Steam News Update - Friday, September 14 2007

[DigiQ8]

It has been one crazy week. The Steam Community officially released, The Orange Box is available for pre-order and the Team Fortress 2 Beta announcement. That's what the Steam News Update recaps this week. Oh, and did I mention that the demo for Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is now available on Steam? Which almost guarantees it's appearing on Steam soon.

For the past month, hundreds of thousands of Steam users have previewed the Steam Community. This week, we dropped the beta tag and officially opened the Steam Community. Thanks to everyone who joined while the paint was drying, with a bonus jumping high-five to those who provided invaluable comments, bug reports, and feature requests.[br]

Not long ago (in geologic time), we announced the sequel to Team Fortress. We?re thrilled to finally be just days away from unveiling Team Fortress 2. Starting this Monday, September 17, those who pre-purchase the Orange Box on Steam or swing by a licensed Valve Cyber Cafe can play the beta version of Team Fortress 2.[br]

Many of you have asked for a way to track your stats while playing TF2. Rest assured that no gib will be forgotten: starting Monday, your Steam Community profile will include a detailed breakdown of your TF2 player statistics.

Can't wait until Monday to get your fix of multiplayer mayhem? We've got you covered: the demo for Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is now playing on Steam.

Good Stuff.

 

[Insano]

Not long ago (in geologic time), we announced the sequel to Team Fortress.

Lovely

 

[FISKER_Q]

what's wit the bonus jumping high five? :I

 

[Insano]

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

Yay, I can play TF2 in a cyber cafe near me.

 

[Jammydodger]

Good to see Quake Wars on steam.

 

[bbson john]

My steam update has stalled at 38% for 2 weeks. So I won't be getting any of it.

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

My steam update has stalled at 38% for 2 weeks. So I won't be getting any of it.

Now that sucks.

 

[Kanehdian]

My steam update has stalled at 38% for 2 weeks. So I won't be getting any of it.

Try deleting ClientRegistry.blob in the Steam folder.

 

[Crispy]

Love how Valve have mentioned every other big mod release on Steam News but suddenly Fortress Forever's getting the silent treatment...

 

[DiSTuRbEd]

Love how Valve is suppose to know when a mod comes out sooner then when they planned on it. I'm sure they sit online and scour the internet all day instead of working on projects. FF should've sent them an email saying they were releasing earlier.

 

[Iron_cube]

Maybe there is somekind of competition

 

[DigiQ8]

I don't think Valve will delay their plans for a mod..

 

[-Psy-]

I don't see the problem with FF and TF2.

FF = Source Remake
TF2 = Sequel with no nade spamming

 

[Kadayi]

I downloaded the QW demo, but buggered if it will work, anyone else with this problem?

As for FF, plenty of mods get released without Valve mentioning them. FF is no competition to TF2 by any stretch of the imagination.

 

[Crispy]

I downloaded the QW demo, but buggered if it will work, anyone else with this problem?

As for FF, plenty of mods get released without Valve mentioning them. FF is no competition to TF2 by any stretch of the imagination.

Have you played either of them, or more importantly both of them? Considering TF2 looks set to release with only 1 CTF map, I think there are plenty of CTF fans out there who will actually prefer FF to TF2, and perhaps others who will prefer TFC to them both.

 

[Kadayi]

Have you played either of them, or more importantly both of them? Considering TF2 looks set to release with only 1 CTF map, I think there are plenty of CTF fans out there who will actually prefer FF to TF2, and perhaps others who will prefer TFC to them both.

Your original post implied that somehow FF was some kind of rival to TF2, and thus was somehow deliberately not mentioned by Valve this week as a consequence and my response is that it isn't, and clearly you concur (the game and mod are quite distinct), so what exactly is your point? The orange box will be selling off more units because of the HL² franchise than the precious TFC demographic will be bringing in. So for once put the conspiracies aside. :dozey:

 

[kilword]

lol nade spamming is what makes TF, TF

 

[bbson john]

Try deleting ClientRegistry.blob in the Steam folder.

Blah, I have tried to delete ClientRegistry.blob, reinstall steam, discconect by computer from router and directly connect to network, shutdown my firewall, scan for virus. But it didn't help. The Steam update is still stalled.

 

[Crispy]

Your original post implied that somehow FF was some kind of rival to TF2, and thus was somehow deliberately not mentioned by Valve this week as a consequence and my response is that it isn't, and clearly you concur (the game and mod are quite distinct), so what exactly is your point? The orange box will be selling off more units because of the HL² franchise than the precious TFC demographic will be bringing in. So for once put the conspiracies aside. :dozey:

It's finally here, on September 17th Fortress Forever will be officially released. A server package will be made available one day prior. Prepare to get your frag on!

The Orange Box—featuring Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Team Fortress 2, and Portal, as well as the complete Half-Life 2 experience to date—is now available for pre-purchase via Steam. Pre-purchase The Orange Box before the October 10 release to save 10% off the regular price and get exclusive access to the Team Fortress 2 beta on September 17.

