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

[QUOTE=Lord Exor;51685578]If they honestly believe Smissmas counted as a "major" update, then there's a serious issue. I didn't even anticipate the Pyro update, merely the standard weapon and class balances that have been par for the course for years.[/QUOTE] There's clearly a different interpretation of what's major. To them, it's any patch they think is worth promoting. The wiki has given it the broad definition of new content and/or game feature. Smissmas would fit as it added cosmetics and the opt-in balance for casual. Even the Saxxy awards fulfills that since it spurs the community to create new content for everyone to consume.

[QUOTE=Rhike;51685746]IIRC it's in 40 minutes.[/QUOTE] [URL="https://www.tickcounter.com/countdown/4781/gaben-ama"]Here's a silly countdown for anyone interested. [/URL]

[QUOTE=Rhike;51685746]Last AMA 2 years ago there was a question about competitive, something like "Do you like the current state of esports CSGO and Dota 2". So make sure to 'spam him with questions about the TF2 comp support, especially funding tournaments. We need a reply. We really do. [/QUOTE] You do realize this type of questions were asked those two years ago, right? That year was when the [B]BIG COMP MEETING[/B] (IE: Matchmaking Confirmed AGAIN!) happened, and Ster made his "same conversation, two years later" video. We have been asking these questions since 2008-ish. Why would they change the answer of "No" now?

[QUOTE=Stroheim;51685806]You do realize this type of questions were asked those two years ago, right? That year was when the [B]BIG COMP MEETING[/B] (IE: Matchmaking Confirmed AGAIN!) happened, and Ster made his "same conversation, two years later" video. We have been asking these questions since 2008-ish. Why would they change the answer of "No" now?[/QUOTE] I *am* pulling this out of my (ass) memory, but some competitive player who has visited Valve (Sigafoo?) mentioned that Valve talked about funding tournaments. Perhaps it took Meet Your Match for them to finally start doing these?

[url]https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Gaben/comments/5olhj4/comment/dck73z4[/url] I think we should up vote Nebrassy's comment for our own sakes, pretty well-made stuff.

[QUOTE=Contra132;51684061]he's fun to torment people on pubs with, but playing demoknight versus actual demoman is tantamount to outright throwing in both 6s and Highlander because he simply lacks the damage output needed to be the offensive core of the team- as he is in those formats[/QUOTE] Yes, but pubs is the main form of the game. Using him in comp is indeed a bad choice in most cases. Also I should have worded myself better. I was under the impression that pills+shield+sword counts as demoknight and full demoknight has boots instead of pills. Pillknight is a viable pub class imo. Full demoknight is a weak character yes, so we can agree on that.

One question of note: "Does Valve plan on doing anything with Source 2 in the coming years? If so, what?" "We are continuing to use Source 2 as our primary game development environment. Aside from moving Dota 2 to the engine recently, we are are using it as the foundation of some unannounced products. We would like to have everyone working on games here at Valve to eventually be using the same engine. We also intend to continue to make the Source 2 engine work available to the broad developer community as we go, and to make it available free of charge." Now before people try to take it as "confirmation" that TF2 (and CS:GO) will be ported, please consider that it's something they'd LIKE to do, but also you can easily have everyone working on the same engine by stopping working on older games.

[QUOTE=DRiller_Valve]TF2 has millions of unique players per month, and the team is staffed by a group of people that love and play the game. We're committed to supporting and growing TF2 with new features, content, and player experiences. We're currently working on our next major update, which features a new campaign, the Pyro class pack, matchmaking improvements/features, and lots of game balancing improvements.[/QUOTE] [URL="https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Gaben/comments/5olhj4/hi_im_gabe_newell_ama/dck7wde/"]Source[/URL].

"TF2 has millions of unique players per month, and the team is staffed by a group of people that love and play the game. We're committed to supporting and growing TF2 with new features, content, and player experiences. We're currently working on our next major update, which features a new campaign, the Pyro class pack, matchmaking improvements/features, and lots of game balancing improvements." [URL="https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Gaben/comments/5olhj4/hi_im_gabe_newell_ama/dck7wde/"]Source[/URL] So did we learn anything with this comment or is this literally nothing new?

I'm still being ignored, but this is the only related thing I found [url]https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Gaben/comments/5olhj4/hi_im_gabe_newell_ama/dck7wde/[/url] 2late

"The count varies depending on what the team is working on, but the current count is 16. This includes programmers, artists, writers, level designers, and sound engineers. As far as the 10th anniversary, we have lots of things we're excited to get into the community's hands this year, but we can't promise a major update will land on that day/date." On a question about how many people are working on TF2, and if there's any plans for TF2's 10th anniversary.

[t]http://i.imgur.com/i7nqNGP.png?1[/t] Plant was on vacation this week.

[IMG]http://imgur.com/ooPMUXQ.jpg[/IMG] Heck, I got ninja'd twice

[url]https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Gaben/comments/5olhj4/hi_im_gabe_newell_ama/dck8b4c/?context=3[/url] 16 people working on the game... At least it's not 5.

[QUOTE=Woozlez;51686113][IMG]http://imgur.com/ooPMUXQ.jpg[/IMG] Heck, I got ninja'd twice[/QUOTE] Pretty much nothing we didn't know already.

I'm whelmed.

Wait we have 16 people working on the game then? So why was Smissmas so half assed? They surely could've taken the time to at least do a few fixes?

