Valve at this point in time has no evidence that the intruders were able to crack or access credit card numbers or user passwords.

The forums have been taken offline for the time being until the investigation ends. Forum users will be asked to change their password the next time they log into the forums once they are accessible again.

Steam accounts do not seem to be affected according to Valve as forum accounts and Steam accounts are not identical.

Users who have a Steam forum account should do the following:

• Change Steam account and other passwords if it is the same as the forum account password.
• Monitor their Credit Card statements if they have ever paid by Credit Card on Steam.
• Be aware of the possibility of targeted phishing attacks, e.g. disguising as Valve.

It is unlikely that attackers will be able to decrypt the credit card information or passwords. What they may do however is to run a dictionary of the top 1000 passwords against all user accounts to get full access to those accounts. Users who have used weak passwords for their Steam forum account need to change the password as soon as the forums come back up. They also need to make 100% sure that the password is not used for any other services, e.g. their email address or social networking sites. It is recommended to change the password on those sites and services right away to avoid further damage.

Recently Valve turned Team Fortress 2, which never cost more than $19.99 by the way, into a free to play game. Users who sign up can play the game for as long as they want, and if they make a purchase in the store get an upgrade to the full version of the game that gives them a larger backpack among other things. So, for less than $1 you get the full game which is an unbelievable price if you ask me.

Team Fortress 2 is a team-based shooter. Each player takes command of a class in the game which all have their specific purposes in the game (well almost). The Soldier and Heavy for instance usually are at the center of the battlefield, supported by Medics. Then you got an Engineer who can build defense turrets and so called dispensers to replenish health for teammates and teleporters to bring them quickly to the Battlefield. The spy can sap the engineers buildings and backstab anyone. Then you got the Pyro, which I believe is often played by gamers who only use the keys W for forward and left mouse button for fire.

The two remaining classes are the Demoman which is probably the best character in the game damage wise and the Sniper, which in my opinion is completely useless.

Valve has added maps and game modes to the game every since it was released. You get the standard capture the flag maps, so called capture point maps where both teams compete to win all capture points on the map, payload maps where one team has to move a bomb to the destination and others.

New players should start with easy to play classes like the Soldier or Engineer and move from there to more complex classes like the Spy or Demoman. Game wise I would suggest to start with CP type of maps as they are usually well balanced.

Part of the game are items that you find on a regular basis. You can find new class weapons which often act differently but are not inherently more powerful than the standard weapon. There are some exceptions though. Regardless, you will find items regularly. Each character has three weapon / equipment slots, a hat slot and two misc slots.

Let me give you an example. The Medic, the character who can heal team mates by firing the medic gun at them builds up a so called Ubercharge with the weapon whenever it is used. When it reaches 100% it can be used to make the medic and the team mate who is healed invulnerable for some time. You cannot capture or steal the flag in this time, but you can be sure that the other team is running. That is, unless they have clever players or a charge of their own.

The Medic can find a gun called the Kritzkrieg, which as the name implies swaps invulnerability for criticals. Your team mate fires crits with every shoot in that time.

I won’t get into trading or crafting that much. You can trade items with other players and craft items that you really want if you got the right ingredients.

Here is a short video demonstrating Simon’s inability to play the game :) [Simon is one of the guys from Yogscast]

Almost everything has been done the right way by Valve. The game is fun to play, it has a great server browser, you can enter and leave games in no time, and maps and classes for the most part are well balanced. It is also pretty easy to ignore the “commercial” aspects of the game. Yes, you can beat anyone with the basic weapons. If there is one thing to criticize it is the lack of proper capture the flag maps. You got some good ones like Doublecross or CP-maps that have been turned into CTF maps like Well, but the game lacks one that brings more gamers to that mode of play.

You need Steam to get Team Fortress 2. You can download Steam from the official website. Once you have installed steam open the Store in the interface and search for Team Fortress 2. Click on the first hit and then on Install this game to install it.

And if you are new to the game, you might want to take a look at this comic here which gives you a good understanding of what you will experience the first time playing the game.

Back in 2007 I published some Team Fortress 2 tips which can still help you in the game. Some functionality may have changed though in the meantime.

Have you played Team Fortress 2? If so, what are your thoughts?

This meant that you had to keep Origin, the distribution platform running in the background, the web browser to select a game and the game itself. Changing servers meant to close down the game, select a new match and server in the web browser to start the game anew.

While I have not tried the system yet, I’d say that it is less practicable than a built-in functional server browser (to be honest, not a single server browser of a Battlefield game was that, but that’s another story).

Back in the good old games of gaming, I would have probably bought the game anyway. Today, I want to make a stand against all the “features” that hurt legit customers. That’s one of the reasons why I did not buy From Dust, even though I would really like to play the game. I also skipped the Modern Warfare series ever since its developers started to drop dedicated server support.

