for 360 at least... unless they implement the halo/shadowrun/etc matchmaking system, unfortunately i wont play. Not into entering and exiting rooms and finding new games every match and coordinating messages with friends to join the same game, 360 is not pc gaming. The game seemed fun though. Playing UTIII on ps3 now tho with friends, because you can just stay on one server.

i'm happy to see the support valve always offer gamers after the release of their games

and if the medic can get a little more challenging to play, other than healing in such a boring way

"It's a large scale modification to the core of the game," Walker hinted. "It'll debut in a limited fashion through the Medic first, but it'll be affecting all classes eventually."

Hmm interesting...seems like it is not only a Medic related tweak.

I love how the medic plays in this game. I don't really want them to change him that much, but as for the new maps awesome.

the medic is such an important class. i wonder why everyone chooses to avoid playing it. it greatly helps your teammates and you learn how to dodge a lot of bullets.

Hopefully they can unbreak the ps3 version.
...
...
Didn't think so.

@dafthero:
Obviously because not many people enjoy being the healer. You rarely get to kill things and the other team is always gunning for you.

Not saying I don't enjoy playing Medic, but its not for those who are looking to rack up on kills

@dafthero: it's great to start with to learn the ropes and actually be useful to your team, but after a while I think people get bored of it, as it can be a more passive role.

I haven't played as much recently but I'm surprised at how seldom teams seem to really know or coordinate to form the rather simple combinations to overcome stalemates or one team owning the other(i.e. the multiple UBer heavy assualt).

Being that Medic is my #1 played class, I'm both looking forward to and a little worried about the "tweak". Right now medics are one of the most underused classes and being a good medic can be a real asset. I wonder if the number of medics will shift drastically (and stay that way) once the new patch is released.

I hope it goes back to normal with only 1 or 2 medic's on a 12+ person team so that I can heal with maximum efficiency.

On that note, I wish Valve would come out with more of those "Meet The ..." series of FMV's. All of them so far have been hilarious and it'd be great to see the rest of the cast.

I've got to lean towards this being for the best provided they've got a way that'll make medic more skillful and exciting to play.

@OneLetter:

I too wish that Valve would do more "Meet The ..." FMVs ... those rocked! I find myself being the only Medic in a lot of servers, which really sucks. As you said, a good medic can be a real asset. It's a damn shame that there's not more people playing with that kit.

Promising; the medic class could indeed use a tweak. Nothing big, but something to make your primary healing duties a bit more dynamic would be nice.

Maybe they'll make the charge usable on a discretionary basis, like the Spy's cloak...

@Grumpy Poops: are u effin' kidding? i hate the halo matchmaking system... why can't i just play a SLAYER or a SWORDS game as many times as i want whenever i damn please??(and never play effin' ODDBALL
(or am i just too stupid, and couldn't figure out how to do it?? if so, someone should tell me how)

GRENADES!

I hope they bring this stuff to the console versions. I was playing TF2 on my 360 religiously for about a month or so, and more maps would definitely help because the small number they put in the game to start definitely starts to wear thin after a while.

As a person who also rocks the Medic as his #1 class (I'm the type to join the losing team, and play the class no-one else is playing) I would like to see the following changes:

Poisoning! Either the Syringe gun or the Healing gun need to poison the enemies a la TFC.

Shotgun! The Syringe gun sucks, although the parabolic trajectory has proved useful... I would like my record for kills in a round to be more than 2.

That said, people frequently have their best class-rounds historically with me medicating them, and the medic can get involved in some seriously hairy shit and it can be a lot of fun being a balancing and tide-turning force in the middle of such chaos.

Medic Petpeeves:

People that run away when you uber-charge them! Run towards the enemy, fuck-wits!

People that don't shoot at enemy turrets and buildings while uber-charged, especially when it's a soldier. I can understand a pyro not going for buildings, but heavys, demos, and soldiers should immediately use the uber to dominate enemy infrastructure.

Truly, I hope that they do something like have weapons drop, but not have the combos work out too well. Such as, a medic picking up a heavy's gun but having to deal with serious kick-back and aiming issues.

Also, I would love to second, or third the notion that they round out and finish the Meet The Character videos. My non-gamer friends absolutely loved them, and the Engineer is fucking _classic_.

"Hey look buddy... I'm an Engineer. That means I solve problems. Not problems like, what is beauty..."

@Blocatan:
If they bring back grenades, i'm deleting my character, deleting my TF2 installation, grinding the harddrive to dust with an anglegrinder, and burning down the house that contained the computer.