[QUOTE=jimbobjoe1234;51686146]Wait we have 16 people working on the game then? So why was Smissmas so half assed? They surely could've taken the time to at least do a few fixes?[/QUOTE] why put in effort doing fixes for some money when you can put in no effort, add some workshop hats and makes lots of money

[B]VNN IS GETTING A GABE INTERVIEW[/B] [t]http://i.imgur.com/FLwg2pi.png?1[/t]

[QUOTE=Stroheim;51686189][B]VNN IS GETTING A GABE INTERVIEW[/B] [t]http://i.imgur.com/FLwg2pi.png?1[/t][/QUOTE] All I would be expecting from that would be really vague answers from Gabe and only one or two questions from VNN about TF2.

I'm pretty sure VNN is going to ask more then 2 questions about TF2, I mean I'm pretty sure out of all the videos he's made that most of them are about TF2. Its clear he cares about the game a lot

Even though it may not be directly tied to Team Fortress, I'm glad to see that Gabe (and Valve as a whole) acknowledge the existence of problems with their support services.

[QUOTE=housejojo06;51686206]All I would be expecting from that would be really vague answers from Gabe and only one or two questions from VNN about TF2.[/QUOTE] LEAKED TRANSCRIPT FROM VNN GABE INTERVIEW VNN: Whats happening with TF2? GabeN: We have stuff planned that you'll see soon™ VNN: Whats happening with CS:GO? GabeN: We have stuff planned that you'll see soon™ VNN: Whats happening with HL3? GabeN: I have nothing to say about HL3

[QUOTE=Woozlez;51686113][IMG]http://imgur.com/ooPMUXQ.jpg[/IMG][/QUOTE] Literally no chance whatsoever of that happening in Q1, then.

[t]http://puu.sh/tpXcP/85315a9ca1.png[/t] Sounds exciting. It's always nice to know the number of people working on the game.

[IMG]http://imgur.com/ryYOONC.png[/IMG] holy shittu

[QUOTE=Stroheim;51686189][B]VNN IS GETTING A GABE INTERVIEW[/B] [t]http://i.imgur.com/FLwg2pi.png?1[/t][/QUOTE] [t]http://i.imgur.com/Z2CUj7E.png?1[/t] [B] AND GABE HAS NEVER HEARD OF IT[/B]

[QUOTE=Sheer Visor;51686281][IMG]http://imgur.com/ryYOONC.png[/IMG] holy shittu[/QUOTE] This was already know, they're working on a Portal movie and a Half Life movie. JJ Abrams actually said in September that more info on the Portal movie was coming soon but it seems like he's being affected by Valve time. [editline]17th January 2017[/editline] [QUOTE=Jetamo;51686015]One question of note: "Does Valve plan on doing anything with Source 2 in the coming years? If so, what?" "We are continuing to use Source 2 as our primary game development environment. Aside from moving Dota 2 to the engine recently, we are are using it as the foundation of some unannounced products. We would like to have everyone working on games here at Valve to eventually be using the same engine. We also intend to continue to make the Source 2 engine work available to the broad developer community as we go, and to make it available free of charge." Now before people try to take it as "confirmation" that TF2 (and CS:GO) will be ported, please consider that it's something they'd LIKE to do, but also you can easily have everyone working on the same engine by stopping working on older games.[/QUOTE] They aren't going to drop TF2 and CSGO as long as they remain as popular as they currently are (especially with their in game economies linked to each other).

[URL]https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Gaben/comments/5olhj4/hi_im_gabe_newell_ama/dckabrt/?context=3[/URL] [QUOTE]Greetings Mr Newell! We at r/tf2 are incredibly excited about this AMA that you are hosting, and we have put together some questions specifically related to Team Fortress 2. On behalf of r/tf2, I sincerely hope that you (or someone from the TF2 development team) will be able to answer some, if not all, of these questions. Thank you for creating such an awesome game! 3: Is it possible that you could get a team to frequently communicate with the TF2 fanbase on a regular basis about updates, weapon balances, competitive, and the general direction the game is taking? 7: Why does Dota 2 and CS:GO get officially sponsored tournaments, while TF2 does not? Thank you very much for putting this AMA together! [/QUOTE] [QUOTE] 3: The team is usually so heads-down focused on working on the game that we sometimes forget to communicate when we should. [B]One of the upcoming blog posts we're planning talks about the game balance changes we're working on for the next major update - along with explanations for those changes - so the community can give us feedback prior to the release[/B]. 7: TF2's been around long enough that our philosophy on the way the competitive scene exists alongside the more casual scene has changed significantly. In the years following the initial release in 2007, we regarded the competitive scene as a separate set of customers, so we'd jump between shipping new content for casual players in one update and adding a bunch of competitive features in the next. These days, we regard that view as antiquated and instead believe we should aim for a single community with players existing throughout a spectrum between casual and competitive. As a result, we've spent the last year or two working towards unifying the two parts of the TF2 community, to bring it more in line with the way CS:GO and Dota 2 work. One barrier was that TF pros played a fairly different game to what everyone else was playing (classes and weapons are missing, different game mode, etc.). So we shipped a set of features, like these: - introduced an official competitive matchmaking mode that is closer to what most players are familiar with - to serve as a bridge - added an in-game Twitch streamers list - to help highlight pro players and organized events - provided in-game announcements around major events - talked with many different groups of players and organizers to see what kind of unified format we could adopt. There's plenty more work to do in this space, and at some point it may transition from adding features in the product to supporting the competitive community itself. In the near term we'll continue to work on pulling the community together, using as much player feedback as we can get, combined with the data we're gathering to see how the work we've done so far is panning out.[/QUOTE]

Well the AMA is over. I'm actually surprised how much they talked about HL3 and TF2.