It now came to light that Origin, EA’s new online distribution system (not to mix up with the classic game developer that EA bought and killed), adds another issue that could convince some gamers not to use that system. Users who sign up need to accept the EULA which gives EA massive rights to collect, use, save and transfer user data. It reads under (2):

You agree that EA may collect, use, store and transmit technical and related information that identifies your computer (including the Internet Protocol Address), operating system, Application usage (including but not limited to successful installation and/or removal), software, software usage and peripheral hardware, that may be gathered periodically to facilitate the provision of software updates, dynamically served content, product support and other services to you, including online services. EA may also use this information combined with personal information for marketing purposes and to improve our products and services. We may also share that data with our third party service providers in a form that does not personally identify you. IF YOU DO NOT WANT EA TO COLLECT, USE, STORE, TRANSMIT OR DISPLAY THE DATA DESCRIBED IN THIS SECTION, PLEASE DO NOT INSTALL OR USE THE APPLICATION.

Gamers either have to accept that EA may collect, use, store and transmit data like their computer’s IP address, software, application usage and hardware, or they may not install or use the application.

EA may furthermore transfer the data in anonymized form to third party companies. Rock Paper Shotgun puts it this way:

And then even more creepily, they say they intend to take such information, combine it with personal information about you, and use it to advertise directly to you. However, when selling on this free-for-all on your computer’s contents, they’ll at least remove personally identifying information. Gosh, thanks.

The site furthermore compares EA’s clause with a comparable Steam clause and comes to the conclusion that Valve’s “policy is self-restricted to anything on your PC directly relating to its own products” while EA’s is “so broad that it gives the publisher permission to scan your entire hard drive, and report back absolutely anything you may have installed, and indeed when you may use it, and then pass that information on the third parties”.

If I would not already have canceled Battlefield 3, I would now.

The game has been developed by Valve, the company behind Half Life and Portal. Unlike those games, Team Fortress 2 was always offered for a bargain price. The retail price has been set to about 20 Dollars or Euros, with promotions dropping that price to less than 10 bucks for a game that entertained many for hundreds of hours.

Another thing that makes the game special is the humor, which you come in contact with not only while playing, but also in the excellent “Meet The” videos that introduce all available Team Fortress 2 classes.

When you open the Steam Store you are directly greeted with the Team Fortress 2 Free To Play announcement. If you have not purchased the game, you can now download and play it for free. The official Team Fortress 2 blog confirms the move to a free to play model.

There are however differences between free and premium members. A premium member is someone who purchased the game in the past. Here are the most important differences:

• Backpack: 50 slots 300 slots (expandable up to 1000)
• Items: Standard Standard, Rare and Cosmetic
• Crafting: Limited blueprints All blueprints
• Trading: Receive items only Full trading
• Gifting: Can receive gifts Can give and receive gifts

Those limitations are all item based, which are not needed to play the game. The backpack limitation could become a problem when items begin to fill it, but everything else is just not as relevant for playing the game. More important than that, “all game modes, classes, and maps are available”. Free players can turn their free account into a premium one by making a single purchase in the inbuilt game store. Players can buy weapons, items and other stuff in that store. The cheapest item cost well below a Dollar / Euro in the store, but you need to transfer at least 5 Dollars, Euro to your Steam Wallet as this seems to be the minimum amount. They can still buy an item for less than that, but will have leftover money then in their account.

To celebrate the free to play release of the game, the developers have created the long awaited “meet the medic” video. It is a bit stereotyping Germans, but who gives a xxxx.

So what are you waiting for? One of the greatest multiplayer games of all time, now free. You need Steam to download the game, should you not have it. If you have Steam, visit the Store and click on the Team Fortress 2 announcement there or search for the game in the store. The download links should appear there right away.

As far as backup is concerned, there are differences between first party games created by Valve and third party games that are distributed via Steam.

You can backup any game on Steam by right-clicking on the game in the Steam library and selecting backup game files from the context menu.

Please note that you can only backup games that are currently installed. Games that you own but are not installed will not be available for backup.

Steam displays a backup and restore games window where additional installed games can be added to the backup. Once you have selected all games, you have to select a location for the backups. Steam displays the space requirements and available disk space here. Make sure there is enough backup space on the drive.

Steam offers to split the file size of the backup so that it can be stored on CDs or DVDs. It is also possible to select a custom maximum file size, good for users who want to burn the data on Blu-Ray or move it to other storage devices with space restrictions.

Steam will then show a backup progress bar. It is possible to open the folder that contains the backup in the end.

To restore game files, you need to select Backup and Restore games from the Steam menu at the top. Select Restore a previous backup there and select the location on the computer that contains the backups.

