Micro-Transactions Coming To Team Fortress 2 Via Steam Wallet

whoop writes "Valve has announced that Team Fortress 2 will be getting a new Mann Co. Store to buy trinkets with real money through a service called Steam Wallet. TF2 is the first game to use this new Steam Wallet, but the money can be spent on anything in Steam, including full games. This would open them up to featuring gift cards, micro-transaction games, and more." PC Gamer has an interview with Valve's Robin Walker about why they're doing this. Walker says everything they're selling will still be obtainable by playing the game, other than a few cosmetic items.

Comments

Price

[DarkXale]

And its some 50€ for the full package of new items. I know what I'm -not- buying.

Re:Price

[Jojoba86]

It's simply amazing that they thought charging more for items than the game itself could make sense.

Re:Price

[Anonymous Coward]

It does to the "consumers".

The mindless drones of our time.

Even Predator drones are more discriminate.

Re:Price

[mejogid]

Why? All the items that count can be earned by playing well/regularly - these micro-transactions are exactly that: single, small transactions to buy the odd item that you haven't got yet and can't be bothered to wait around for.

Re:Price

[sortius_nod]

No, there's new items... that are purchase only and can't be traded.

The model is ok, it's better than trying to charge monthly fees AND have a micro-transaction store... looking at you Cryptic you fucks.

Re:Price

[imakemusic]

I haven't looked into it but apparently these items will be purely cosmetic. They'll probably just be things to identify the player as someone who has used the service in the same way that white Apple earbuds became available when you play TF2 on a Mac.

Re:Price

[delinear]

I wouldn't have an issue with micro-transactions if they were, well, micro. Back when these ideas were first being touted it seemed like we'd be talking pennies to buy, and that the profit would come from the cheap distribution model coupled with high volumes of sales (partly driven by the incredibly low price). Instead what we usually see is a few pounds per transaction which, while still hardly wallet-busting, very quickly adds up to the point where, if you buy the game and all the extras, you can easily double the purchase price of the game alone. I can see where this is a great deal for the seller, but as usual it seems the buyer is getting the raw end.

Re:Price

[PopeRatzo]

I wouldn't have an issue with micro-transactions if they were, well, micro.

I agree.

But I think ultimately the success or failure of these "micro-transaction" systems depends more on how good the underlying game is than anything else. Need for Speed World won't work because the game sucks, not because of the micro-transaction system. If a Burnout Paradise 2 came out with a microtransaction system, I'd pay a few bucks for certain in-game items (well, maybe a buck or two). But there are not that many games for which I would do that.

So far, games with micro-transactions have had a cheap feel to them. They feel like some half-assed browser game and I just don't care to play them. There's not the feel of quality.

So I guess the best way to make money with a game is to make a good game. I'm pretty surprised at how little quality there's been in games the past year. Even the big blockbuster games really weren't grabbers.

Re:Price

[HaZardman27]

So I guess the best way to make money with a game is to make a good game. I'm pretty surprised at how little quality there's been in games the past year

This doesn't really apply here, since TF2 has been out for about 3 years now and is a very high quality game. What people are failing to mention here is that some of the items being sold are made by the players. The designer of these items will also be getting paid every time someone purchases his/her item.

Re:Price

[tibman]

I was looking at the store last night and most of the items have "abilities". The soldier for example can get an Anti-Sentry rocket launcher and a backpack that causes nearby mates to take 35% less damage.

Re:Price

[supersloshy]

It's simply amazing that they thought charging more for items than the game itself could make sense.

Farmville.

Re:Price

[Anonymous Coward]

I haven't looked into it

That's probably the reason you are wrong. They have all ready said there will be stat affecting items as well as cosmetic ones.

Every time Valve fucks me in the ass I hear an echo of Gabe saying "Trust us".

I don't know about you guys but I feel a moral obligation to do my part in keeping Valve from making any more money.

Re:Price

[VGPowerlord]

I was looking at the store last night and most of the items have "abilities". The soldier for example can get an Anti-Sentry rocket launcher and a backpack that causes nearby mates to take 35% less damage.

Those items can be crafted (Direct Hit + Reclaimed Metal = Black Box rocket launcher, Buff Banner + Reclaimed Metal = Battalion's Backup backpack) and drop from the random drop system.

The hats for the set bonus are what hurt, as there's no way of crafting a specific hat,

Re:Price

[imakemusic]

I have now looked into it and found that I was actually right.

The person I was originally responding to was expressing their disappointment at there being items which can only be purchased and not earned through grinding.

I said that these items do exist but that they are purely cosmetic i.e. don't affect gameplay. This is true (at least according to Robin Walker:

PC Gamer: Just to be absolutely clear: everything you can buy with real money is also available to find or craft for free?

Robin Walker: Almost everything. There are a really small number of cosmetic items that you can’t find. On the flip side, there are a few items that aren’t purchasable either. Our main goal was to make sure that all gameplay affecting items are findable, so that no-one can buy an in-game advantage over someone who’s choosing to find their items.

To be fair, if you ignore the context of my comment and consider it as an answer to a different question than the one I was answering then, yes, I was wrong. Similarly, your comment is incorrect as an answer to the question "What is the capital city of Sweden?"

For the record I stopped playing TF2 around the time they started introducing upgrades. Partly because I didn't like the upgrades and couldn't be bothered to keep track of- and grind in order to get new weapons but mainly because I just got bored of the game.

Re:Price

[Anonymous Coward]

Not the case... you can buy items that have an impact on your stats.

However, they claim that you can also find or craft all of the "gameplay impact" items. Some cosmetic items will be for sale only.

Re:Price

[cgenman]

Burnout Paradise came out with basically a microtransaction system. Unfortunately, they didn't seem to make enough to sustain the process, as they moved on after releasing their initial batch of content.

TF2 is a really high quality game, that they've been selling for less than the cost of a Starbucks run. They have made hundreds of updates to the game over the years, yet they haven't complicated the experience to the point where it is no longer fun. I'm just getting back into it on a new laptop, and it is still amazing. I completely forgot about weapons upgrades and hats and such in the middle of playing, because I was just having fun.

Hopefully a few dollars here and there will allow them to continue enough development of the title that there are a continuous stream of new players to it. The game is worthy of being a competitive gaming standard, like Counterstrike and Starcraft, but is also pretty accessible to new players.

Re:Price

[The MAZZTer]

That was a common initial reaction but think of it this way: All the DLC so far has been free, and some of us have only had to pay a one time charge of $20 for three years of one of the best games of all time (well some of us think so). So this is a way for some of us to say "thank you" to Valve for all the free updates.

I won't be getting the $50 thing but I might buy a few lesser-priced things like the trial rocket launcher and maybe a key or two.

Re:Price

[masshuu]

Yup.

Play games on Facebook, and your sitting there asking yourself "People really pay $120 for a bunch of artificial points they can spend on energy and random crap?"

When you can buy those points in every store around you in the form of gift cards, you know its bad.

Re:Price

[PopeRatzo]

TF2 is a really high quality game, that they've been selling for less than the cost of a Starbucks run. They have made hundreds of updates to the game over the years, yet they haven't complicated the experience to the point where it is no longer fun. I'm just getting back into it on a new laptop, and it is still amazing.

I tried TF2 a few times during various free weekends on Steam. Even though I'm pretty good at some multi-player games, it just seemed like everyone was way way better than me at TF2 and I'd last about 5 seconds.

Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of gamer friends in real life that I could get into private TF2 games with, so it's just a matter of getting slaughtered before I barely have a chance to raise my weapon.

I do hear a lot of good things about TF2. What would you recommend to someone who'd like to play the game but just can't seem to compete with anyone in multiplayer. Man, at games like the Unreal series, I was shit-hot, and it doesn't seem all that different. My connection and computer are definitely capable, so it's not a matter of lag.

Re:Price

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree. TF2 is getting bloated with too much cr*p. Do we really need so many hats and weapons? Team fortress is the best team shooter period. If valve keeps messing with it they will dilute its core appeal. I may go back to TFC.

goldfinger

Re:Price

[VGPowerlord]

For the record I stopped playing TF2 around the time they started introducing upgrades. Partly because I didn't like the upgrades and couldn't be bothered to keep track of- and grind in order to get new weapons but mainly because I just got bored of the game.

You didn't play the game for very long, then. Upgrades* were introduced 7 months or so after the game launched, in April 2008's Goldrush update. This update introduced 3 new items for the medic and a new game type. It was clear then that Valve planned on doing one update for each class, which they finally completed when the Engineer Update was introduced in mid-2010.

Originally, you did need to grind to get the new items, but with the Spy vs. Sniper update in mid-2009, Valve introduced the random drop system to help alleviate this. When they did add a way to get the new Sniper and Spy items through achievements as well, they were at drastically lower number of achievements than the previous updates... 7, 12, and 17 achievements rather than 11, 18, and 25 (I believe; I can't currently check the TFWiki).

As of right now, I have nearly every weapon unlock in the game, including the new ones. This gives me lots of different ways of playing each class.

Strangely, one of my favorite items is the Gunslinger... which allows an Engineer to build non-upgradeable mini-sentries that are less powerful than a level 1 sentry, but go up in less time.

* I use the word upgrade loosely, as TF2's new items tend to have both positives and negatives. Valve finally released the final TF2 class update a few months ago.

Re:Price

[cgenman]

Jump into Team Fortress 2 as a medic or engineer. Medics just heal teammates and try to stay away from the enemy, and Engineers put up gun turrets that do all of their work for them. Both are fun classes on their own, and can help ease into the experience.

Also, I just saw what they were charging for in-game items. OMFG that's a lot of scratch for a hat. Hopefully the game will go free-to-play at some point, which would justify those costs.

Re:Price

[cgenman]

Also, *players* don't win TF2, teams do. This may seem like a small point, but in Unreal and other games you could win matches by being great on your own. In TF2, a team of OK people sticking together will beat a team of amazingly hot people that spread out. Sure there are advanced tactics, yadda yadda, but mainly you need to stick with your teammates. If you die and respawn on your own, wait for another teammate to respawn and run in with them. If you see a mass of your guys, get over to them and try to guard their back. And spam the "medic" key at the slightest provocation.

