Team Fortress

Team Fortress
Developer(s)	Team Fortress Software
Designer(s)	Robin Walker John Cook and Ian Caughley
Engine	Quake engine
Platform(s)	Windows, Mac OS X
Release	August 24, 1996
Genre(s)	First-person shooter
Mode(s)	Multiplayer

Team Fortress is a team- and class-based online multiplayer video game mod based on id Software's Quake. Team Fortress was designed and written by Robin Walker, John Cook and Ian Caughley in 1996. The mod's gameplay has caught on with a large following of fans, which has spurred many developers to create similar gamemodes on other engines. In August 1999, after the development team was hired by Valve, Team Fortress was ported to Valve's Half-Life engine in the form of Team Fortress Classic. An official sequel developed by Valve Corporation was hinted at for many years, and was finally released in October of 2007 as Team Fortress 2.

Gameplay

The premise of the game is a class-based battle between 2-4 teams, Red, Blue, Yellow, and Green. Players are defined by which class they select (the classes being Medic, Sniper, Soldier, Demoman, Pyro, Spy, HeavyWeaponGuy, Scout, or Engineer), with each class having strengths and weaknesses. Each class also has unique weapons (e.g. Pyro has the flamethrower and Heavy has the minigun) and abilities (e.g. Scout being able to run the fastest and Medic being able to heal teammates).

A player can either choose to be on the red or on the blue team. On community maps or through the use of custom skins, players may also choose to be on a green or yellow team. The objectives of play can vary, including traditional objectives such as capture the flag or controlling a point(s) on the map. Another mode involves delivering a payload to the enemy's base while the other team defends, or have two teams race to deliver a payload.

On April 13, 1997 in Version 2.5 Beta A, Team Fortress introduced head-shots to the FPS genre.

Evolution

Team Fortress has evolved into an entire genre as fans of the original modification have created a multitude of slightly different versions for various games:

