Mar 23, 2011
Team Fortress 2 selling $100, $20, $7 hats for Japan aid
Team Fortress 2

Valve has just deployed a two-week sale on three unique Team Fortress 2 hats, the proceeds of which will go entirely to the American Red Cross fund. Respectfully, we feel obligated to give this promotion a plug: we know your hunger for conspicuous hat consumption, PC gamers, and any transaction that helps relieve the immense toll of this disaster benefits us all. Click within for a peek at the headgear.



"They are tricking compulsive hat-buyers into being good people," declares Dan Stapleton, Reviews Editor for PC Gamer. Valve reminds us that donating directly is always an option.
Mar 23, 2011
If We Could Be Serious For a Moment...
Team Fortress 2 - SZ
Here at Valve, we've always been consistently blown away by the creativity and generosity of the TF2 community -- through art contests, map making, item creating, or any one of the hundreds of other ways that you manage to impress us every day.

<img src="http://www.teamfortress.com/images/posts/japan_relief_aid.png" width="420" height="292" border="0">

Today, we'd like to offer a chance to help out at a time when that help matters most. To support the relief efforts currently underway in Japan, we're introducing three limited edition hats and two special noisemakers to the Mann Co. store. The "Humanitarian's Hachimaki" ($7.99), the "Benefactor's Kanmuri" ($19.99) and the most prestigious "Magnanimous Monarch" ($99.99) will be available from now through April 6. <i><strong>All proceeds</strong></i> (net of applicable taxes) will go directly towards the Japanese disaster relief fund that the American Red Cross has set up. The hats can be equipped by all classes; however, they cannot be traded or used for crafting.

After April 6, none of these items will be available in any form. We encourage you to spend as much as you are comfortable with contributing to this good cause. While your Mann Co. store purchases cannot be written off as tax deductions, those who would prefer to donate directly to the American Red Cross fund can do so at their <a href="https://american.redcross.org/site/Donation2?5052.donation=form1&df_id=5052&idb=0">website</a>.

Thanks.
Mar 23, 2011
If We Could Be Serious For a Moment...
Team Fortress 2 - SZ
Here at Valve, we've always been consistently blown away by the creativity and generosity of the TF2 community -- through art contests, map making, item creating, or any one of the hundreds of other ways that you manage to impress us every day.



Today, we'd like to offer a chance to help out at a time when that help matters most. To support the relief efforts currently underway in Japan, we're introducing three limited edition hats and two special noisemakers to the Mann Co. store. The "Humanitarian's Hachimaki" ($7.99), the "Benefactor's Kanmuri" ($19.99) and the most prestigious "Magnanimous Monarch" ($99.99) will be available from now through April 6. All proceeds (net of applicable taxes) will go directly towards the Japanese disaster relief fund that the American Red Cross has set up. The hats can be equipped by all classes; however, they cannot be traded or used for crafting.

After April 6, none of these items will be available in any form. We encourage you to spend as much as you are comfortable with contributing to this good cause. While your Mann Co. store purchases cannot be written off as tax deductions, those who would prefer to donate directly to the American Red Cross fund can do so at their website.

Thanks.
Mar 23, 2011
Team Fortress 2 Update Released
Team Fortress 2 - Valve
Updates to Team Fortress 2 have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:

Team Fortress 2
Mar 23, 2011
If We Could Be Serious For a Moment...
Team Fortress 2
Here at Valve, we've always been consistently blown away by the creativity and generosity of the TF2 community -- through art contests, map making, item creating, or any one of the hundreds of other ways that you manage to impress us every day.



Today, we'd like to offer a chance to help out at a time when that help matters most. To support the relief efforts currently underway in Japan, we're introducing three limited edition hats and two special noisemakers to the Mann Co. store. The "Humanitarian's Hachimaki" ($7.99), the "Benefactor's Kanmuri" ($19.99) and the most prestigious "Magnanimous Monarch" ($99.99) will be available from now through April 6. All proceeds (net of applicable taxes) will go directly towards the Japanese disaster relief fund that the American Red Cross has set up. The hats can be equipped by all classes; however, they cannot be traded or used for crafting.
Mar 23, 2011
Left 4 Dead Cold Stream DLC enters beta
Left 4 Dead 2


Left 4 Dead 2's forthcoming Cold Stream DLC expansion is open for PC and Mac beta testing now, publisher Valve has announced.


Next time you boot the game up you should notice the new addition to the campaign list. Valve wants you to take a look and then offer feedback and bug reports via the add-on's official forum. The finale in particular demands your attention as that is set to "change massively" following the beta.


First announced last month, Cold Stream started life as a community campaign created by modder Matthew Lourdelet. It caught the eye of the folks at Valve who then decided to jump in, buff it up and give it a full release.


