Digital Media Concepts/Team Fortress 2

Team Fortress 2 is a team based online multi-player, first person-shooter built using Half-Life 2 source engine. It was developed and published by Valve Co. with a released date of October 10, 2007. It was bundled with the Orange Box that included 5 games, Portal, Half-life 2 and its two expansions. The game visuals is compared to that of Pixar cartoon like visuals. As 2011, the game is free-to-play with micro transactions, allowing players to purchase hats and other in-game cosmetics.

Team Fortress 2

Team Fortress 2 style logo
Developer	Valve Corporation
Publisher	Valve Corporation
Release Date	October 10, 2007
Genre	Multiplayer, First-Person Shooter
Platforms	PC, Linux, OSX, Xbox360, PlayStation 3

Gameplay

The gameplay is like its predecessors, in that there are two teams, the blue team and the red team. The objective is to capture opposing team’s briefcase as many times as possible before the match ends. The team with the highest scores wins. There are 9 different classes for players to choose from. They include medic, pyro, scout, heavy weapons guy, spy, sniper, demoman, engineer, and soldier. There are also new gameplay modes added such as assassination mode, territory advancement, hold the ball mode-that included 4 opposing teams, and nuclear meltdown.

Art style and design

The game’s art style is like that of Pixar animated film, the Incredibles. It has 50’s, 60’s theme to it, that most of the characters were design from that era. Characters are diverse, all represented by their style and voice accent. The scout has east coast accent, HW guy is Russian, Demoman is Scottish, sniper is Australian, medic is German, and spy is French. The game was originally design with the Half-Life engine and titled Team Fortress: Brotherhood of Arms, but was canned and redesign.

Classes

Class	Description	Weapons
Pyro	Medium armored class that can disrupt players by igniting them on fire	Short-range flame thrower, flare, and ax.
Medic	Support class provides health to nearby allies.	Surgeon saw, medic gun, and syringe gun.
Scout	Light armored support class, preferable useful for flag capturing as they are quick.	Sawed-off double barrel shotgun, bat, and pistol.
Heavy Weapon Guy	Heavy armored class, usually take high amount of damage while dealing high damage.	Mini gun, shotgun, and unarmed combat.
Spy	Light armored class, can disguise as enemy player classes and can instantly kill player by backstabbing them.	Butter-fly knife, revolver, and sapper.
Sniper	Equipped with long-range sniper weapon that can deal high damage by charging and aiming for head shot.	Sniper rifle, machine rifle, and large knife
Soldier	Highly versatile class with light-heavy armor, equipped with long range rocket launcher that can perform rocket jumps.	Rocket launcher, shovel, and shotgun
Engineer	Support class, usually on defensive side, builds sentry guns and dispensers for ammo	Wrench, pistol, and shotgun
Demoman	Offensive and defensive class, can layout pipe bombs	Self-detonating and control-detonating grenade launcher and broken glass bottle.

Game Modes

Capture the Flag

The blue or red team must steal the enemy’s briefcase and return it to their own base. The team with the most points at the end of the match or by scoring limit wins.

Attack/Defend

Players must either defend or capture all the control points before time runs out.

Payload

Just like attack/defend, teams must either push the cart to the destination or prevent the cart from reaching its destination

Mann vs Machine

Cooperative team mode where player must defend against a horde of enemy AI controlled robots.

Reception

The mod was well received as it offered humorous cartoon style graphics and team based gameplay. It is listed 93/100 on the metacritic website. The original sequel, team fortress 2 brotherhood of arms was scratched.