Also, if you're dying, withdraw. Instead of fighting to the respawn (and arduous walk back), retreat to live, get healed, and go back in. It feels better, and it's usually much faster than dying / respawning.

Oh, to counter spies, shoot any teammate that seem like they're coming up to you. If it's a spy, they'll take damage and be revealed. If it's a teammate, you can't hurt them. You'll see teammates occasionally do this to you too. That's why.

To counter snipers, stay away from big open areas and keep jumping.

Re:Price

[PopeRatzo]

Thanks, pal. For $9.99 I'm going to give it another shot. It seemed like a well-made, fun game but I never gave myself the time to learn a few techniques. Now that I think about it, every game I ever got half good at took me a while being bad first.

Final nail

[Jojoba86]

Well I guess I will not be playing TF2 again. Despite the 'it's optional defence' some of the items will give advantages. You can still get them all randomly, so it's a choice of grind or pay up. I think I'll do neither.

Re:Final nail

[keatonguy]

Why have you been playing at all? You've had to grind for items since the first patch, why does including an option to skip over the grind make the grind (which I reiterate, has already existed) intolerable? Have you thought this through, or is it a hyperbolic reaction to a new feature you don't like?

Re:Final nail

[rsmith-mac]

Agreed. "You can get it through grinding" is usually a cop-out for microtransaction systems, and it's no different here. The new item sets (which confer a bonus for having the complete set) make this especially silly - the odds of obtaining all of the items directly through the game's anemic drop rate are virtually nil, and crafting doesn't make this a lot better because you need to melt down dozens of items (including already extremely rare hats) when the results of crafting are a random class/slot weapon.

Just to put this in perspective, Valve is charging $20 for any one of the new item sets. Items that can more easily be obtained through achievement unlocks are $0.50. And that's not inappropriately priced - that's a really good representation of just how much grinding is necessary on average to acquire all the parts of a single set. You can't reasonably do it, especially if you're not an unemployed 14 year old (keeping in mind this is an M game).

Ultimately Valve is going to argue that all of this is balanced, but that's not the case. There are already items that are better than other items, and the item sets infer additional bonuses above and beyond that which make the item sets must-haves for most situations. Items never fully replace skill, but after today they sure as hell make it secondary; for equally skilled opponents it's now a pay-2-win game. And that's a shame, as it used to be the best non-military multiplayer FPS on the market.

Re:Final nail

[Jojoba86]

I liked it most and played it most before any of the grinding! I've tolerated it since then, but with each new patch things seem to be getting more and more towards grind/pay.

Re:Final nail

[rsmith-mac]

Exactly! The first most frustrating thing about what Valve has done to the game over the last 3 years is adding the items. The second most frustrating thing is that server admins don't have the power to turn this stuff off. If you could run a "pure" server (to steal a term from Unreal Tournament) where it disables all purchased/unlocked items and makes it behave like the original 2007 game, then the vast majority of the complaints would stop.

As it stands Steam holds the game hostage. There's no way to revert the game - you have to play the latest version as Valve intends it. For the traditional MP FPS crowd, being unable to control the game like this is simply mind-boggling.

Re:Final nail

[Magada]

Annoying is more likely. I used to enjoy |TF2 so much, I played in preference to any other fps out there. Not anymore. What's worse, grinding noobs for items in tf2 is even more boring than grinding mobs for items in other games - at least some mobs have interesting behaviors and abilities designed in, while noobs are utterly boring and predictable.

Re:Final nail

[Anonymous Coward]

Go any play Team Fortress Classic or TF2 on the xbox then - before they changed anything!

Re:Final nail

[Vectormatic]

Why have you been playing at all? You've had to grind for items since the first patch, why does including an option to skip over the grind make the grind (which I reiterate, has already existed) intolerable? Have you thought this through, or is it a hyperbolic reaction to a new feature you don't like?

for a casual player who isnt in it for the items, it is somewhat acceptable that people who play for ages have some advantages (better weapons/items). You can somewhat side-step that by not getting into servers with only the best players (they will own you anyway, regardless of any advantages, they just tend to be more skilled/faster), however this pay-per-gun system wrecks the idea of playing among your peers, since the guy you previously were on equal footing with, will have spent a few bucks on the better gun, gaining an advantage, ruining your experience.

Allowing people to buy better weapons in games quickly gives rise to a prisoners dilemma, either you also spend the money (on top of what you paid for the game), or you will have your lunch eaten by the people that do, the only winning move is not to play...

(i had this experience in BF2 years back, the special forces expansion allowed people to use (better) weapons which they unlocked in SF to be used in the regular maps, giving SF-buyers an edge on the normal maps, in the end i ended up buying the expansion, mostly for the sniper rifle... although i did enjoy the maps as well)

Re:Final nail

[Shadow of Eternity]

Except that BF2's unlocks were almost universally Strictly Better whereas TF2's unlocks are things like a revolver that gives you extra cloak time on hits but does 20% less damage, a rocket launcher that fires faster and more damaging shots at the cost of virtually nonexistence splash damage, and so on.

The items that are broken aren't broken because they're Strictly Better, they're broken because the break the field that class is supposed to be in.

Re:Final nail

[Vectormatic]

yeah, the only exception being the l85a1 in BF2, the medic unlock, which was a CRAP assault rifle, but did well as a pseudo-sniper.

Re:Final nail

[rainmouse]

Well I guess I will not be playing TF2 again. Despite the 'it's optional defence' some of the items will give advantages. You can still get them all randomly, so it's a choice of grind or pay up. I think I'll do neither.

It's amazing how angry people can get over the idea of paying for new content. In my opinion this is a much better model than releasing expansions that prevent others playing with the majority population without purchasing it. I recently reinstalled the game and to be sure, everyone has weird hats etc but I cannot say I found any noticeable disadvantage in having none of these gimmicks, my scores are middling same as they were a year or more ago when I last played it and I'm grateful to be able to still play with everyone without having to fork out 10 or 20 for the new maps and gear etc.

Re:Final nail

[sortius_nod]

I loved the L85A1, was a great weapon, but you are right, close range it was a pain.

TF2 unlocks are vastly different to the "unlockables" in other games. They are always balanced out. As a soldier, I use the old weapon, same as with demo, scout, heavy, I even use old weapons with medic. It's more about play style than upgrade.

Re:Final nail

[ShakaUVM]

>>as it used to be the best non-military multiplayer FPS on the market.

Right after the original Team Fortress, which was superior in every way except graphics.

(Or, cough, CustomTF.)

Re:Final nail

[Rockoon]

The second most frustrating thing is that server admins don't have the power to turn this stuff off.

You are full of shit. There are mods that restrict the weapons you can use, and one in particular (Randomizer) even forces specifically chosen weapons on you.

Re:Final nail

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't find this terribly suprising.

Many years ago, before Valve took over the Teamfortress team I was granted permission by the team to use their TF2.5 source code as a basis for a TF clone I was working on for a later version of Quake. After Valve took them over Valve tried to retroactively withdraw permission, and we pointed out the source code was freely available so it was hardly a state secret anyway, and they then tried to go a step further and retroactively declare the license provided with it as invalid.

Valve since the day they took it on have always maintained a stranglehold over TF and have tried their hardest to ensure you play it they way they want you to. It's no coincidence really that I stopped caring about the TF franchise since around the time Valve took it over though. It stopped being good post QWTF anyway, TFC was just a mediocre half assed copy which didn't feel right, and TF2 is a god awful bastardisation of what the original was. I actually preferred Valve's concept of TF2 being completely different gameplay wise to the original QWTF, because at least then it wasn't meant to be a recreation of the original. Despite delaying TF2 by about 10 years, when they finally released it it ended up being a clone of the original minus most the fun, and half the features coupled with some terrible, terrible cartoon theme to it.

It's not that I have a problem with TF2 as a game in itself, I have a problem with the fact it's supposed to live up to the TF name, and I have a problem with the fact Valve are peddling their relatively half arsed versions of Teamfortress off the back of the success of the original.

If TF2 were a film, it'd be one of those god awful sequels that totally destroys the good name of the original and that would've been better off spun off as a completely different IP.

A lot has changed since the Quake days, and not really much of it for the better- customisability of game play experience through server variables and such being one of the big ones.

Re:Final nail

[Anonymous Coward]

On the Steam forums somebody brought up a good point, the reason for this is most likely not that valve wants to make a profit, but they want to prevent others from making a profit with the new item trading. If you look at it that way it's not a bad idea.

Re:Final nail

[delinear]

I have to admit, I haven't really played since just before (literally a few days before) the spy upgrades, but back then I thought the upgrades were really well balanaced. They added a new aspect to playing a class without being terribly game-changing, some upgrades actually seemed a little worse than taking the default equipment, but were still fun to use. I wonder how many people will be willing to pay for equipment that doesn't give them a definitive edge, though, and whether this micro-payment system will lead to the end of well balanced upgrades.

Re:Final nail

[VGPowerlord]

Honestly, though, I was under the impression that the Polycount Pack ($50, includes all 5 sets including hats) were for people like me who have played the game for hundreds of hours and are still playing the game. I've clocked somewhere over 800 hours of actual play time for a game that I essentially spent $10 on. I'm willing to pay another $50 to Valve, no problem.

But don't expect me to buy individual items, those are WAY too expensive. Up to $17 for a hat? Pssh, I'll simply see if people want to trade for the ones I want (Towering Pillar of Hats, Frenchman's Beret*)

*Solely so I have every Spy hat. I had them all prior to its addition. :/

Re:Final nail

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps we're about to see the resurgence of idling servers that the recent drop rate increase was supposed to do away with.

If there's one thing you can count on Valve doing in TF2 with updates, it's giving with one hand while taking with the other. :)

Re:Final nail

[Anonymous Coward]

for a casual player who isnt in it for the items, it is somewhat acceptable that people who play for ages have some advantages (better weapons/items).

If I had bought an online RPG (Diablo, etc.) or MMORPG, I'd agree. But I didn't. I bought an FPS without persistent items or microtransactions. I bought a game with no grinding where anything beyond fame and glory disappears when the game ends. Where, as a purely casual player, I can pop in to play from time to time, and the only difference is skill.