And i'm only half kidding.

It's great that they're remaking badlands, but I'm afraid they're giving it the same treatment as well got.

@Waza:
Valve is really great with that. In fact, it seems like they just kind of drop tf2 updates on us, yet tf2 seemed so freaking balanced and finished from the get go. I don't think the medic is boring though (granted I play an engineer 90% of the time). You have to know how to use cover and remain inconspicuous, while at the same time keeping your guy from dying. I wouldn't mind the syringe gun getting a little more power, a little more range, or a little more ammo.

Grenades were the best part of TFC.

Play on a server that disables regular grenades and you can obviously see thats how the game was meant to be played.

Engineer EMP jumps or medic jumps were what separated skilled players from average joes. When a medic can concussion himself over the 2fort moat and land into the enemy battlements, that was when you know a person has skill.

I'd like to see a PS3 patch so the game actually works properly!

To the first poster, that isn't PC multiplayer, that's a retarded mix of Console and PC multiplayer. Console multiplayer is (taking Halo as an example) getting automatically joined up with little to no choice of who you are grouping with for a single round. PC multi is joining a server that you pick personally and staying on that server for multiple games/rounds/maps. With services like Steam you can join your friends or set it to autojoin once a spot opens (which can be a pain). Personally I hate that they use Halo3 matchmaking in games that also are released on PC. Was playing COD4 on my friend's 360 and could not stand how I had to reconnect every time the game ended.

Now as far as medics, I think they should add a damage over time to the needles, it's not like I would be shooting sterilized needles at an enemy if I was actually trying to kill them. I love the medic, as well as the soldier, but find that there are a lot of people that do not understand that you are supposed to kill people while ubered. You cannot cap points while ubered, so don't just stand there squeeze the trigger! If you have a good medic you should be able to run into a group of 5 or so guys and not even have to aim (but please do!)

I'm glad they are gonna change it up, there is not much an individual can do compared to counter strike for example, which is also a team game.

They removed the grenades to reduce spam, but at the same time gave the Soldier and Demo way too much rockets and grenades and can spam all the time, often without even needing to refill ammo, which kind of defeats the purpose.
Another thing is that as much as I like the concept of the Heavy, his minigun bullet spread is too big, so you don't really have to aim and quickly killing an opponent is more about luck, than anything else. It has to fire faster with lower damage and have smaller spread to reduce the luck factor. I also can't stand how slow he is, while the soldier is just a bit faster, he definitely feels better.
They could also increase the overall game speed/pace by 5-10%, it's a bit too slow, reducing walking distances would be also very good.

@OneLetter: They are working on making more of the "Meet the..." videos. If you stalk Yahtzee like I do, he mentioned that they showed him a clip of one when he visited Valve. [www.escapistmagazine.com]

@ERazER: The slowness makes sense to me, it evens things out a bit. And that's why you have engineers build teleporters.

@Blocatan: Oh lord, I hope not. Soldiers with grenades? They're already too powerful. Leave the demomen their pride.

Maybe they could release a "Make defending CPs easier for Infradead" patch? Eh, didn't think so.
Man, I sure suck at defending CPs.
Or maybe my *team* just happens to suck every single time... yeah, that's probably it.

@ERazER:
What? I thought the layout of the maps and such almost made teleporters useless. I mean it takes a few seconds to reach the spawn point of 2fort, to the sewers, versus how long it use to take to do it in TFC. And by the time the recharges done you could have made it to the other side of the tele by walking, even with a heavy. 2fort is just an example, but none of the maps feel like an excruciating walk.

As for the accuracy of the heavy, I find it to be generally accurate to a certain extent and proximity. It seems the spray develops at longer ranges, which makes sense, the heavys supposed to maul at close quarters. And the games emphasis on team means that individuals have to work with other individuals to gain the maximum objective, rather than just uber individuals rushing in their uber greatness of uberdom, uberness. UBer.

The only quirk I have with the game is the 20 second respawn. They should reduce it to 5-7. I mean 20 just feels like.."Do I really want to wait?..."..Sure there are servers with instant respawns but those soon become a spam fest of heavies and rockets.

In the end they made a great game, and all I can do is but welcome the updates they give out.

Although, Im still wondering about that whole "Commander Class" that , I think, Lombardi(?) mentioned in one of the reviews before the game was released. While I dont think the game needs a commander class, it wasn't a terribly bad idea. I assume that they scrapped the idea for the same reason though, that it just probably would not work.