"Matthew has been hard at work on the map and the initial release looks a little more polished than you may have expected," read a post on the Left 4 Dead Blog.


"The reason for that is the difference between how we work on a campaign compared to modders. When we work on a campaign, we normally work in a rougher state without textures for a long period. Level design artists come in later and give the game its finished look with textures.


"Modders often texture early as they have to create the structures based on the available artwork. They don't have a team of artists coming in after them. So don't let the level of texturing fool you. The campaign is still in flux."


There's no console beta planned but, as previously announced, the finished campaign will be released for Xbox 360 along with the three remaining Left 4 Dead 1 missions. No official date has been set, but it's not expected until after Portal 2 ships.

Mar 23, 2011
Left 4 Dead 2 Cold Stream map now in beta
Left 4 Dead 2

If you boot up Left 4 Dead 2 today you'll notice a new addition to the campaign list. The modder made map, Cold Stream, has been added to the line-up as a beta campaign. It looks a lot more polished than you might expect from a beta map, but Valve expect players to find a few bugs. To help people report problems, they've extended the in-game bug reporting feature, and asked that fans post feedback on the Cold Stream Steam forums. For more information, check out the Left 4 Dead 2 blog.
Mar 23, 2011
It's Spyday, Spyday, Gotta Murder On Spyday
Team Fortress 2

When Team Fortress 2's mother-lovin' Spy meets teen pop anti-sensation Rebecca Black, nobody wins.


I wouldn't know about Rebecca Black's horrid pop song Friday if not for the lovely folks that frequent our Speak-Up forum, so this one goes out to them. A long-distance strangulation dedication for the ones that brought the whole affair to my attention in the first place.


Top Tier Tactics could have done with a little more autotune for this Team Fortress 2-based parody, but it gets its point across, multiple times. In the back.


Thanks to Dr. Tran for sending this vid our way. Now if you'll excuse me, I've gotta have my bowl; gotta have cereal.


Mar 22, 2011
Steam Updates: New L4D2, & SILK Voicechat
Left 4 Dead 2 - contact@rockpapershotgun.com (John Walker)

If you were to restart your Steam account, you’d notice that your copy of Left 4 Dead 2 would start updating. This is to add in the beta for a new campaign, Cold Stream. It has a few bugs, but that’s why God gave us betas. Wow, that’s such a succinct news story I need to add another.

If you were to restart your Steam account, you’d notice that it would have updated to change its voice chat technology. As anyone who’s ever used Steam Voice will know, it wasn’t exactly as good as it could have been. It’s now been replaced with SILK, an audio codec developed by the Skype peeps, with what I like to call a “dynamic bit rate protocol”, meaning it can vary its bandwidth up to 30kbps (twice as much as Steam Voice would use.) Valve adds that the voice chat connectivity and reliability has also been improved, which is mighty fine news as we were increasingly finding ourselves opting for using non-Steam chat when playing together. Isn’t that all smashing?

Mar 22, 2011
Cold Stream Beta Release
Left 4 Dead 2 - the gish
Today we are releasing the beta version of Cold Stream. Since we announced it, Matthew has been hard at work on the map and the initial release looks a little more polished than you may have expected.

The reason for that is the difference between how we work on a campaign compared to modders. When we work on a campaign, we normally work in a rougher state without textures for a long period. Level design artists come in later and give the game its finished look with textures.

Modders often texture early as they have to create the structures based on the available artwork. They don’t have a team of artists coming in after them. So don’t let the level of texturing fool you. The campaign is still in flux.

We have activated the in-game bug reporter for L4D2. You can currently submit bugs on Valve maps including Cold Stream. This system will eventually be extended to work with community campaigns.

So how can you help and give feedback on Cold Stream?

If you see a bug report it. There are sure to be nav-mesh bugs, navigational issues, hit box problems, missing zombie ladders, art problems, etc. Remember it's a beta.

For suggestions and feedback, first play the campaign and then post in the <a href="http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=1088">Cold Stream forum</a>. The finale is one place in particular that we think is going to change pretty massively but please post all your feedback.

If you want to follow the development on Cold Stream, make sure to subscribe to our <a href='http://twitter.com/#!/l4ddev'>Twitter account</a>.

Reminders:

The beta is for PC/Mac only. The 360 version will be included in the full DLC.

Cold Stream is part of an upcoming DLC for L4D2. No release date or pricing has been announced.

Cold Stream does not replace featured campaigns, they will resume next month.

Campaign Release Notes:
If you have a problem with a spawn room, vote to restart that chapter.
Everyone needs to be by the radio headset to start the finale map.
There are bugs, this is a work in progress.

Have fun.
...