But those greedy bastards at Valve have stolen all that.

Re:Final nail

[Aceticon]

This can't be true!

<rant>
After all, Valve are the guys that invented an online DRM system and digital download store that screws you but at least lubes you up first (not like the competition's online-DRM which uses no lube). I mean, just look at all posts from defenders of it saying how you can be offline for a while and still play the games or re-download them when you loose them - sure it's not as good as a simple serial number, but at least it's not as bad as living in North Korea ...

I'm sure that they haven't added must-have-pay-with-cash items to a highly competitive, fast-paced kind of game like an online FPS after releasing the game and after loads of people had bought it: that would be sneaky and deceitful, not to mention a lub-less screwing of customers.

This kind of thing is the purvey of Machiaveli-inspired companies like Sony Entertainment, not good guys like Valve.

Right!?

Right!???

Right????

</rant>

Re:Final nail

[Aceticon]

It's amazing how angry people can get over the idea of paying for new content. In my opinion this is a much better model than releasing expansions that prevent others playing with the majority population without purchasing it. I recently reinstalled the game and to be sure, everyone has weird hats etc but I cannot say I found any noticeable disadvantage in having none of these gimmicks, my scores are middling same as they were a year or more ago when I last played it and I'm grateful to be able to still play with everyone without having to fork out 10 or 20 for the new maps and gear etc.

It would be great if buyers of the game would know about this change to the nature of the game up-front, before buying the base game and it was priced appropriatelly.

That way, those that don't like the idea of an online FPS with must have items bought with real money could avoid the game and those that don't care about it could still get it.

The problem here is that Valve wants to have as many people as possible pay full price for an incomplete game and then again for the extra bits that are essential to play it competitivelly online.

Consider an MMORPG like WoW - you pay for the base game and then additionally you pay extra (in the case of WoW, for time but, for example, for D&D Online you can pay for gear instead if you want). Everybody knows what the deal is, up front and in big letters, and yet millions of people take that deal. Since there is an after buy pay-toplay component the base game is priced appropriatelly.

The difference for Team Fortress 2 is that the game you were sold was a fast paced, competitive, online FPS and then after a while Valve turned it into a pay-to-play game (at least if you want to remain competitive instead of just being cannon fodder for the guys with the paid-for-gear). They unilaterally changed the product after the sale and you have no choice but to take it or stop using it.

Re:Final nail

[tibman]

These items don't give an advantage either.. they are better at one thing and worse at another. The items appear balanced in power but unbalanced in ability.

Re:Final nail

[strack]

you could buy a real hat for that price...

Re:Final nail

[YojimboJango]

I'll back this up by noting that I play on a server that specifically does this for weapons that CEVO and ETF2L have removed. It's a server for those that like to practice for more serious matches the way they'll be played in the league events. You should see the rage some people have when they can't play with their favourite load-out.

It's not that it's impossible to make a 'pure' server. It's just that everyone hates them and the servers sit empty till the admin takes them down. The only exception to this rule are the servers that limit a few select weapons that get a bit overpowered in smaller (6v6) matches with well organized teams. Those seem to be empty most of the times, but will occasionally see some traffic.

So yeah, GP is in a vast minority of players. The idea has been had, and implemented, and then promptly forgotten about because of it's vast unpopularity.

Re:Final nail

[TheLink]

I used to play customtf a lot... Even though I often had 700ms ping. One of my fav classes was medic pyro with speed+bunny hop jumps.

The autoaim cheats got annoying though. You know they are cheating when they can snipe you when you run and jump off a ledge, but keep missing you when you stand right in front of them and jiggle left and right very quickly- not actually moving from the spot, just jiggling :).

I found it mildly interesting that the autoaimer didn't have an averaging or manual option... Either that or the guy was clueless.

Re:Final nail

[ink]

It's interesting that you should say that you want the 2007 version of TF2 because there's always the XBox 360 version. Microsoft hasn't allowed Valve to do free updates, and so there it sits in all its 2007 glory. Valve has a perfect case/control experiment here. On the PC side, they've added items, grinding and now microtransactions. On the 360, the "pure" version is there in front of a much larger audience. Guess which one gets played, and which one doesn't.

Re:Final nail

[cgenman]

To be fair, they're changing the system to a microtransaction model 3 years after release, and 2 years after everyone else would have abandoned it. It was about 10 years in development, and at release it was about 1/3rd of the cost of a full game. It has had quite literally several hundred updates throughout the years, and is by far the most actively developed FPS I've ever seen. And while it is slow, you can supposedly grind the items that effect gameplay. As far as I can tell, the items that effect gameplay are all items that were previously available in-game.

Imagine the Modern Warfare 2 people launching at $20, and receiving an update every two weeks for at least three years. It just wouldn't happen. The people at Valve have found a way to potentially keep the game in development, which means more upgrades, more balancing, and a longer life for your initial purchase. We'll have to see how the store pans out over time, but if the choice is target noobs that can die with higher-level items, or an abandoned game collapsing to the rigors of time, I'll take the target noobs.

Also, Steam is a lot better than a serial number. If you lose a physical disk, you lose your game. If you're at work or at a friend's house and want to show off a physical disk at home, you're out of luck. If you have two computers and one disk, you're out of luck. How is a serial number better? Unless you plan on downloading a pirated copy, it's completely useless to you.

Re:Final nail

[hibiki_r]

First, all the items other than the hats and the GRU are easily craftable, today. the GRU has a 50% chance recipe. So most of us have been able to get the most of the items we wanted in a matter of minutes, without paying a dime. We'll be able to get the rest in a couple of weeks worth of item drops.

Now, the hats were an issue, because the chances of hat drops are extremely low, so getting the rare hat that completes a functional set is very difficult. There's been enough complaining about it that Robin has said that they'll quickly add a recipe to build the set hats. Now, we don't know if said recipe will require 2 regular items, some intermediate metal, or a bunch of refined metal plus token. Either way, it will make it easier to get the hats you want without paying a ton.

Re:Final nail

[hibiki_r]

Some items are almost straight upgrades, but they are relatively easy to obtain without paying for them: Take the degreaser, almost strictly superior to the regular flamethrower for an experienced pyro, or the GRU, which brings a major improvement while just replacing the heavy's default weapon, which very few people would even use when playing even semi-seriously.

Once they make the hats that are part of a set craftable, we'll be in good shape.

Re:Final nail

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't blame Valve for their DRM system. I blame the absolute pricks who force the industry into taking any action at all.

Re:Final nail

[Draek]

Ahhh, yes, serial numbers. Of the kind that EA used on my as-of-now unplayable copy of LotR:BfME2.

If you think Steam, Impulse et al hold no advantage over a "simple" serial number, you must be a neat freak with no children, or have eidetic memory. Sadly, most people don't fall into either category (myself included), which is why Steam is enjoying such success.

And please save the "highly competitive" talk for games that do this kind of thing *cough*MMOs*cough* for items that are not purely cosmetical.

Re:Final nail

[Darinbob]

I've never played it, but I thought you only played with friends. Or at least people you know. Can't you just say "please don't use items from the store"?

Re:Final nail

[FauxReal]

Well I guess I will not be playing TF2 again. Despite the 'it's optional defence' some of the items will give advantages. You can still get them all randomly, so it's a choice of grind or pay up. I think I'll do neither.

It's amazing how angry people can get over the idea of paying for new content. In my opinion this is a much better model than releasing expansions that prevent others playing with the majority population without purchasing it. I recently reinstalled the game and to be sure, everyone has weird hats etc but I cannot say I found any noticeable disadvantage in having none of these gimmicks, my scores are middling same as they were a year or more ago when I last played it and I'm grateful to be able to still play with everyone without having to fork out 10 or 20 for the new maps and gear etc.

Well to be fair, some of the new content unbalances the game... like the $4.95 Crocodile hat that makes you immune to death by headshot.

Re:Final nail

[ShakaUVM]

Yeah, you basically got to play on a server that has an admin watching for cheaters. Hasn't been a real problem in years on the Phoenixlabs one.

Re:Final nail

[theArtificial]

It was about 10 years in development, and at release it was about 1/3rd of the cost of a full game.

Initially Team Fortress 2 was part of the Orange Box which retailed for $49.95 and individual games were not available for purchase seperately. The $20 price was recntly introduced (down from $30). I agree about Steam being superior to a serial in many ways however VAC is worth mentioning.

Re:Final nail

[Anonymous Coward]

Allowing people to buy better weapons in games quickly gives rise to a prisoners dilemma, either you also spend the money (on top of what you paid for the game), or you will have your lunch eaten by the people that do, the only winning move is not to play...

The new guns aren't "better". Every new weapon valve has ever realised has drawbacks. Backburner has no compression blast, Cloak and dagger can't be recharged with ammo e.t.c.

Re:Final nail

[Aceticon]

If you can't make an image of the CD/DVD, store it in you Hard-disk and play from there then the game has some sort of CD/DVD check DRM which is way beyond a simple serial check.

While Steam is great compared to more recent types of DRM (ever more intrusive CD/DVD checks or even constant online validation) it's evil when compared with the simple serial key validations for games from several year ago.

Everytime I hear pro-Steam arguments, they come from somebody that didn't game in the 90's. Back then there were lots of independent Software Houses and Producers out there (lots of competition) and DRM was non-existent or nowhere nearly as intrusive

A Well-Executed Plan

[keatonguy]

I'm going to jump in early on this one. If you actually read the fucking article, nothing being put up for sale is only available through sale. Everything can still be found and crafted the old-fashioned way, with the same drop rates and the same recepies. This merely gives people who don't like grind a means to skip over it. Furthermore, they've ousted my most hated aspect of microtransactions, Game Co. Funny Money, allowing you to put money in as money, not as points, which you can then use on anything on Steam.

This is the best way to build a microtransaction system. Once again, Valve legitimizes a system loathed and reviled rabidly by slashdot posters and the OSS community at large. Bravo, Mr. Newell.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Jojoba86]

You may be understimating just how long the grinding will take. 200 hours to get a random hat, of which there are 5, sound good to you? That's a lot of play time to get the one you want.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Undead Waffle]

I'm going to jump in early on this one. If you actually read the fucking article, nothing being put up for sale is only available through sale.

