Team Fortress 2 Review (RevilleAJ)
Team Fortress 2 is one of my favorite games and hat simulators of all time. It's not really much of a secret, given how many hours I've gotten in it plus the fact I've been playing it for over 10 years (although it was a while before I had a computer that could run it very well). It is more than just a game; it is a whole experience.
The gameplay is very addictive. The gunplay and counters feel just right, and no two classes play the same (which can't be said for some modern hero shooters). Team Fortress 2 showed that you only needed 9 classes maximum, instead of 20 or so. There are crates and microtransactions sure, but they aren't exactly forced upon you; you can simply get free item drops by just playing the game on servers (at least if they are secure VAC-enabled ones). A lot of the maps are very memorable; 2Fort, Dustbowl, Badwater etc. and a dozen of community created maps that would be too much to list here. Even with (non-cheating) singleplayer bots, the game is still very fun.
Personality and style wise, TF2 had the best a shooter game could ever have. The classes are all fun to witness, and even 17 years later they still feel irreplaceable, with perfect voice acting and beyond memorable and hilarious dialog. It's not like some other games where they are just generic, too. Each class was designed with shapes and silhouettes in mind, creating easily identifiable looks (i.e. if someone is outlined behind a wall, you could tell which class it is even from afar). The art-style of the game, inspired by J.C. Leyendecker, really made it timeless, and it still looks good to this day; an incredible feat for a game from 2007, a time when most games went for a muddy realistic look (a large portion of which haven't aged well visually). TF2 went for a heavily researched mixture of being cartoony and grounded, and it worked very, VERY well. It's not like some modern cartoony shooters that don't have reason behind the style, because this one does. There is also a story that is not forced upon you, being told through item descriptions, map objects, comics and shorts. It is wacky and adds a lot more to the game's world.
Now sure, the game has had its rough times. The Meet Your Match update was an attempt at making TF2 appeal to the e-sports scene, when really it was a game that you could pick up and just... play (hence why Quickplay was a thing). There was (currently remedied) also the botting crisis that lead to all sorts of different things (drama, campaigns, review bombings etc.). None of these affect my opinion on the game itself, however. You don't HAVE to play on Casual and Competitive; you can make your own server or join community ones. I only have minor criticisms with some weapon balancing decisions and bugs, but they aren't enough to lower my thoughts on the game. I do also wish that the classes had more unique lines for interacting with each other, rather than them being stuck to domination lines (think Left 4 Dead 2 or even Overwatch, where characters would refer to each other by name and talk if nearby).
I feel this review was long, long overdue (10 years overdue, even). I never really made serious reviews until now, but I figured I'd finally do so. Team Fortress 2 is not only one of the most important shooters, but also one of the most important games alone to me. It's a game that will never die to me, because even if the official servers shut off, you can still host your own and get others to join or play with singleplayer bots. Even playing with stock weapons is still fun. I'll probably still be playing in a decade or more from now. It just never gets old, even 17 years later.