9 out of 10 monkeys believe they are not behind glass

I downloaded the Beta for TF2 today. And it definitely has the No One Lives Forever 1/2 feel to it. Almost a direct carbon copy feel to it. The faux 60′s kitsch, soundtrack, sound effects… all it needed was a secret volcano lair or a space station with shiny future clothes (ala Austin Powers).

The gameplay itself really is not all that different than the previous version (I played that what? about 8 -10 years ago?), although the analogues of the previous maps feel clunky almost. Too big in places, like my muscle memory for certain maps made me shoot walls far too often to blame my mouse or the fact that I haven’t played Team Fortress of any flavor for many years now.

The cartoon feel to it is spot on, and way more effective than the realism bent that they were headed so many years ago. I think games like CS and DoD have their place, and TF has it’s own now. I am missing some of the tips and tricks to take my playing to the “next” level so-to-speak, but I think I will be able to catch on. Hopefully game play won’t skew horribly like previous online games have. I know deep down that it will eventually skew towards the players that play 30+ hours a week (the losers still living in their parent’s basements or the no lifers that spend every non-work moment on the game).

I used to be one of those lifers. I used to play a lot.

But it is nice not to be that way anymore (honestly it is). It would be nice to have a “casual shooter” around, but that may be the stuff of dreams.

Pipe bomb dreams perhaps.

Ha.