FTFA:

Robin Walker: Almost everything. There are a really small number of cosmetic items that you can’t find.

What's that about reading the article?

Not that I care about cosmetic stuff.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Anonymous Coward]

nothing being put up for sale is only available through sale

Welcome to the world of marketing and PR. This is what they usually say in the beginning, in order to decrease customer complaints and outcry. They have to, because these kind of money-sucking stores are looked upon as bad. So they come up with the "but it's only cosmetics and you can get everything without paying anyway".

Never mind that even then, they have to make it harder to get content for everyone, to provide an incentive to pay for as many players as possible.

In a few months the next PR spin will add exclusive items because "customers want them".

As for Funny Money vs. real currency, Steam already treats non-US currencies as Funny Money by converting 1:1 from $ to € and setting arbitrary higher prices.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Psaakyrn]

I'm going to jump in early on this one. If you actually read the fucking article, "Walker says everything they're selling will still be obtainable by playing the game, other than a few cosmetic items."

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Djehuty3]

And those few items you can't find are the preorder bonuses, like Bills Hat - given out for preordering L4D2.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Djehuty3]

And those few items you can't find are the preorder bonuses, like Bills Hat - given out for preordering L4D2, or the Sam and Max hats.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Burnhard]

I've spent many hours playing that game; actually around 800. When I'm lying on the hospital bed reflecting on my life, I don't know whether I'll be more pissed about having wasted 800 hours of it playing team fortress, or that not once during those 800 hours did I manage to get a pyro brigade helmet

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[pandrijeczko]

This merely gives people who don't like grind a means to skip over it.

I believe the term you are looking for is called "cheating", even though the cheating is legitimised because you've parted with some money in order to cheat.

Sorry, but if you're not prepared to grind at a game to become better at it, then the game is not entertaining enough for you (a perfectly legitimate reason) - in which case go play a game that is more entertaining for you.

People cheat at games for *TWO* reasons only - winning lots of money or to feed their egos at showing everyone else how wonderful they are.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[delinear]

Okay, so assuming they abandoned the micro-payment system, how is that any better when you still have to grind that 200 hours for a hat (and by the way, I've seriously been away from this game for too long - people are grinding hats now?). The alternative is they just give everyone everything for free the second it's available, but that would be just as dull as grinding, at least with the proposed system, people who play a lot will probably feel a sense of pride in earning the hat, but everyone else can still have hat fun (maybe they could leave a price tag on bought items so that non-bought items still earn kudos). Of course, the final alternative is that they just stop releasing new content, but that doesn't seem in anyone's interest.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[delinear]

That's a very narrow view of the world. Some people have jobs and families and committments outside of gaming - that doesn't mean they don't enjoy grinding as much as the next gamer, but realising it takes 200 hours for an item to drop on average and you get to play maybe three or four hours a week while your friends play that every day makes it hard to keep up. That doesn't mean they wouldn't rather be playing the game or that they have giant egos - if anything I'd say the elitist people who believe you only have any demonstrable skill if you spend grinding out drops are the egotistical ones, since they care so much about losing some illusory advantage.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[ink]

Bullshit. I have 240 hours of play in TF2 over the past 3 years, and I have several hats. I've even gotten duplicates and crafted them together to make other hats.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[hibiki_r]

Robin claims they'll add recipes for the set hats, which are the only ones that aren't purely cosmetic. If the recipes are anywhere near those for making a random hat, you'll be able to get said hats in 20-30 hours, which is nowhere near as bad as you describe.

Until they add said recipes, it's rather outrageous, but valve tends to release a quick update or two right after every major pack, so I'd be surprised if it took more than two weeks. Meanwhile, just hoard random items

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[rainmouse]

You may be understimating just how long the grinding will take. 200 hours to get a random hat, of which there are 5, sound good to you? That's a lot of play time to get the one you want.

Unless I am mistaken you can trade them with other players. Besides if you are playing 200 hours a the game just to get a specific hat instead of just playing the game to have fun with your mates then perhaps your looking at it wrong. It's more just rare icing on the cake that overly greedy players can choose to fork out with real money for instead.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[Draek]

This is the best way to build a microtransaction system. Once again, Valve legitimizes a system loathed and reviled rabidly by slashdot posters and the OSS community at large. Bravo, Mr. Newell.

You forgot the Apple zealots, Java haters, rabid atheists and Amiga fanboys. Oh, wait, they've got nothing to do with implementing microtransactions on a Valve game, and neither does the OSS crowd.

Re:A Well-Executed Plan

[pandrijeczko]

if anything I'd say the elitist people who believe you only have any demonstrable skill if you spend grinding out drops are the egotistical ones, since they care so much about losing some illusory advantage.

I actually do quite a bit of gaming but very little of it online, for precisely the reasons that I hold down a full-time job, have a family & therefore want to maximise the fun part of the gaming time that I do have.

Ultimately, the online games I do play are ones like UT2004, Quake, World Of Padman and Warsow where there's no player advantages other than the players' own skills. Yep, a lot of times there can be people sat on servers spending their times picking off the newbies, but then it's just a case of trying other servers to find fun games.

I have no problem with buying a single-player game, playing it in my own time but having to spend a considerable amount of time learning it well in order to master it.

But not having the ability of going onto a server where there are players who are about my standard defeats the object of multiplayer - it's no different to me, as someone who merely understands how to play chess without being a master of it, having no fun be thrashed over-and-over again by a grand master chess player. Much better to learn from the challenge of playing against other players of similar skill.

New compiler statement...

[RyanFenton]

Steam is proud to announce a patch for GNU and Microsoft Visual Studio compiler sets, which enables the new 'ifmo' command in most programming environments.

The 'ifmo' statement is a traditional if statement, with one extra parameter, for the amount of money you want to be paid to make a given state true.

The 'ifmo' statement coordinates with the Steam framework in most OS environments to manage a list of opportunities the user has to pay for events to happen.

'ifmo' should be compatible with most common languages, from FORTRAN, to Visual Basic, to C/C++, to common scripting languages like Python.

'you get mo with ifmo!'

Ryan Fenton

Steam wallet

[RogueyWon]

I like the Steam wallet idea as a general principle, provided they develop it properly; gift-cards, in particular, have been a glaring omission from Steam for quite some time and I'd love to see them introduced. Yes, you can buy games as gifts for other steam users, but there's a relatively high barrier to doing so - you need to make an account, set up your payment details in it, mess around with the friends list etc. This means that unlike, say, Xbox Live, where you can just walk into a shop to buy a gift-card, there's no realistic way for non-gamers to give gift-cards to Steam-users. To be honest, given the number of gift cards that circulate every Christmas (not to mention birthdays throughout the year), I'm surprised they've missed out on this particular revenue stream for so long.

But I'm much less sold on the whole micro-payments for in-game content thing. I don't mind DLC as a concept; I've bought a good few pieces for games I'm particularly fond of; the Mass Effect games, Dragon Age, Forza 3 and Lost Odyssey spring to mind. However, these have all tended to be fairly substantial chunks of content that significantly extend the single-player experience. I tend to see these as small expansion packs, and provided they're priced appropriately, I'm happy to buy. The idea of buying plug-in content for a competitive multiplayer game, however, just feels like a bridge too far...

None of the DLC on offer here really seems to add anything new to the game. As they say, it's only really cosmetic stuff that can't be obtained via entirely in-game methods. And I'm sorry, but while cosmetic stuff as DLC has been there from the infancy of the concept (yay horse armour), I'm still not going to part money for that. So what you're really buying is a shortcut. They're mixing the in-game and real-world economies and allowing people willing to spend real money to speed up their progress in the game.

It's very close to the most hilariously awful form of DLC around. You might not have come across this yet, as to date it's been limited to a relatively small number of (mostly Japanese) not very good games. You'll find it in the likes of Cross Edge and Argarest Wars, but also in the odd Western title like Dante's Inferno. I'm talking about the ability to buy, using real money, in-game cash, items and experience points for your single-player game. As in, this is all stuff that's present in the base game, on the disk that you have paid money for, and isn't (generally) even locked away. But if you want to get it without hours of grinding, you've got to pay money. What they're basically saying (and the design of many of the games affected is clearly supposed to support this) is: "We've given you a game here, but if you actually want to enjoy it properly, you've got to give us some more money now. Because if you don't... well... I hope you like running in circles killing rats. Because that's where the next 20 hours of your life will be going".

Re:Steam wallet

[whoop]

I think this TF2 implementation is just preparation/proof-of-concept for Steam being able to host games (MMOs, perhaps) that have all kinds of micro-transactions. Valve likely isn't expecting much revenue from your new tin-foil hat for your Heavy. But it is a stroke to publishers that they too can join the Steam family and sell their games with them.

Just like in real life...

[Gordonjcp]

... if you want a hat *now*, go and buy a damn hat. If you're not prepared to buy it, do without.

Re:Just like in real life...

[Jojoba86]

But the appeal of games is they're not like real life. A game that emulated real life would be pretty boring (see also: The Sims).

Re:Just like in real life...

[Anonymous Coward]

I think that's the point. A lot of people will do without. They'll just go ahead and do without the whole game, in fact.

Re:Just like in real life...

[migla]

And that's what would suck about it: Just like in real life, the rich obnoxious bastard will be the one that can flaunt their fancy hats in the face of those who can't afford all those hats.

Re:Just like in real life...

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

Just like in life! When they can't afford the hat, or don't want to buy the hat, they go and kill themselves.

Oh wait...

Re:Just like in real life...

[vux984]

If I wanted to make real world spending decisions about new hats I'd go to the mall. I even get a real hat.
I don't need to buy a game for the privilege of experiencing spending money 'just like real life' on things that don't even exist or belong to me after 'buying' them.

Further, if just like real life was a good reason to implement something than team fortress 2 would have you lose a limb in the first firefight and then spend six to 12 months teaching your avatar to walk with a prosthetic and try to build a new life far away from combat.

Games are about providing enjoyment and entertainment. If you want to argue that spending real money on in game hats is somehow more fun than other methods of getting in game hats then feel free to make that case. But falling back on 'its just like real life' is completely specious.

