those cannot be used as they are packed into the bsp itself. How swiftwater for example was added, was different (everything not packed into the bsp) from let's say majority of the community maps (everything packed into the bsp). [QUOTE=ComodoreBluth;51588545] I would love to see Valve make a new Halloween map next year. I would love to see an evil snowman or Santa boss, have Valve reskin a snow themed map (or maybe add snow to upward and reskin that) and call the update The Nightmare Before Smissmas. One other nice thing would be Valve to snap up some of the Iron Gauntlet stuff and put out an MvM update (along with the air raid MvM map they seem to be working on based on MvM code updates) though I don't know when a good place to for that in would be since I doubt Valve would ship a normal major update and MvM update in the same update, but you never know. I also hope Valve announces sometime next year that they're going to work on a Frontline themed update like they did with Jungle this year. [/QUOTE] I also think it's time for them to do another halloween map and since it's 10 year anniversary year for TF2, it needs to be something great. What you said just now, sounds very awesome. I'd be up to build a map around that for sure even though i have a new idea for next year halloween too. I think MvM is a bit on the background for now. There are the loyal fans playing it, buying tickets and enjoying it but large majority isn't really into it. Frontline was something i was excited about at first, when i saw the teaser trailer, it was just something great to expect. But after i looked into the stuff community made for it, there's lots of stuff to use but most maps seem unfitting to the TF2 theme itself. I'm not sure frontline itself is something that Valve will add, neither was mayann since jungle theme is much more versatile. Maybe we'll be seeing frontline in one form in the future but it would work great as a real animated short!

[QUOTE=riki2cool;51588682]I'm talking about devs like the ones who made the passtime gamemode[/QUOTE] pls no [QUOTE=riki2cool;51588682]or the rocket league devs[/quote] that would bring sweeping changes, such as cosmetic updates [QUOTE=riki2cool;51588682]or Overkill[/quote] shitty paid DLC here we come [QUOTE=riki2cool;51588682]or maybe even Tripwire[/quote] this is how we unbalance the game to shit again

[QUOTE=ics;51588704] I think MvM is a bit on the background for now. There are the loyal fans playing it, buying tickets and enjoying it but large majority isn't really into it. [/QUOTE] Even if Valve doesn't release the MvM air raid map they seem to be working on they could pretty easily grab some of the Iron Gauntlet maps and missions along with the cosmetics for a crate and put it into an update. If they don't want to directly pay for the maps maybe make special Tour of Duty Tickets or Squad Surplus Vouchers for the update that Valve pays a portion of the the revenue to the map makers with. Maybe make normal tickets/vouchers work (so people don't get mad they can't use the existing tickets/vouchers) but if you use the event ticket/voucher if you get a bot killer or Australium you get a special unusual effect that you can only get during the event. Make a few new Australiums (including a Huntsman that turns the enemy head gold on headshot kill) and bot killers for the update. You could include some MVM changes upgrades but it's not necessary. It would be a nice sized MVM update Valve would probably make a lot of money off of that would make MVM fans happy. Edit: Probably don't give the bot killers unusual effects (unless it's very rare) but make unique new botkiller heads for the event. Make all the Australium weapons have the unusual particle effect for the event.

[QUOTE=riki2cool;51588682]So let's not give it to activision then? I'm talking about devs like the ones who made the passtime gamemode, or the rocket league devs, or Overkill, or maybe even Tripwire. Obviously they're gonna have to take some Italian speaking lesson to be able to understand all of the spaghetti code.[/QUOTE] Sure, but the examples you gave aren't exactly the best, and good luck finding a AAA company that wouldn't have turned it into a "COD killer" I feel like I should explain a bit more what I mean, I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, it's just that there isn't any other company that comes to mind that is known for their games having a long life-cycle while still retaining a high player count, and just handing it off to anybody could severely affect both, see CSGO by Hidden Path compared to CSGO now by Valve as an example of what I mean.