• MegaTF was a popular Team Fortress mod which featured new enhancements to each class like proximity mines, laser drones and airMirvs. In its prime, Mega-TF was played by thousands of players every day, and the original Quake engine version of the mod still has a strong following after eleven years (2000-2011). There is a MegaTF mod currently in development for the Amnesia server called "MegaTF United" being developed by XavioR and other Team Fortress modders.
• Team Fortress Classic was an extremely popular mod for Half-Life created in April 1999. There are still servers for and players of Team Fortress Classic today.
• A mod titled Quake 3 Fortress (Q3F) was developed for Quake III Arena in 2001. This mod was further developed into the Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory mod Enemy Territory Fortress, or ETF, in 2005; it had a notable initial following and many servers still operate where pickup gathers take place on a daily basis.
• NeoTF is a modification of Team Fortress Classic, originally created by BillDoor and further developed by Hitokiri_Battousai in 2001. NeoTF adds many new elements to the game that can turn it into a completely different experience. After Hitokiri_Battousai (HB) took over, he added many new features and created a larger fan-base than the original creator. There are still many servers hosting this once-famous modification.
• AdminOP is a modification of Team Fortress Classic, originally created by Drunken Fool in 2002. AdminOP adds many new elements to the game that can turn it into a completely different experience much like NeoTF. This later extended into a modification for Team Fortress 2 called SourceOP
• Unreal Fortress (abbreviated as UnF) existed for Unreal Tournament. Unf was heavily modified version of TF, with a strong emphasis on team rather than individual play. Thus scoring was not for flags retrieved but for individual class effort. Each class was renamed and heavily modified, like MegaTF classes had a wide range of capabilities, and were designed to help each other rather being a variation on the soldier class, for instance turrets could be upgraded by various classes.
• Unreal Fortress: Evolution first started out as UnF 2003 for Unreal Tournament 2003 but was made into a mod for Unreal Tournament 2004 when Epic released the newer version of the game. It has never left the beta stage.
• Enemy Territory Fortress, based on the revolutionary 'Quake III Fortress' as modification for the free Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory has maintained a considerable following ever since it was first released in 2005. Since, it has undergone several updates and it is played on a daily basis to this day. It distinguishes itself from the immensely popular TF2 by incorporating grenade usage and a more challenging learning curve. The last update is estimated to be released in the first quarter of 2011.
• Fortress Evolution for Quake III Arena was intended to create a very close replica of the original QWTF but was canceled and last released as an alpha build. It has recently returned as a standalone mod built upon Evolution Q3 but as a completely different project.
• Another evolution of TF is the multi-games mod Weapons Factory that has several considerable modifications to TF classes which results in different gameplay, resulting in many servers having to put limits on specialists (non-soldier classes).
• There is also a large Custom TF community presently active. Custom TF by Bill Kerney (aka Shaka[UVM]) has the normal classes of TF but also includes a "custom" option, where players have a set amount of money with which to buy weapons, armour and skills.
• Custom TF [1] AGR mode (offense vs defense) is Custom TF modifications still being developed and supported by community. AGR stands for "Attackers Go Red". It's an O vs D style mod for Quake1 Custom Team Fortress, where all the attacking players go Red, and all defending players go Blue. It's coded to increase action, improve gameplay, and enforce teamwork, thus creating a 'Clan Match' feel to games on public servers. Also AGR mode has many game impovements and modifications compared with original Custom TF. AGR online community still active.
• Fortress Forever is a mod for the Source engine heavily influenced by Team Fortress Classic.
• AvP2 Team Fortress is a mod that brings Team Fortress like gameplay and character classes to the Aliens versus Predator 2 game. The game modes are slightly different than Team Fortress Classic but they still rely heavily on teamwork. What's notable about this mod is that various classes are assigned to various species (i.e. the scout is an alien runner, predators act as spies and so on).
• Team Fortress 2 is a stand-alone multiplayer game created by the original designers who now work for Valve Software. The game has a cartoon-like look to it, and was designed to reflect the style of campy 1960's spy films. Team Fortress 2 was in development for more than nine years and has had many changes to it along the way.
• Quake 4 Fortress, a mod focused on the fast paced action of the original Team Fortress, first started as a mod for Doom 3, but because of lacking network support moved on to be developed for Quake 4. Q4F 1.5 was released but production ceased early because of the lack of a Quake 4 player community. Jeremy Raymond (aka photeknix) and Jared Cone (aka 3j) also focused on professional careers in the industry around the same time. Jeremy is a Designer at Certain Affinity and Jared is a Programmer at Psyonix Studios.
• Gang Garrison 2 is an open source demake of Team Fortress 2.
• The yet unreleased Korean game H.A.V.E. Online appears to be heavily influenced by Team Fortress 2.

External links

• Info and forum regarding Enemy Territory Fortress (ETF)
• The Citadel, one of the original Quake TF fan sites
• The Biscuit Board (MegaTF)
• CustomTF forums
• Original Intro Video
• Team Fortress Wiki - An official wiki for the series

News

• Enemy Territory Fortress (ETF)
• TF2 Official Blog
• PlanetFortress
• Team Fortress HeadQuarter's Template:Fr icon
• Teamfortress (pl) Template:Pl icon
• TFPortal (bilingual - English/German)
• Team-Fortress .ES Template:Es icon
• TeamFortressXtreme
• TeamFortress.se(swe) Template:Sv icon
• OnlineGamerTF(swe) Template:Sv icon

Software

• at archive.org
• Custom TF (server mod based on Team Fortress)
• Weapons Factory Arena (mod for Quake III Arena)
• Enemy Territory Fortress (mod for Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory)
• Team Elite (mod for Star Trek: Voyager: Elite Force)
• Fortress Forever (mod for Half-Life 2)
• AvP2 Team Fortress (mod for Aliens versus Predator 2)
• Quake 4 Fortress (mod for Quake 4)

History

• QWTF Archive (match history for QWTF)