Please note that backups will not include save games. For Valve games, custom multiplayer maps and configuration files will also not be included in the backup. You need to create manual copies of those files. You find Valve custom game contents in the following locations:

\Steam\SteamApps\\\\ :

The following folders contain custom game contents:

• /cfg/ – Custom configurations and configuration scripts
• /downloads/ – Custom content for multiplayer games
• /maps/ – Custom maps which have been installed or downloaded during multiplayer games
• /materials/ – Custom textures and skins
• /SAVE/ – Single-player saved games

An official thread on the Steam forum highlights save locations for third party games.

User IDs
[USERNAME] — The name of the Windows account you use on your computer
[STEAMNAME] — The name of your Steam account
[STEAMID] — A numerical identifier for your Steam account

Steam-specific locations
[STEAMPATH] — The default location where Steam is installed
Windows 32-bit: C:\Program Files\Steam\
Windows 64-bit: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\

[STEAMAPPS] — The default location for Steam Games
All versions: [STEAMPATH]\steamapps\

[STEAMCLOUD] — Files that synchronize with the Steam Cloud
All versions: [STEAMPATH]\userdata\[STEAMID]\

General Windows locations
[DOCUMENTS] — The default location for the “My Documents” shell folder/library
Windows XP: C:\Documents and Settings\[USERNAME]\My Documents\
Windows Vista: C:\Users\[USERNAME]\Documents\

[APPDATA] — The default location for standard application settings
Windows XP: C:\Documents and Settings\[USERNAME]\Application Data\
Windows Vista: C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Roaming\

[LOCAL] — The default location for system-specific application settings
Windows XP: C:\Documents and Settings\[USERNAME]\Local Settings\
Windows Vista: C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\

[PUBLICDATA] — The default location for cross-user application settings
Windows XP: C:\Documents and settings\All Users\Application Data\
Windows Vista: C:\ProgramData\

[PUBLIC] — The default location for cross-user system settings
Windows XP: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\
Windows Vista: C:\Users\Public\

[SAVEDGAMES] — The Windows Vista default Saved Games folder
Windows Vista: C:\Users\[DOCUMENTS]\Saved Games\

You can also take a look at the official support Knowledgebase article that contains further information about backing up and restoring Steam games.

One of the most annoying problems of Steam, is the inability to select custom installation folders for Steam games. All games that are downloaded and installed via Steam are installed in the same folder on the same hard drive.

This can be problematic, as even the biggest hard drives eventually run out of space. Many Steam users help themselves by uninstalling games to free up space on their hard drive, before installing new ones on the system.

Moving Steam to a different hard drive can be another effective option, especially if the other hard drive offers more space than the old one.

Steam itself offers no direct option to move the steam folder to another hard drive. It is however possible to do just that with some manual work. The same workaround can also be used to move Steam to another computer.

Lets assume that the Steam folder is currently located on drive c:, which does not have enough space anymore to store all the Steam games. Drive e: is a new hard drive with lots of free space.

To move Steam from c: to e: perform the following five steps:

• Close Steam, make sure the client is completely closed.
• Locate the SteamApps folder on the c: drive, it is located in Steam > Steamapps, usually in Program Files or Program Files (x86).
• Move the entire folder from drive c: to e: root
• Uninstall Steam completely after the games and files have been moved to the new drive.
• Reboot your computer once
• Install Steam again, this time on drive e:
• Move the Steamapps folder into Steam folder.
• Start Steam. The client will automatically recognize the games in the Steamapps folder and make them available again.

That’s how the Steam folder is moved to another drive or computer. Let me know if you are interested in a tutorial on how to move individual Steam games to another drive.

The default value is 0 which seems to reduce the sharpness of the textures somehow. Changing that to the value -0.9 which is the lowest value that you can choose without being kicked from servers that are protected against cheating is effecting the graphic quality of the game tremendously.

If you have troubles opening the console try the following: Right-click on Team Fortress 2 in Steam and select properties. Add -console to the launch options. This opens the console by default and will bring it back whenever you hit escape in the game to see the menu.

Take a look at some of the before after screenshots to see what I mean:

I got an 10% discount of the $49.95 retail price in October and was able to download Team Fortress 2 right away. This had another advantage: The rush on this game will be immense and it can very well be that the Steam servers will have bandwidth troubles in the first days of the release.

The other included games, Half-life Episode 2 and Portals have not been released as of now and have to be downloaded once the Orange Box comes out on October 10th.

I say that it is worth it. You pay less, get to play it early and can pwn all your friends once they get the game on October 10th.

The game has a size of only about 6 megabytes, should download fast. There are even additional maps that you can install for a greater variety.

You buy weapons, ammunition and grenades at the start of every round like in the real game. After that you head out to complete your objective which could mean you would have to plant a bomb (terrorists) or rescue hostages (anti-terror). The game is fast paced and lots of fun, especially when you join the internet servers to play against other human players. You will get some beatings at the beginning until you get the hang of the game. Great game.