[QUOTE=riki2cool;51588627]Fucking hell. I'm getting tired of Valve viewing the TF2 community as nothing but sentient wallets who will buy anything and accept whatever small amount of shit we're given. from [URL="http://makanidotdot.tumblr.com/post/149762367641/i-really-didnt-want-to-bother-you-with-this"]makani's tumblr[/URL] (3 months old but still relevant) [QUOTE]releasing [the comic] sooner would have required not contributing to any other projects for TF or Dota or VR[/QUOTE][/QUOTE] Here's exactly the problem though: they barely did anything for TF2 this year. Don't tell me they didn't have time to look over the comic, because I won't believe it. This was the last issue until they decided that they were totally on schedule and could absolutely handle a 7th entry, so this must mean the plot has been finalized and the script finished by now. It must've been done for years. They couldn't have been sitting at their desks doing nothing for [B][U]3 years[/U][/B]. Not to mention, the art itself must've also been done for the better part of 2016. I know Dota had a handful of comics and there's the occasionnal update every now and then, but other than that we have NO idea what is going on at Valve. We don't even know if they make games anymore, what their projects are beyond some VR demos that are just there, and if they even plan to do anything in the short or long term. Valve is just the company that manages Steam nowadays as far as I'm concerned, and I am absolutely stumped that this would require so much manpower that it makes finishing and releasing a comic that is near completion impossible. Their only excuse would be that they have some sort of big project that we will obiviously never hear from, otherwise I'd have no fucking clue what even Valve is anymore.

[QUOTE=ComodoreBluth;51588750]Even if Valve doesn't release the MvM air raid map they seem to be working on they could pretty easily grab some of the Iron Gauntlet maps and missions along with the cosmetics for a crate and put it into an update. If they don't want to directly pay for the maps maybe make special Tour of Duty Tickets or Squad Surplus Vouchers for the update that Valve pays a portion of the the revenue to the map makers with. Maybe make normal tickets/vouchers work (so people don't get mad they can't use the existing tickets/vouchers) but if you use the event ticket/voucher if you get a bot killer or Australium you get a special unusual effect that you can only get during the event. Make a few new Australiums (including a Huntsman that turns the enemy head gold on headshot kill) and bot killers for the update. You could include some MVM changes upgrades but it's not necessary. It would be a nice sized MVM update Valve would probably make a lot of money off of that would make MVM fans happy. Edit: Probably don't give the bot killers unusual effects (unless it's very rare) but make unique new botkiller heads for the event. Make all the Australium weapons have the unusual particle effect for the event.[/QUOTE] I'm all in for everything new coming into the game but their way of working is something that we don't understand. For example, CSGO has been nearly 10 months without an operation. Many people would have thought that they grab some new maps from the workshop and eventually add in the "gungame" maps also along their own made basic maps to play on the missions too. A lot of people predicted that we will be seeing another similiar Gun Mettle update at smissmass but they don't always do what is expected. They could do the cashgrab, but i don't think thats their goal, but to improve their work and future products that they do. If anyone has looked the videos added to their channel month ago from the past steam dev days, they explain in those why they added official servers into the TF2 back 2011 when TF2 went free to play. It wasn't alone because the experience of users from the servers were bad, but also as a test. Now they host servers for every future games as well as host servers for other game developers on their servers farms, which they build around the world. They already have made some tests. They have also made changes to backend that the TF2, CSGO and Dota2 teams will add into their games. Maybe just to test out, but they also use that feedback on developing tools and features on Steam. As for why TF2 is not getting that much attention is, that Steam Business side and development take a lot of resources from that. They talked about making tools to Steam for developers to release games faster and remove them from the middle, slowing down the releases. They also talk about how they renewed Steam store and finding stuff from it etc. VR seems to be a market that they want to expand to and also adding SteamOS to support that fully as well as other controllers which now work with Steam. Not just the one they did. These tools are for developers to use freely and incorporate into their games. The revenues are on Steam are at rise a lot in areas like asia, north america and europe, so making something for TF2 is more like keeping us happy, not to gain money. It doesn't take a genious to count that if Valve has ~450 people working and Steam, VR, SteamOS, Steam hardware and unannounced projects are on their main products, not much time and resources are left for the rest of the stuff out there. TF2 team doesn't seem to be doing just TF2, they do other things and those other things seem to have the priority, just like the tweets from Jay are letting us know. It looks like there just isn't time and people to do everything at the same time.