@ERazER: TF2 is much more of a Team Based game then CS. They both have teams and allow you to shoot people but thats about as far as the similarities go. The thing i love and hate about TF2 is that extreme emphasis on team play. I love it when you can get a bunch of people together who know how to play and can work well together, but I hate it when your on a team full of players who just dont get it. TF2 is one of the only games ive played for a extended period of time where it doesnt matter how good you are, if your not helping your team you will more then likely loose.
As far as tweaking the medic goes i hope they give them a better weapon, but thats a double edged sword. Last thing we need is more medics running around trying to kill people when they should be healing.

TF2 lacks Deathmatch :(

Like Detre said, TF2 is far more a team game than most anything on the market today. This is fine for some people, but the folks who stick with a game for more than a couple months are the ones that want to be able to improve and learn new things.

If performance is tied almost exclusively to your teammates instead of your own abilities, many people won't be interested for long.

I'm really hoping this new change places a greater emphasis on individual skill than the game has now. I don't want to eliminate teamwork, but a good individual should be able to outperform two bad players that stick together.

That's how it was in TF/TFC and is one of the biggest reasons why TF2 is hemmoraging players. People want depth. Crits, zerg rushing, stalemates, and invulnerability aren't depth.

Robin Walker said: "We're really excited about where TF2 will be going over the next year."

Well if you keep on being so cheap on new content, it wont do much waves.

i LOVE the Doctor!

@CVV1:
because half the classes would be useless in deathmatch. it's a team game with goals. it's why players score points instead of kills.

@MHCJimQc: Give them a break, they spent a month or so resting up from the OB release, seeing their families, imprinting on their children for the first time etc.
If they can get out a major update like this (and a character bio) at least quarterly, I'm a happy guy.

What point is there to making new maps when people only vote for the same two maps EVERY round (dustbowl and 2fort)? New content and tweaks are great and all, but how 'bout some confirmation of a ps3 patch?

@Detre: FALL, said it very well, the thing is you don't have anything to improve upon and you can't really excel, because teamwork is all there is to it.

1) I hope they un-dumb down TF2, restoring it more to TFC-levels. Removing grenades turns the game into much more of a rock-paper-scissors contest than it was previously.

2) Bring back The Rock! Rock2! Rock2! Rock2!

Great. An update. It says it is undecided for the 360 and PS3 releases of TF2. D:D:D:D:

oh god. if they bring back grenades, i'm definitely moving on to something else. The demo essentially becomes useless if everyone can throw grenades. I only use stickies to defend.

I also hope that they dont have it so Medics are attacking people solo as they are a support class.

I have a bad feeling about this.

Bah. TF2 is a great multiplayer game. It's even better if you're at a LAN with people you know. It's just that kind of game.

It never feels unfair as well. Not for the noob that is me, at least. It has wonderful little details and it's extremely accessible.

Valve... are Gods. They'll build the city on the hill - and of course they will release DLC for it. For now they're just giving us some stuff, which is nice.

But why no custom maps for the 360 and the PS3? Sure, it doesn't affect me, but I just don't see why not. The maps included doesn't really grant longevity.

i wish they would make more gravelpit/dustbowl style cp maps. well and granary are pretty freakin awful. back and forth back and forth, stalemate, over time, engineers camping base for another 3 mins, zzzzzzz.

I can see how the medic could use a little tweaking, and I like playing as the medic, a lot. It can get a little tedious sometimes when you're just standing there shooting the healing beam not doing anything else. In say, Battlefield 2, while you could hold a medpack to slowly regenerate everyone around you, 90% of the time you'd be frantically throwing medpacks to the ground, or zapping dead people and then diving for cover, while fighting as an equally capable soldier. I'm not saying the Medic in TF2 needs to play like this, but at the very LEAST can they make it so you can click once and have your heal beam continuously fire instead of having to hold down the button? My index finger gets tired, damn.

if it weren't for the medic, i wouldn't have played this game anywhere near as much. the medic is such a refreshing change of pace from the usual, and iirc, this medic is a vast improvement over the original medic. didn't you used to drop medpacks for your teammates?

Finally.. that class is so OP'd.. One medic can keep an entire army alive.. Wanna heal, go play WoW.

Hope this dlc affects all platforms and no more ps3 ulove. Btw TF2 seems to run perfectly fine on PS3 its main HL2 and Portal that suck and even then most of it is cosmetic or maybe a little aggravating hiccup. It would be ioce for valve to give sony's console a little love with some dlc and updates to improve it. Oh Gabe why must you be such a hater?

How's this going to affect us PC Steam users?

@Wookiee1: I hope you're joking.