Funny how this says 'September 6th', when the news wasn't officially announced until September 11th, 2 days after FF announced they would be releasing on the 17th. It could be just the timestamp on the original piece, but that doesn't rule out that the release date was confirmed and edited in at a later date. The main point is it does seem that Valve does consider FF a rival to some degree if they attempted to release on the same day.

Also, notice that on SteamStats Fortress Forever has not yet been assigned a web link for curious parties to investigate the game. Yes, Valve have more important things to worry about right now with the beta release coming up, but it'll be interesting to see how long it remains without a link.

Anyway, I'm not really concerned with any sort of conspiracy. I'm just interested to see how Valve acts on a business level in addition to being a games development studio.

 

[FISKER_Q]

Funny how this says 'September 6th', when the news wasn't officially announced until September 11th, 2 days after FF announced they would be releasing on the 17th. It could be just the timestamp on the original piece, but that doesn't rule out the release date was doctored since the first version of the news piece. The main point is it does seem that Valve does consider FF a rival to some degree if they attempted to release on the same day.

Also, notice that on SteamStats Fortress Forever has not yet been assigned a web link for curious parties to investigate the game. Yes, Valve have more important things to worry about right now with the beta release coming up, but it'll be interesting to see how long it remains without a link.

(As well as other mods)

CONSPIRACY!

 

[Kyorisu]

lol nade spamming is what makes TF, TF

Nade spamming makes a game boring as all hell.

 

[Crispy]

(As well as other mods that are still in development or that Valve don't like )

Correction.

FF is the biggest HL2 mod to come out since Insurgency. It doesn't have excessive depiction of violence or offensive material, it's suitable for children (assuming they play on a child-friendly server) so there's no reason why it shouldn't be linked. The forums don't have swear word filtering, but neither do the Gmod (FPS) forums. At this stage this is purely an observation.

Those Kuma games basically make significant money (i.e. more than just enough to host a website) off Valve by selling advertising and negotiating TV deals based on their games that use Source technology. So maybe Valve don't like this and have made a conscious decision not to help them.

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

Valve don't mention you in a Steam update or add you to the Steam stats until you bring it to their attention...

 

[^Ben]

Oh dear. Take the tinfoil helmet off please.

 

[Kadayi]

Fortress Forever has not yet been assigned a web link for curious parties to investigate the game. Yes, Valve have more important things to worry about right now with the beta release coming up, but it'll be interesting to see how long it remains without a link.

Anyway, I'm not really concerned with any sort of conspiracy. I'm just interested to see how Valve acts on a business level in addition to being a games development studio.

If Valve were really conspiring against them I wouldn't even expect to see their server stats in the ratings at all. As for the Steam TF2 Beta release....seriously there is probably a hell of a lot of work that goes into preparing a game for digital distribution. The Beta date was probably established a couple of months back. Fact of the matter is, is that the ball was always going to be in the FF mods teams court to ship ASAP once news of TF2 came out. That they've waited until barely a month before the Orange Box is released is just plain unfortunate. The TF2 'beta' release is just a hook by Valve thrown out there to lure existing Steam users to buy TOB through Steam rather than hold out for the EA retail release.

Anyhows enough of FF when is ND going to ship? Before Christmas 2007?

 

[Lucid]

Sweet, a memory whore of a game on a memory whore of a program!
!

 

[FatboyTim]

Blah, I have tried to delete ClientRegistry.blob, reinstall steam, discconect by computer from router and directly connect to network, shutdown my firewall, scan for virus. But it didn't help. The Steam update is still stalled.

Have you tried deleting the local game content and starting it again? :bounce:

 

[BabyHeadCrab]

Hm, I just hope ET:QW retail doesn't feature the same god awful copy protection stuff as most recent titles have.

 

[NeoNight]

lol nade spamming is what makes TF, TF

lol Give me cluster bombs or give me death!

 

[Stigmata]

lol nade spamming is what makes TF, TF

And the lack of nade spamming is what helps make TF2, TF2.

I really hope you see what I did there. Failing to will make me lose a significant amount of my faith in humanity.

 

[TheDan]

Blah, I have tried to delete ClientRegistry.blob, reinstall steam, discconect by computer from router and directly connect to network, shutdown my firewall, scan for virus. But it didn't help. The Steam update is still stalled.

Did you try reversing the polarity?

 

[DEATH eVADER]

Sooo, when they say Monday Beta, does that mean 17:00PST or something. I thought they would of activated it at around 9:00PST, when they entered the office.

 

[FISKER_Q]

Sooo, when they say Monday Beta, does that mean 17:00PST or something. I thought they would of activated it at around 9:00PST, when they entered the office.

They weren't ready with the beta so they postponed it to later today, their time.

Originally it was supposed to be out @ noon apparently.

 

[DiSTuRbEd]

Originally it was supposed to be out @ noon apparently.

Greg said "late in the day" yesterday.

 

[FISKER_Q]

Greg said "late in the day" yesterday.

hence "Originally"

 

[Crispy]

If Valve were really conspiring against them I wouldn't even expect to see their server stats in the ratings at all.

Now I can't do a filter for Fortress Forever servers on the Server page, but I can for Nuclear Dawn (unreleased mod). ZM, PVK2, Sourceforts and NS are also all available to filter the master server list by. Anyone else getting this?