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Team Fortress 2: Madcap mayem hasn’t been this fun in a long time
Madcap mayhem, that is how I would describe the gameplay in Valve’s Team Fortress 2, now available on the PC and Xbox 360 as part of The Orange Box, or by itself for download over Steam, Valve’s large digital distribution network for the PC.
Team Fortress 2 is an online, multi-player only, first-person shooter. Like most games of this nature, the action could be described as ?chasing around dudes with guns, and shooting them.? However, such a phrase could not even begin to portray the real game here. No, there are a large number of things that set Team Fortress 2 apart from the rest of the FPS pack.
To begin with, this game is, as the name implies, all about teams. Many games of this nature boil down to solo frag-fests. You may be divided up into two groups labeled as ?teams,? but for the most part it is every man for his own kill count, and co-operatve strategy be damned. Not so in Team Fortress 2. The game types presented here makes teamwork essential. Capture the Flag and Control Points both make territorial control of the maps paramount. Additionally, the interesting and dynamic interplay between the game’s character types make communication between team members a prerequisite to success, which brings us to our next point.
Most shooters toss everyone into the game on an equal footing, usually carrying around some pea-shooter and looking for a better gun to upgrade to. TF2, however, differentiates each player from the get-go, by having players choose as one of nine unique character classes, loosely grouped into three groups: offensive classes Scout, Soldier, and Pyro; defensive classes Demoman, Heavy Weapons Guy, and Engineer; and support classes Medic, Sniper, and Spy.
Each class has its signature primary weapon (the Pyro’s flamethrower, the Solder’s bazooka, the Heavy’s Gatling gun) and one to three additional sub-weapons, usually something like a pistol, shotgun, melee weapon, or class-specific items and abilities such as the Engineer’s tools used to build sentry turrets, the Spy’s kit of disguises, and the Medic’s health gun. Accordingly, each class has several roles to play and niches to fill in the game.
Check out the trailer and then take the jump to find out more.
Posted in: The Artful Gamer
Tags: FPS, Team Fortress 2, The Orange Box |