Re:Just like in real life...

[Anonymous Coward]

If I wanted to make real world spending decisions about new hats I'd go to the mall. I even get a real hat.
I don't need to buy a game for the privilege of experiencing spending money 'just like real life' on things that don't even exist or belong to me after 'buying' them.

Just curious, is there ever a time in real life where you can either choose to buy a hat or just walk around until said hat appears out of the aether for free?

Re:Just like in real life...

[thousandinone]

You're right, The Sims hasn't been any kind of success, and there isn't any large following of that series either because of it. Nobody likes that shit! Other games that simulate "real life" activities fail just as horribly- Nobody plays, say, Madden, or Skate, because you can play football or go skateboarding in real life!

...We done here?

Re:Just like in real life...

[bertoelcon]

A game that emulated real life would be pretty boring (see also: The Sims).

Yet The Sims was one of the best selling games of all time.

Re:Just like in real life...

[vux984]

Just curious, is there ever a time in real life where you can either choose to buy a hat or just walk around until said hat appears out of the aether for free?

You realize that your just further arguing my point right?

Re:Just like in real life...

[rainmouse]

But the appeal of games is they're not like real life. A game that emulated real life would be pretty boring (see also: The Sims).

Are you accusing Team Fortress 2 of being too lifelike?

Re:Just like in real life...

[vux984]

You're right, The Sims hasn't been any kind of success, and there isn't any large following of that series either because of it. Nobody likes that shit! Other games that simulate "real life" activities fail just as horribly- Nobody plays, say, Madden, or Skate, because you can play football or go skateboarding in real life! ...We done here?

But it not because they are 'just like real life'. That's a catastrophically stupid reason to implement a game mechanic. If mimicing real life makes it fun, then do it, otherwise do something else. The Sims is nothing like real life, although it carefully mimics parts of it. It even mimics things that aren't fun, because the mimicry itself is still humourous.

You'll note with the sims in particular you play some sort of god-voyeur construct. Is that anything like real-life? Hell no, but its the only way it would be entertaining and fun. Can you imagine playing the sims being forced to actually personally act out one of their banal little lives? Think that would sell well...?

Re:Just like in real life...

[thousandinone]

Strictly speaking, I wasn't offering The Sims as an example. Jojoba86 listed it as his example, and I was making a point in regards to that.

I guess I should have quoted the parent?

Not exactly micro

[FauxReal]

When I logged into TF2 today it tried to sell me a hat for $4.95, the full game is selling for $10 right now. Though even if the game was $60 I can't justify $5 for an in-game hat that gives some minor advantage. I wonder how much it costs to buy everything?

Re:Not exactly micro

[Magada]

Too much. But that's not the issue here. The issue is that you cannot opt out of this whole bullshit. You get wasted if you don't have the money or time to plow into these things. I want no upgrades, damn it! I used to love how the classes in TF2 were so well balanced and no-one got a free lunch. That all went out the window with the introduction of items.

Re:Not exactly micro

[D J Horn]

You get wasted without new items? I think you're just projecting your dying on whatever appears to be a likely suspect.

Yeah there's a lot of new stuff compared to vanilla TF2, but variety doesn't mean imbalance. Its all about playstyle and taste. Lots of people still use the old gear.

Does everyone use the kritzkrieg instead of the ubercharge? Not even close.
Does everyone use the huntsman bow instead of the sniper rifle? Definitely not.
Does everyone use the direct hit instead of the old rocket launcher? Yeah right, most competitive soldiers don't touch it.

So you hop onto TF2 after not playing for a long time and see a whole bunch of new things, and then die to someone wielding and item you've never seen before. OH THAT MUST BE WHY THEY WERE ABLE TO KILL YOU, if only you had it too you wouldn't have died, right? It's just a convenient excuse.

But sure, TF2 is -somewhat- different now than it was originally, and liking its original form better is perfectly fair. But on the other hand, new content is what keeps most players coming back. You might be one of those guys who still plays counterstrike or quake decades from now, but you'll certainly be the minority. TF2 would be nothing but pleasant memories among me and my friends if it had never gotten new content to periodically bring us back from time to time.

Re:Not exactly micro

[Magada]

The kritzkrieg is a horrible, horrible waste of a slot, true. Would you say the same about the blutsauger?

The huntsman is akin to an IWIN button at the moment, in the hands of someone even marginally competent.

The direct hit is just as bad at short/medium range.

Speaking of ill-considered changes... Do you remember the first iteration of Force-a-Nature? Everyone was playing Scout. BOOM headshot! was suddenly all that was going on in a game that used to be about team tactics.

That's when things started going south, imo.

Oh and speaking of first iterations... how will you like it when Valve nerfs your bought-and-paid-for item?

Quick Question

[sammysheep]

Are these items merely cosmetic (a la some blizzard promos) or do they actually confer advantage? If the latter, I could see this going in the direction of games like Magic the Gathering, where having more money IRL means you have a better chance of buying better cards and therefore winning. I'd hate to see an FPS video game go in that direction, since it's a very different genre than a collector's trading card game..

Re:Quick Question

[will_die]

No they are advanced weapons, bonus, etc that you can get from playing the game for a while.
With the age of the game this is a smart idea. It allows new players to spend some money and get items that will keep with equal with older players.

Re:Quick Question

[D J Horn]

Are these items merely cosmetic (a la some blizzard promos) or do they actually confer advantage? If the latter, I could see this going in the direction of games like Magic the Gathering, where having more money IRL means you have a better chance of buying better cards and therefore winning. I'd hate to see an FPS video game go in that direction, since it's a very different genre than a collector's trading card game..

A prime example of that would be the free-to-play-but-micro-transaction-based Battlefield Heroes. In there you can buy weapons that are immensely better than their free counterparts. It's a disaster and the main reason that game never got very big.

However in TF2, which has been getting new items added to it for years, new stuff is always -different-, not better. For instance a rocket launcher that shoots faster rockets but has no splash damage. Its a matter of playstyle and taste rather than one being better than the other. All the new stuff is like that.

Besides, it's also all easily crafted without paying anything, so even if some new item was better, you don't have to buy it to get it.

The only things in the store that you can't make yourself are new dyes and name changers used to customize the appearance of other items.

Re:Quick Question

[entoke]

It's not easily crafted, you need hats to make one of the new hat that is needed for a set bonus, getting a hat can take 200 hours of gameplay. That does not fit my definition of easy. Also are not the duel thing only paid for aswell?

Re:Quick Question

[Therilith]

All of the weapons you can buy can be acquired (relatively) easily by playing.
However, they also introduced "item sets" which require a certain combination of weapons and a hat (a previously cosmetic-only item) to complete.
Hats are very rare in-game (even more so if you need one particular hat to complete a set) which used to be fine since they never did anything until now.

Re:Quick Question

[D J Horn]

True that hats are still not easily crafted, but the issue is gameplay and the set bonuses are trivial at best. Even if you had every item you'd most likely use some mixture of items you like rather than the set, as the bonuses aren't worth carrying not carrying your personal best items.

Even with the new set bonuses, hats are still cosmetic by any standard.

The duel token isn't gameplay related either, and its 5 uses for 99 cents anyway.

Re:Quick Question

[RalphSleigh]

Very few of the unlockable/craftable/buyable items are universally considered a direct upgrade on what they replace, and of those that are almost all of them are unlockable by achievements (wangler, equaliser, axtinguisher, etc). The achievement milestones are easy to get, and the achievements required are designed to make sure you know how to play the game (While there are some uberskill and grind ones in there, you don't need those to unlock items).

The only item I have seen consistently equipped that's not achievement based is the Sniper's Tribalman's Shiv. It's not a huge upgrade but you will need a couple of random drops to craft it.

Re:Quick Question

[VGPowerlord]

The only item I have seen consistently equipped that's not achievement based is the Sniper's Tribalman's Shiv. It's not a huge upgrade but you will need a couple of random drops to craft it.

I have a Shiv, but I don't use it. It's just not worth it, as in the few instances a Sniper is meleeing with someone, the decreased damage in favor of bleed is useful against exactly one class: Spy.

Having said that, there's a new Sniper melee weapon that causes you to take +20% fire damage, but when you'd mini-crit, it will crit instead... useful if you Jarate opponents first.

Re:Quick Question

[VGPowerlord]

Also are not the duel thing only paid for aswell?

No, they and the Name Tag also drop randomly.

The only item that doesn't appear to randomly drop is the supply crate key.

Microtransactions done right? Figures it's Valve

[D J Horn]

I wasn't sure what to expect when I saw the post this morning, I'm not a fan of microtransactions in games, as I've never seen it executed in a way that didn't punish players into using it.

But I read all about it, and then checked it out for myself. It actually seems like this system was built with a fair dose of common sense, something I've come to expect from Valve.

First and foremost is the fact that all the items are still attainable in game. But wait, did they make them really rare drops or difficult to craft in order to push people toward purchasing? Nope, they're still the same as they've always been. Easily crafted by anyone who plays much at all.

But hold on, these systems always have stupid virtual currency that you can only buy in chunks that don't match the item costs. You want an item that costs 3500 neato-points but you can only buy points in chunks of 2000! Oh, Valve's system uses real currency tied to your steam account, that you can use anywhere on steam. That actually makes sense.

Surely there is a catch though. These new items must be overpowered and imbalanced to make them worth buying, right? That's what most games do (cough BF Heroes cough) but it doesn't really work when people can still get the items without buying them. And it turns out the stats are all in line with the way Valve has always added new items to TF2. They all have their ups and downs and are more a matter of playstyle and taste than outright better/worse. There are still plenty of people who used the old original items simply because that's what they're best with.

BUT HOLD ON, WE'VE FOUND THE EVIL PLOT! Most item's are community made, Valve is profiting off content they don't even have to make themselves!! Oh nevermind, community designers are given a cut of any sales their item makes, which is probably the coolest thing about the whole system. As someone who's mapped and modded Source as a hobby over the years, and having friends who actually made items in this very update, I think it is absolutely awesome that they're getting money out of something they'd normally love to do just for fun.

This is is precisely the microtransaction system I would expect from Valve. I have no problems with it and I have yet to read any legitimate arguments against it.

