Oh those crazy kids at Valve.

TF2 holiday cards are inexpensive, hilarious, and will touch the heart of the gamer on your list.

Something strange may happen today when you log into Team Fortress 2…

Quietly, and without fanfare, the guys at Valve started a promotion bundled with pre-orders of Left 4 Dead 2—you will receive a special hat if you own Team Fortress 2.  The promotion, attached to both Xbox 360 and PC, was announced yesterday.

The other interesting thing mentioned in this announcement is a subtle allusion to a tenth class in TF2. First hinted at in Left 4 Dead, it has slowly faded into the background as time has passed.

It is also worth mentioning that this is the first official cross-IP content in any Valve game. Valve’s tactics of subtlety and humor continue as Left 4 Dead 2 launch day approaches.

Dispenser-on-a-blimp

Either someone got their hands on some insider info, or this is an amazing fake reveal of  the first Engineer update.

Called “project 25″, or “The Mothership”, it’s basically a Dispenser taped to a blimp. While not releasing as much health and metal as a dispenser, it is mobile, and can be controlled by the Engie.

Be careful, though–if an enemy shoots it, it goes Kaboom.

They also show the community map CTF Mach 4.

At the bottom of the page is an allusion to day 2: Confidential.

The regular site at Teamfortress.com does not have the link to the Engineer update yet. As we get info, we’ll be sure to let you guys know.

Thanks to Shwaip for the find!

Update: Robin Walker emailed me to confirm that it is indeed fake. Of course, the “fake by sunwar” at the bottom cleanly answers that question as well.

The high-and-mighty Armchair Quarterbacks from the Steam forums are also having a field day, triumphantly declaring their superiority from their ivory towers and pointing out how obviously fake this is, and how I’m an idiot for posting/copypasting/being trolled.

The fake is so well done and so clever, that this is a newsworthy piece for several reasons, which I won’t bother to list. I will say this: One of my goals as Editor is to stimulate conversation, fun, and traffic. End of story? It worked.

Icrontian Quady the Turnip saw an opportunity; something that had never been done before. Like any good Icrontian, he moved when he was inspired.

When Valve posted a blog entry and a fake letter with the rubber stamped “This just got signed by SAXTON HALE”, Quady was moved; When a Reddit member offered $50 to the first person to deliver a rubber stamp that could duplicate such, Quady switched into high gear.

The result?

Saxton Hale stamp, designed by Quady the Turnip

To top off the lulz, Quady was going to send an email to Robin Walker, project lead for TF2. He started off the email with the subject, “I hope”

He jumped the gun a bit,  and accidentally hit send, with no body, and only the subject “I hope.”

He got a reply from Robin that said, simply:

“Me too.”

A motivated Icrontian can move mountains. Never let it be said otherwise.

Signed, Saxton Hale

The Team Fortress 2 dev team has been known to play mind games with their fans before, so you’re going to have to come up with your own interpretation of the following:

The latest entry on the Official TF2 blog hints at a “guard dog” update. Clicking through leads to a mysterious site on a non-Valve domain, 50webs.com. It looks like a new playable class called “Guard Dog”, and goes into great detail about abilities, weapons, and achievements, but the fake footer and this post on the Steam forums revealing it to be a very well done fake lead us to believe that it is a grand effort by a very talented hoaxster.

We could be wrong, of course. Valve could be making it look like a fake so that if they do drop the mysterious “10th class” hinted at in the past, we will all be thrilled at their clever games.

I’m still holding out for Engineer updates. Perhaps a twist on this post will reveal that the Guard Dog is actually part of the Engineer update; some of those Guard Dog weapons certainly look familiar…

Woof

One time, her and I were so close...

“I AM THE GOD QUEEN!,” I shouted gaily, my voice ringing across the green plains in front of me, echoing back to the mountains and beyond. I raised my hand in a fist, clenched triumphantly, claiming the land before me as my own, ready to explore all the hidden treasures it had to offer, when–

“Jackie, stop being ridiculous and heal the tank!,” my guild leader’s voice crackled from Ventrilo over my headset, pulling me back to the group. I quickly turned back towards our tank (another guild leader, no less) and popped off a few heals. One of our guild jokes was that I was the “God Queen of Norrath,” or as one guildie referred to me, “The Drag Queen of Norrath.” God Queen is actually where I got my current name from–the Gnome Queen. I used to sign onto the accounts of my friends occasionally and proclaim in guild chat that I had taken over their characters with my godly powers.

At that point in the game, which was Everquest 2, I was a 70 level character, and I had a great guild. I was a feisty little gnome druid, and as such, could find a group or raid whenever I wanted (healers were always in demand). I had decent gear, a large house in game, and I loved playing. That’s when I walked away from the game almost entirely… (more…)

Sorry guys. You lose.

Ha! I WIN!

According to the Team Fortress Blog, anybody who used an external app to “fake idle” on TF2 servers to gain item drops will have their ill-gotten goods taken away from them.

In addition to that, those who preferred to get their goods the right way (I’m not naming names me) will be awarded a special hat for being a good citizen.