I'd rather put up with paid DLC than nothing at all at this point. And Valve has more than enough money to hire employees for dedicated customer support and legacy game development. Stop being a Valve fanboy.

Paid DLC is better than keyless cases. Right now we're literally a shitty F2P Korean MMO with gamble boxes. the only saving grace is the steam market and trading in that aspect.

[QUOTE=Lord Exor;51589683]I'd rather put up with paid DLC than nothing at all at this point. And Valve has more than enough money to hire employees for dedicated customer support and legacy game development. Stop being a Valve fanboy.[/QUOTE] you gotta look at the problem that happens before that like whats wrong with the current team, how many members, what legitimately causes the content drought etc before just saying 'lmao hire more ppl' it's like why would I hire 10 people to change a lightbulb when 1 can do it anyways though tf2s recent problems are most likely ironically stemmed from the community backlash in conjunction with how hard it is to update the game, given the spaghetti for coding - remember how the game stopped functioning on an entire operating system? thats pretty hard to achieve by sheer accident unless you change something fundamental like the engine itself, which they didn't. The few people that do anything for the game probably have to go through hoops just to make sure the game still works (and most of the time it doesn't) even after minor patches, let alone the major ones they get death threats over coupled with the ever infinite 'gg they killed tf2' all whilst overwatch breathes down their necks it ends up being very little wonder why nobody wants to touch a basically self-sufficient game especially when there's other popular, innovated and/or flashier products to work upon. Besides, didn't they ultimately admit to tf2 being valves guinea pig? there's still plenty of cash to beat out of this dead horse of a game (not to be confused with dead game, it is still very well and truly alive by player count and a passion standpoint) so it'd just be simply too stupid for anyone affiliated with valve to mention anything about tf2 that isn't a promotion and there is no point talking about promotion when you can't bring the content; case and point being the pyro update we're still waiting for

Releasing five comics in the time it takes for most people to get a degree is fucking unacceptable for a multi-million dollar company. I refuse to believe every Valve employee is working on VR and Dota 2, although it wouldn't surprise me one bit and would only further my belief that they're stuck in the past with their "we're a small company of whacky computer people who can't talk or be good at PR" that they defined themselves as in the 90's. Hire more people, change the management structure, get people paid to communicate with the community. Valve cannot hope for a good image if they refuse to evolve as company.

[QUOTE=Lord Exor;51589683]I'd rather put up with paid DLC than nothing at all at this point. And Valve has more than enough money to hire employees for dedicated customer support and legacy game development. Stop being a Valve fanboy.[/QUOTE] Money is not the issue, finding people who fit in the company and have the necessary skills, trust and dedication is. Also, people who apply for a position, aren't just doing that job alone, but everything else required. It's the same in any company.

[QUOTE=Power Glove;51589823]you gotta look at the problem that happens before that like whats wrong with the current team, how many members, what legitimately causes the content drought etc before just saying 'lmao hire more ppl' it's like why would I hire 10 people to change a lightbulb when 1 can do it anyways though tf2s recent problems are most likely ironically stemmed from the community backlash in conjunction with how hard it is to update the game, given the spaghetti for coding - remember how the game stopped functioning on an entire operating system? thats pretty hard to achieve by sheer accident unless you change something fundamental like the engine itself, which they didn't. The few people that do anything for the game probably have to go through hoops just to make sure the game still works (and most of the time it doesn't) even after minor patches, let alone the major ones they get death threats over coupled with the ever infinite 'gg they killed tf2' all whilst overwatch breathes down their necks it ends up being very little wonder why nobody wants to touch a basically self-sufficient game especially when there's other popular, innovated and/or flashier products to work upon. Besides, didn't they ultimately admit to tf2 being valves guinea pig? there's still plenty of cash to beat out of this dead horse of a game (not to be confused with dead game, it is still very well and truly alive by player count and a passion standpoint) so it'd just be simply too stupid for anyone affiliated with valve to mention anything about tf2 that isn't a promotion and there is no point talking about promotion when you can't bring the content; case and point being the pyro update we're still waiting for[/QUOTE] Either hire more people or start assigning qualified individuals within the company to a dedicated task. Clearly the current arrangement isn't working, and outside of TF2, Valve still doesn't have a support department.