TFA is short and informative

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

Q: Will I have to spend money to remain competitive?
A: No. Any items affecting gameplay, and even most purely cosmetic items, will still be obtainable simply by playing the game.

Ya sorry Valve

[Sycraft-fu]

I'm not at all opposed to the idea of micro transactions. On the contrary, I like the idea when done right. Mass Effect 2 does a great job. They released a good game, well worth the money. However they've continued to develop for it and you can get new content. They just released an addon for $10. It adds a good bit of new, unique, gameplay. They spent a good deal of work developing it, new visuals, new voice tracks, etc. It is a worthwhile upgrade for the money, if you enjoy the game.

Well the TF2 stuff has two big problems:

1) The TF2 engine is a POS. Seriously, that game has all kinds of problems, owing to the age of its engine. If I am going to spend money for DLC, it'll be on a newer game that runs well on my system. I'm not saying it doesn't render frame fast, its older graphics insure that happens. However it stutters often because it doesn't handle streaming well, it takes forever to load content, its interface has a number of problems, etc. Sorry, but compare that to say Bad Company 2 and there is no comparison. I'm just not really interested in putting money in to a game that isn't well updated for my system.

2) More importantly, they have to get the fuck out of here with those prices. $5 for a gun? $18 for a hat? What the fuck is that shit? For the price of one hat I could get the new ME2 DLC and still have enough left over for one of their older DLCs ($7 each) or a few weapons packs if I really wanted (which are $2 for a pack with multiple items). They are completely off their rocker if they think it is worth that kind of money.

Really, if they need cash, I'd rather they just produce Team Fortress 3. TF2 is showing its age (though it still ought to behave better, I think Source is also showing its age in general) and maybe it isn't feasible to completely rework the engine. That's fine, do a new TF game with new engine, graphics, maps, etc, and sell it at a new game price. I've no problem with that, it is about 3 years old and I'm ok with the idea that for non-subscription games you have to periodically pay for an update. I also know it is easier to rework things in a new game than to continually modify an existing one.

However I'm not giving them nearly $20 to have a hat. Sorry.

Re:Ya sorry Valve

[sahonen]

I've never run into any of the problems you talked about with the engine. In fact it's my opinion that the Source engine is the best modern engine for multiplayer gaming. Unreal Engine has very bad input latency (unacceptable for a first person shooter engine on PC), and Source's netcode beats the pants off of anything else out there. Not to mention the fact that I can play TF2 on hardware costing half as much as what I need to play any of the other modern shooters.

Re:Ya sorry Valve

[N1AK]

On the contrary, I like the idea when done right. Mass Effect 2 does a great job.

A game that comes with an achievement you can't get without buying DLC? (The Thief character). Personally I was very disappointed by this, otherwise I had no issue with its DLC.

Re:Ya sorry Valve

[RegTooLate]

I've experienced these issues and it isn't the game, it's your PC. Run Autoruns and see what is interrupting your game. Kill off those extra services. Then experience TF2 smoothly as everyone else does.

Re:Ya sorry Valve

[vic.tz]

However I'm not giving them nearly $20 to have a hat. Sorry.

No need to apologize, friend. I'm sure they're not expecting everyone to buy that hat.

Here's my TF2 experience: I paid $45 for the Orange Box back when it was released (Oct 2007). That got me HL2 + ep1 + ep2, Portal, and TF2, so if you divvy that up, it'd be fair to say I spent $15 on TF2. Since its launch, Valve has released updates to all nine classes, added several new game modes, and they've added a dozen or so maps (not to mention the entire hat/crafting system). All for free! Three years of updates and support and hundreds of hours of gameplay for $15. I feel like I OWE Valve money for TF2.

For comparison, Halo 3 was released in Sept 2007, and CoD4 was released in Nov 2007. How much free content was released for those games? Are Bungie or Infinity Ward still developing content for them? Not a chance! Instead, they want you to buy the next revision of the game (i.e. 90% the same) for $60 once or twice each year. TF2 trounces those two and pretty much every other fps franchise in value.

Yeah, I don't mind giving Valve a few bucks for a hat. They've earned it.

Re:Ya sorry Valve

[a20tornado]

I... just really don't understand. If you don't want to pay for a hat, or a gun, or whatever... just don't. I really enjoy the game, but there is very little chance that I'd be spending money on new weapons, and absolutely no chance I'll buy the cosmetic items. No one is forcing you to spend the money on it. You don't need to have *any* of those items to play the game. I have gotten several of the unlocks over the course of playing the game, and I still choose to use the original weapons in some cases because I like them better. I'm not a pro at the game by any means, but I can generally hold my own play how I want with the weapons I like. If people want to spend money to bypass the need to play the game and wait for the drops, that's their call. It's not going to make them automatically better at the game, just give them some different ways to play. And personally I think Valve deserves to get a little extra something for all the work they've put into TF2. I haven't necessarily liked every single update that's come out for it, but at least they're *trying* to keep the game from becoming stagnant and stale.

And if you don't like the game... just don't play it. If you don't think it looks good, don't buy it. If you bought it a few years ago, but think it's become outdated in that time, just stop playing it. No one is forcing you to spend your time or money on this game, you're completely free to go off and spend your time playing whatever else you'd like. Obviously there are a lot of people that do enjoy it, because a ton of people play the game, a ton of people flood in to try out the updates, and a ton of people are crafting, creating, and wearing/using these items.

Just because this style/feature isn't for you, that doesn't make it invalid. Play what you'd like to, spend your money the way you'd like, and let other people do the same.

Buy a kevlar for $800?

[elh_inny]

I wonder how long until I have to pay real $800 for my kevlar in CS:S....
I guess even at 1/1000th of the price this could get interesting as in the long run if you're decent you get more money then you spend in CS:S...

Perhaps they could balance it out a little and allow people to play with real money?

Also

[Sycraft-fu]

The items aren't obtainable through skill, just through sitting there. Most games that offer things either in game or via a store, you have to work to get the in game version. Like say in DDO you want an item to respecialize your character. You can purchase it in their store or get it in game. To get it in game you have to run various quests, which get you items that you combine to what you need. So you don't just sit logged in hoping for the things you need to show up. If you are skilled, you can get it faster since you can do the quests faster.

With TF2 you just have to be on a server and hope that you randomly get what you want, no skill involved. This also means there will likely be an increase of people who just want to sit on servers and not do anything while they wait for their items, to the detriment of actual players.

Personally I like the Blizzard system, or the system Sony used before EQ2 went free (haven't seen what they do now). The microtransactions/store stuff is only for meta game and cosmetic kinds of things. So in WoW any item that does something, you have to get in game. However you can buy meta game stuff like server transfers, name changes and so on. You can also buy purely cosmetic things like a new mount. Same deal (formerly) with EQ2, you could buy "appearance only" armour that changed how you looked and so on, but you couldn't buy actual powerful items.

I'm ok with that. However I don't like the idea of "You pay to get good stuff in the game." This sucks not only because you have to cope with people trying to make up for lack of skill with money, but also because it is a slippery slope. Way too easy for the developer to start to decide all the best stuff should be for pay only.

Then, as you said, the price is monkey-fuck retarded. $20 for an item set? Hell no. For just under $30 Amazon.com will sell you Bad Company 2, which is a completely new FPS game. No way I'd spend $20 for some items rather than $30 for new items, characters, levels, game design, graphics and so on.

$20 is not "microtransaction" price. That is expansion pack price.

Re:Also

[ink]

TF2 already is like the Blizzard system. In WoW you can pay to re-spec, so it does allow you pay to make yourself stronger. Valve killed idle dropping in the fall 2009 update, which included the Cheater's Lament. You must now play in order to get drops. I had every single game changing item after about 80 hours of play. It's not an onerous task, if you enjoy the game and play it off and on. Personally, I am not planning on buying any of the cosmetic items -- and this doesn't penalize me in the slightest. With TF2 you can also download amazing mods if cool cosmetic changes are what you are after. You don't have to pay Valve anything.

trolls everywhere!

[D J Horn]

I like how every positive reply has gotten modded troll.

Meanwhile I still haven't read a single valid point by any of the naysayers, here or elsewhere. Most of the time it doesn't even sound like they even -play- TF2.

The only valid points people have brought up are the ones who liked vanilla TF2 better before it had any new content added and wish they could play that old version. That's fair, but completely unrelated to this whole microtransaction deal.

Re:trolls everywhere!

[paziek]

Yeah, I just bought TF2 (waited for special off) and I'm not bothered by it. Some people would rather spend their time grinding in game, while others prefer to spend their time grinding IRL and just convert some of those drops to the ones in game. Its fair enough for me, especially that the only advantage buying gives is that it requires less grinding IRL than it would in game. I see complaining here just by kids who are too lazy to grind in either way.

Re:trolls everywhere!

[pandrijeczko]

I think you and too many other people have lost the concept of what gaming is.

Any game - computer, board, sports, etc. - is supposed to be *FUN WHILE YOU ARE PLAYING IT* with an added bonus of possibly winning it at the end. The *FUN* bit generally happens because you are playing against opponents who are all around the same skill level - throw in one expert at the game & the *FUN* element disappears because the other players have no possibility of winning and the expert gets bored rapidly by trouncing everyone else.

If winning is of primary importance to you, then you can have a lot of *FUN* honing your skills to become better and better at the game as you understand the mechanics more. However, being able to *BUY* an advantage in a game is the equivalent to permissible cheating.

I'm more than happy to grind at a game as long as it's *FUN* to do so and as long as everyone else in that game is doing the same thing. But I don't see what *FUN* I am supposed to get from somebody who comes into the game and trounces me just because he or she has parted with good money to buy cheats.

Personally, I'm all for grinders of similar expertise being on their server, and cheats with their purchases on another.

Re:trolls everywhere!

[VGPowerlord]

However, being able to *BUY* an advantage in a game is the equivalent to permissible cheating.

All of the items in TF2 have some sort of tradeoff. The new Spy knife does an instant disguise (of the "blink and you missed it" type), but removes the Spy's disguise kit; once the Spy with the new knife is undisguised, he *has* to backstab someone to redisguise. This makes the Revolvers significantly less useful.