THE GOOD GUYS WIN IN THE END! Take that Caffranampersandidiotslayer!

Maggots!

Today an astute TF2 fan happened to catch a slip-up on his phone’s RSS reader, and quickly grabbed a screenshot before Valve took the post back down. Seeing as how much we love you here at Icrontic, I took the liberty to turn it into text and OCR it so that it would be easier to read:

The blog post in its entirety (please forgive any errors introduced by the sketchy OCR process):

In response to various calls from our blog attentive audience, we’re happy to report that the next class to receive the update treatment will be the Soldier.

Playing such a damage-centric role, the Soldier has been extremely difficult to develop beyond the default offensive stance that we commonly see him occupying. As such, we decided we like to blur the line between attack/defence, hopefully causing even veteran players to rethink their conception of the class. Our primary goal when designing the update was both maintaining the balance of the class for newer players, while simultaneously rewarding those who experiment with more outlandish techniques. Thus, the update will focus heavily on the teamwork aspect that the Soldier is well equipped to explore, while introducing players to awide variety of roles that, although tough to master, will allow even the inexperienced to assist their team effectively.

Obviously, designing balanced unlockable weapons for such a potentially powerful class has been difficult, but we’re happy to say that what we have in mind should bring a whole new meaning to the term ‘Shock And Awe’.

As always,we’re looking closely at how we can improve performance across the board for our loyal players, so as a result, the forthcoming update will bring with it our largest collection of hotfixes, mechanic overhauls and engine optimizations to date. The combined effect of these fairly major changes to how you interact with both the game world and other users should help make playing Team Fortress 2 a safer, more accessible experience for everyone.

Finally, we’re extremely excited to announce not one, but two major introductions to the game. The first of these being the long-awaited launch of the Item Trading system, allowing you to put to use the myriad collection of weapons that you may have built up since the drop system was utilized with the Sniper/Spy update. Bundled with the Item Trading will also come a minor tweak to the rates at which random items are placed into the game. We’re keeping quiet about the changes for now, but we’re confident that when released, keeping hold of those 7 Kritzkriegs may not seem like such a bad idea after all.

The second revision, one that we hope will breathe new life into both the player and map-making communities, is our third new game mode to be introduced since release. King Of The Hill, a mode relying on a coordinated approach by both teams, will offer every class a chance to excel at one or more aspects of their gameplay, while raising awareness of their more unusual abilites. Of course,what game mode would be complete without several new maps to battle over? So we’re throwing in a few of those too.  Until then, dismissed!

As you can see, the update can be broken down as follows:

• New Soldier unlockables
• New Soldier achievements
• Item Trading
• Tweaks to random item drops
• King of the Hill game mode
• New maps
• “Fairly major” engine tweaks that increase performance and “safety”

Keep your eyes open; we’ll talk about the updates as we find out about them!

The ever-entertaining TF2 blog has been updated with a bit more info on the sniper update. Looks like the sniper will be getting a new gun with a shorter range as an unlockable!

In an effort to reduce some of the aggravation that other players feel towards the Sniper, we chose the goal of designing an unlockable that encouraged the Sniper to get a little closer to his target. We want him to give up some of his primary advantage in return for something else, so that enemies he kills feel like they were engaged with them, and feel like they could have survived if they’d just managed to fight a little better.

That’s all we know aside from the pee jar but as soon as we find out more, you’ll be the first to know.

As an added bonus, they linked to a sweet 2D side-scroller version of the game called Gang Garrison 2. Check it out when you’ve got a few minutes to spare. The site is cute in an 8bit sort of way, and if you’re brave why not try the download?

Yesterday, the Team Fortress 2 team announced the anticipated Force-A-Nature double-barreled shotgun will be the third item released in the upcoming Scout update. It’s powerful, sends enemies (an possibly you) flying through the air, and reloads very slowly.

Made in Portugal

What wasn’t anticipated Monday was the poll included in the update. Valve is letting players decide what order the items should be released in. Should players get the BONK! energy drink, the Force-A-Nature, or the Sandman first? Pick wisely, and vote soon. The Scout update should hit servers Thursday.

We love you guys.

Seriously, we do. 

If you are a member of the {IC} Steam group, you now have access to a private L4D server.

If you aren’t a member of the {IC} Steam group, what are you waiting for? Contact me or {IC} Keebler and we’ll get you an invite.

To get to us, make sure you select “Play on Steam Group Server” in the lobby, and our server will show up. It’s an 8 player box. Admins are {IC} Fatcat and {IC} TiberiusLazarus, as well as myself and {IC} Keebler.

This is not free. If you play, please help out. We use a system called Clanpay to support our TF2 and L4D servers. If everybody chipped in $5-$10 every couple of months, we’d be all set. Unfortunately, we have a few very generous members who carry the burden of the payments for the servers, and they are not the most prolific players on the servers, either. If you find yourself on an {IC} server (either TF2 OR Left 4 Dead) PLEASE consider chipping in some lunch money to keep it running for everyone and keeping the burden off of our sugardaddies.

Enjoy, IC!