In just about every aspect, 2020 has been a wild year for the planet at large. But Team Fortress 2 could be the sport that has had the foremost ups and downs in its 13th year on the market.
From big updates and hitting an all-time peak player number to losing the voice behind one among the game’s iconic characters, TF2 has skilled tons and is merely just officially an adolescent.
Starting with the older version of the game’s ASCII text file leaking in April alongside CS:GO’s, it already felt like TF2 was getting longer within the spotlight than it normally does that early within the year. And while that wasn’t a cause for alarm because most of the small print was quite two years old, it did set the stage for one among Valve’s oldest games to leap back to the general public eye.
That spotlight came back to the sport but a month later with the passing of Soldier voice actor Rick May following complications associated with COVID-19. Valve added statues and other tributes to immortalize the charismatic man within the game’s May update.
Each statue plays one among Soldier’s iconic voice lines and one among the tribute pieces has been permanently added to the Granary map, where the first Meet the Soldier trailer was set.
The community went back to playing TF2 in chaotic peace for several months, and it wasn’t until October when things got wild again when the sport broke its previous all-time peak for active users.
From the standard 65,000 player average that TF2 has experienced throughout 2020, the game’s October update brought a complete of 130,548 users into the fray on Oct. 1. That shattered the previous record of 117,917 set in August 2012, consistent with Steam Charts.
There are a couple of several questions raised about the validity of that number since TF2 has had massive problems with bots for years. But it does line up with how the player number spikes during an equivalent period in previous years.
The Scream Fortress XII update has regular players excited that Valve even put something that big out, while new and returning players get to experience TF2 with four new community maps and various other changes that ought to improve their experience.
Happy birthday, TF2. May your wild antics and growing library of hats and other cosmetics continue for several years to return.