You can get every single weapon in the game through the game's random drop system. The Polycount packs all have weapons that can be crafted, and word on the street is that the other 3 new weapons will have crafting recipes added to the game sometime today.

If you're an existing player, you can craft all the weapons using the game's crafting system... if you were smart, you would have stocked up on extra items knowing that this patch was coming. I personally had enough metal + items to craft 7 of the new weapons already, and they just came out yestsreday.

The hats (and set bonuses that require them) are the part that will piss people off. Some of the set bonuses have no downs, other than being forced to use a particular set of equipment.

For example, the Sniper's set has the set bonus of being immune to headshots. However, the Sydney Sleeper Sniper Rifle can't do headshots, so it's not like it's a free win.

Another example: The Scout's set gives the wearer an extra +25 health. The downside is having a less powerful primary gun (Shortstop), no secondary gun (Mad Milk instead), and being forced to use the fish melee weapon... the fish has no extra stats, so it's just a more humiliating version of the Bat.

Re:trolls everywhere!

[delinear]

I suppose people who buy better sports equipment are cheating, because real atheltes craft it themselves? Also, if you believe these purchases give a game-altering advantage (and clearly you do, if you thought they were balanced or purely cosmetic then there'd be no "cheating" after all, since cheating implies gaining an unfair advantage) then how does your world view accommodate brand new players? Surely people who have been playing for years and have earned all the equipment through grinding are going to have a massive advantage over new players, and even if the new players spend the next three years catching up, the old players will have six years of grinding at that point - shouldn't the game be fun for those new players too? If being able to buy the equipment creates a level playing field, surely that moves us closer to your ideal of a game where no one player has an unfair advantage, because even players who have full time jobs and can't spend the time "honing their skill" can still jump on and play and have fun. In reality, these upgrades don't really confer any competitive advantage (maybe they will in the future but for now they don't) so it's all moot because someone who buys every piece of equipment can still be thrashed by someone with more skill using a clean vanilla install/account.

Re:trolls everywhere!

[pandrijeczko]

I suppose people who buy better sports equipment are cheating, because real atheltes craft it themselves?

In a nutshell, yes. It's just a matter of how much they are allowed to cheat - e.g. what sport shoes they can and cannot wear, restrictions on size and weight of javelins, etc. etc.

Also, if you believe these purchases give a game-altering advantage (and clearly you do, if you thought they were balanced or purely cosmetic then there'd be no "cheating" after all, since cheating implies gaining an unfair advantage) then how does your world view accommodate brand new players?

I'd much rather see adoption of more servers that only allow players of certain abilities on them - that, in itself, could be a means for advancement - i.e. being moved to a certain new server when reaching a certain ability level.

Surely people who have been playing for years and have earned all the equipment through grinding are going to have a massive advantage over new players, and even if the new players spend the next three years catching up, the old players will have six years of grinding at that point - shouldn't the game be fun for those new players too?

As above.

If being able to buy the equipment creates a level playing field, surely that moves us closer to your ideal of a game where no one player has an unfair advantage, because even players who have full time jobs and can't spend the time "honing their skill" can still jump on and play and have fun.

Yes, but that's kind of like saying "Mind if I join you elite poker players who do nothing more with your time and play poker. But because I have to hold down a full time job and cannot practice as much as you guys, I've bought my own four aces with me."

In reality, these upgrades don't really confer any competitive advantage (maybe they will in the future but for now they don't) so it's all moot because someone who buys every piece of equipment can still be thrashed by someone with more skill using a clean vanilla install/account.

Let's get one thing clear - the whole idea of charging for upgrades is *JUST* so the games company can make more money from you. I don't have a problem with how people choose to spend their money, but I don't see small print on any games packaging that says "Note: in order to stand a good chance of winning in multiplayer games online, you will need to purchase additional game content." So, potentially, that can mean my fun is reduced because in order to stand a good chance of winning online, I have to spend more money.

Trading worth

[Anonymous Coward]

So what are those 7 refined metals that i've got worth (never felt like making a hat)? What will the backpack full of vintage items be worth?

Re:Trading worth

[VGPowerlord]

Even without trading, you can turn 1 refined metal into 3 reclaimed metal. Each of the 12 new non-hat Polycount items require 1 Reclaimed Metal + whatever item it's the most similar to in effect... TF2Items has a list of recipes (new items are above the legend near the bottom).

Unfortunately, if you crafted away all your items... sucks to be you. Of course, some people are willing to give away their extra base items if you need them.

Re:Microtransactions done right? Figures it's Valv

[Anonymous Coward]

I love that this got modded troll. Fucking retards....

Sad Panda

[Charliemopps]

Microtrans are destroying the gaming industry. People don't want to be nickle and dimed to death... and they also don't want to play against other players that paid $20 to get items that are going to make harder to kill. Why can't companies just sell me the god damned game and leave me alone anymore?

Re:Sad Panda

[pandrijeczko]

The simple answer is that selling something as an ongoing service makes a lot more money over a longer period of time than selling to you once.

Personally, I don't get the whole microtrans stuff anyway. I do use Steam, I'm a big fan of all the Valve games, but I own the boxed copies of all the games I play on Steam. I've bought no downloadable "Steam-only" games because I don't get what it is I'm supposed to be paying for.

I have bought a few applications online, plus a few games from Good Old Games because, in both cases, I have them stored on my local hard disk(s) and therefore in my possession to install, use or play whenever I want to.

I have friends who play WoW (I tried it for a month but it didn't grab me) and who pay for all sorts of in-game objects but, again, I don't get that either.

I guess it's a case of "each to his own" but I'm not prepared to put that much faith in games companies that I truly believe the add-ons they want to sell me are just that, rather than stuff they deliberately left out of the original game to sell to me later on.

Re:Sad Panda

[delinear]

I keep hearing the argument that people don't want to be nickle and dimed to death. The gaming industry is an open market. If one developer is nickle and diming and people don't like it then other developers will fill the void and steal their customers. The very fact that this isn't yet happening and that people seem to be sticking with the games/systems where they're nickel and dimed would suggest that, actually, people are comfortable with the idea - or, at the very least, that it doesn't annoy them enough to vote with their Steam Wallets.

Re:Sad Panda

[delinear]

I guess it's a case of "each to his own" but I'm not prepared to put that much faith in games companies that I truly believe the add-ons they want to sell me are just that, rather than stuff they deliberately left out of the original game to sell to me later on.

ME2 and DA:O were two prime examples. The first DLC for both was obviously built at the same time as the core game and just detached for separate release, to the extent that ME:2 has a "space" on the character select screen in the basic game for a character who is only available with DLC, while DA:O has a DLC character standing right in your camp trying to sell you a mission. I have to say I bought both and enjoyed them and don't regret the purchases, but yes, pretty cynical move on the developer's part.

Re:Sad Panda

[Anonymous Coward]

Because you are their cash supply..

Their game wasnt good enough to continue to draw new players. So they gotta squeeze more cash out of existing players.

"make a new game? fuck that.. thats expensive. we can squeeze alot more cash out of you before you'll leave."

Re:Sad Panda

[Charliemopps]

or, there is a certain segment of players that, while not being the majority, are highly profitable for the developers. If you can make 10x the profit off 1 player than you can another, then losing 75% of your playerbase to switch to microtrans is a solid business choice for your game. But if the majority of games go this route, in the end the larger gaming community is going to become jaded and fed up.

TF2 weapons traditionally have tradeoffs

[cycleflight]

So far, Valve has been pretty careful to not make a weapon strictly better than anything else available in its loadout slot (the bonesaw/ubersaw being the exception). They always put in some drawback to a weapon that has new abilities. As a result, the proliferation of weaponry has tended to change emphasis on different styles of play vs. making the holder of a particular weapon mightier than anyone without it. There are usually kinks when a weapon gets first released, but once a strict advantage becomes clear, weapon stats usually get changed to alter it.

It's interesting to see the ebb and flow... suddenly you learned everyone in the server who plays soldier is highly accurate (or not) when the Direct Hit came out. You learned who's an ambush scout when the F.A.N. came out. The cruise-control pyros got their own weapon. Scouts got a way to be useful against a sentry nest, but lost their medium range weapon for it. The list goes on and on.

Except for that damn fish. I haven't seen yet, but if the taunt for that isn't Monty Python's "Fish Slapping Dance," I'll be a little disappointed.

Re:TF2 weapons traditionally have tradeoffs

[derfy]

No unique fish taunt. :(

These items can still be crafted

[Anonymous Coward]

The items for sale through the store can still be crafted from other items. For instance, you can get the Degreaser by combining a Backburner and Reclaimed metal. When the store says "non-craftable", what they mean by that is that you cannot use a purchased item in crafting, not that the item cannot be crafted. A lot of people are going to get pissed off about their use of the term "non-craftable", but really I think it's to protect people from wasting their money.

So not only do you not have to sit around waiting for items (or "grinding" for them), you also don't have to buy them. You can craft them if you've got the right parts.

The difference being...

[NoSleepDemon]

... that in TF2, setting fire to the rich obnoxious bastard and tea bagging his smoldering corpse won't earn you 3rd degree burns to your testicles and a life time in jail.

translation

[Truekaiser]

while the items are still available through normal means in the game. 'we' as a company have decided to make the process hard enough that most of you will give up in frustration and pay the small amount to get the items. we have realized the american public's lack of basic math skill's, simply addition, and figure we will earn more money this way as the public spends more on the game then if they bought it outright using the old transaction model.

this is a logical progression

[DragonTHC]

there's been a lot of us asking for steam cards for a long time, this is good progress imho.

Granted, I stopped playing tf2 like a year ago. I can see community mods being offered for micro-transactions.

Unfortunately this is the end of free community modding. But it's a step forward for PC gaming. It's an evolution. It will bring more talent and games back to PC gaming.

I don't see how this is a bad thing

[Droce]

I don't believe how much people are freaking out over this, you can get the items by crafting the simplest things (I already have lots the new items will spare stuff I had in my backpack). You also grossly overestimate how hard it is to get new items, I'm in my third year of university and I manage to find loads of items. Any item with really game-changing qualities will be, as always, easy to get. Not to mention that you can trade for what you want, get 30 rocket launchers? Trade with your friend who has 5 bows or something.

More sinister than it would appear

[Durzel]

First off I should preface this by saying that I love Valve and hate microtransactions.

That being said there are some "devil in the detail" points which leave a nastier-than-normal taste in the mouth.

For starters - the item set hats (that you need to get the set bonus) aren't craftable. They (apparently) drop but with the number of items in game currently and the already very rare percentage chance to get a hat the idea that you could complete an item set by getting the hat via an item drop is about as unrealistic a proposition as relying on winning the lottery to be your income source. In fact, the FAQ makes mention of the fact that you don't have to pay for the set-completing hats, but this is pretty disingenuous in my opinion considering the item drop probabilities involved.

Secondly - bought items are not tradeable. This means that even if someone else did buy the item and for some inexplicable reason was prepared to trade the "item set" hat away, you couldn't get it from them. Right now the only way you will get the set bonuses is by buying the set(s) yourself, with cold hard cash.

What this means in very simple terms is that set bonuses such as "+25 health for Scout", which are a significant advantage in the right hands, is something that will affect the gameplay of those that choose not (or can't afford) to participate.

Microtransactions for alternative (but not necessarily better) weaponry and cosmetic items are one thing, having no other option but to pay to get an ingame discernable advantage is something completely different and not something I ever imagined Valve stooping to.

A minor off topic nit...

[sgtrock]

If you could run a "pure" server (to steal a term from Unreal Tournament)...

I think this term pre-dates UT by quite some time. I used to run a QuakeWorld server back in the day and I could swear that I had the option of running a 'pure' server for that. I know I was running a Q2 server with that variable enabled.

"Micro"?

[Mystery00]

$20 for a hat isn't micro. That's all I have to say.

25

[drumcat]

This is just the old "pump quarters" deal. Arcade in your home. You sure you like it?

The sky is not, in fact, falling.

[res1216]

Observations, in rough order of significance.

1.) The default weapons are some of the most powerful, flexible weapons in the game. Rocket launcher, minigun, scattergun, butterfly knife, sticky bombs, medigun (etc.) are all core to game play, and you'll never be at an item-based disadvantage playing with a stock loadout. The new items (all the way back to the medic update), range from situational to strict downgrades. The only real mistake was version-1 backburner, when it gave 50 health, and that only lasted two months. (Melee weapons are the possible exception here--especially the ubersaw and equalizer--but it's probably okay balance-wise for the melee weapons to be above the curve.)
I played last night; some players had bought new item sets. I didn't really notice a difference. Sure, if you get hit with milk (non-milk substance!), another scout has a 1v1 advantage, but that's a corner case. The new sniper rifle is good, and makes the sniper more team-oriented, but that ignores just how absurd the default sniper rifle is. On the other hand, being killed by a fish IS mighty humiliating.
The upshot is, that you can compete on a level playing field without spending a penny at the store.

2.) The store is purely value-added. The new items are in the same mold as the community-created content added this spring. Valve could have continued to release them the same way, by adding them to the drop system. This time, though, the also provided the option (apparently a widely-requested one) to allow players to purchase the items instead of taking their chances with the drop system. The important thing, though, is that if you don't want to pay for additional content, NOTHING HAS CHANGED. From your p.o.v. the system is just like it was for every other set of new items since the sniper/spy update.

3.) The comments about "grinding" being a poor way to earn paid content pretty much entirely miss the point. Valve was wise enough to tie item drops to nothing but time played. There's no kill farming or achievement whoring required. If playing TF2 qualifies as "grinding" for you, I'd suggest that finding a game you enjoy.

4) TF2 players complain. About everything. Grenades (lack thereof), pyros, the Sandman, demomen, achievements, new weapons, hats, the drop system, idlers, should I keep going? It wouldn't surprise me if somewhere on the forum, someone is complaining that Red is OP. Lost in this is the fact that the game is incredibly fun, and has provided amazing long-term value. The game has never in it's life been 50 dollars (unless you count the Orange Box), and has never had a subscription fee. And yet Valve has quadrupled the number of available maps (not even counting the community-made ones that they incorporated and polished), tripled the number of available weapons, and added two entirely new game modes. Complaining that they began offering the option to purchase freely-available content three years into the game's lifespan is the very epitome of ingratitude.

Re:Microtransactions done right? Figures it's Valv

[Chowderbags]

Easily crafted by anyone who plays much at all.

They've increased the number of items it takes to do your crafting. Also, item sets require hats, which you'll be lucky to get one for every couple hundred hours of playing (so for someone who doesn't spend all day in their basement, a couple months, and good luck getting the hat you actually want). So yes, while it's theoretically possible to get all the various sets through sheer grinding, you would probably never keep up with it if they start releasing new items/sets every couple months, and to me that's a problem. You used to be able to get all the new class weapons fairly easily, since the pool of total weapons was small and you could grind achievements if the random number gods hated you. Now that there's a huge pool of weapons it's like playing roulette to get the one you actually want (oh gee, another Jarate, just what I didn't want), but it's ok because everyone is under the same system.

But now we're basically dividing the community into those willing to drop $50 to get a couple hats so that their outfit will come together (meaning that the hats provide a bonus with no ill effects), and those who don't. If we're going to do that, why not just directly sell bonuses? $5 for an extra 50 health on the heavy! $3 so your spy doesn't catch on fire anymore. $10 so your sniper automatically does head shots. And it'd be a'ok if these bonuses "randomly dropped" every couple months for a person, right?

Market Segmentation

[BassMan449]

I really like this choice for one big reason: it segments the market well. In general you have to major categories of people : people with lots of time but little extra money and people with extra money but not much extra time. This update helps to let those two groups play the game equally. I have friends who are in college and lots of free time. They have logged hundreds of hours in the game, usually at least an hour a day. They have tons of hats and all the items. I only have enough time to play a few hours a week, usually only one night for a couple of hours, but I have a good job and I have some extra cash so if there is a specific item I want I can buy it.

As long as Valve keeps with their pattern of making all the weapons have trade offs and being more about changing play style rather than flat out more powerful, then I think this system will be fantastic at keep TF2 development going. I do think the prices are currently too high, but I also think knowing Valve that they are likely to lower or have regular sales (think Steam sales).

Re:Microtransactions done right? Figures it's Valv

[YojimboJango]

Actually most of the community that I've met seems to view this as a way to limit price gouging in online auctions. If you can buy that rare hat that you've always wanted for $3 from the store there's no way someone is going to be able to charge more than that for an item on Ebay like you see with WoW stuff. There seems to be a lot of online moaning about this, but the reaction from 99% of people (that I've played with) in game seems positive.

A better user for this technology....

[malakai]

A much better use for this technology would enable you to Tip the server host and the authors of any current mods running on the system. Sure, right now you can pretty much do it through paypal, but it's time consuming.

If the game gave me a way to 'tip' my current server, and that tip was appropriately split between the server host and the mods he runs based on back end points ( like shares in a film ), we'd end up with a new economic model for mod/map/hosting development.

It could reach a whole new level if you could 'tip' your medic... I suppose with the trade system you can always gift them something.

I agree with many of the other comments that the 'micro' size of these transactions are too large.

Re:A better user for this technology....

[ADRA]

That would be a neat idea to implement, but I think ultimately the mass of transactions(fees per), wire transactions, charge backs, tax trails, etc.. would weigh down the system to the point that nobody would bother to implement it.

Re:A better user for this technology....

[cycleflight]

The other replier makes some good points about red tape, but I think this is an A-class idea too. I'm a senior admin in a server that sees a good bit of traffic, but our bills mainly get paid by occasional donations and largely out of the pocket of one guy. A way to encourage players to support the servers they enjoy would be a fantastic way to ensure that the game continues to roll along happily, and would help the people who do foot the bill pay for nicer, leaner, meaner servers that perform better. Top notch stuff.

Re:Microtransactions done right? Figures it's Valv

[ADRA]

Most of the item sets' "combined bonus" also has weakness. Pyros can move 10% faster and take 10% higher DMG. That seems like a reasonable tradeoff to me. The soldier one doesn't have a tradeoff, but its basically a tactical turret killer to begin with and not suited for all purposes use.

Bribery-based gaming

[Animats]

Online gaming is moving to a bribery-based model. Call this by its right name. Players have to bribe the game management to get an edge.

Let me just say...

[bat21]

I have over 100 hours into TF2 at this point and I'm a pretty good spy (the best regular on a couple servers). I just want to say that I doubt that buying the entire inventory of the store will make you much of a better player. Assuming the items are balanced, a crappy player is still a crappy player. I for one am planning on keeping my current spy loadout (though I may check out that new revolver when I get it in a drop). With item trading and random drops you can get whatever weapons you want for your primary class or two w/o too much trouble. The only thing I don't like is how total newbs can have 5 or 6 hats. Hats were originally a status symbol, because you could tell that a player had been around for a while if he had a decent hat for his primary class. On the bright side, trading will allow you to get the hats that you want easier...

Re:Let me just say...

[cycleflight]

When I was your age, having hair was a status symbol. AND WE LIKED IT!

They sure like implementing payment systems...

[Anonymous Coward]

... I hope they implement the resale of Steam games next, because I'm ready to resell my (boxed) copy of the Orange Box.

Oh wait...

I am not bothered by this.

[John Pfeiffer]

Want to know WHY I'm not bothered by this? Because the achievement-whoring douchebags will probably just buy the items they want and get back to ACTUALLY PLAYING instead of burdening their teams with their ineffective half-assed play while they try and grind new HATS. And anything that lets Valve make more money off of the kind of people I detest is good for Valve, me, and the gaming ecosystem in-general.

I have some faith that Valve won't misuse this idea. Honestly, letting people buy the items if they want to benefits everyone. I don't really think they're going to do something like, say, start charging for molotovs in Left4Dead. Maybe they should charge for ragequitting. Let people buy $0.50 'get out of game free' cards, as it were, to keep them from getting a negative reputation for quitting in the middle of games! ;P

I am completely serious

[Anonymous Coward]

It's good that I have a Jewish friend that plays TF2.
He's coaching me on good trades.