Team Fortress 2 Classic News

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It’s time once again for what we hope to be a monthly status report on the progress of the Steam release - and we are characteristically one week late. Except this time, it's for a very good reason. [/p][p][/p][h3]Today, July 4th, 2025, marks the 5th anniversary of our mod’s official launch with the Death & Taxes update![/h3][p]
It's been a long ride, and it's only up from here. I’d like to thank not only all the devs working on the port, but also all the game designers and artists who’ve come before us. They've paved the path as much as we have trailed it.

Since our last update in May:

Beta testing is in full swing, and the first full matches of the port are being played. With this comes a wave of bug reports, unexpected issues, missing details, and the occasional (common) crash.. we’re digging through our growing backlog to address these.

Networking, dedicated server support, automatic crash reporting, and reintegration of key features are a major focus. These are core systems that need to be nailed down before we can ensure the game feels just right. It's not as flashy as ported content, but this work ensures the mod has a solid foundation so we can reach the quality our players are expecting.

But we've also had some new changes in our back pocket. Some of you may remember a tease I dropped in the TF2C Discord shortly before the SDK was announced...

The "Lucksman" is officially gone.
Huntsman arrows will no longer snap to the nearest hitbox to trigger a headshot. Instead, on hitting the bounding box, the arrow sends out 9 directional checks (like a shotgun blast). Its straight forward and consistent: if the head is close enough, it’s a headshot. If not, it’s a miss. Here is an early demonstration, remember everything is subject to change as we continue to test and iterate. [/p][previewyoutube][/previewyoutube][p]A similar rework is also coming to the Anti-Aircraft Cannon, and other weapons will get quality of life changes as well. [/p][p] [/p][h3]Finally, we are proud to announce that we have reached 200,000 wishlists on Steam![/h3][p]
This is more people than we could have dreamt of. We still have a long road ahead. UI and 4-Team HUD remain major hurdles, a long backlog of QoL features and small details still needs attention, but we’re committed to monthly updates from here on out - with teasers, progress reports, and milestone highlights all leading up to launch.

You’ve all been with us through thick and thin, it’s the least we can do to keep you in the loop.

Happy 4th of July![/p][p][/p][p] ~ Nito[/p]

Hello! We have been fairly silent for the past three months and wanted to give you all an update on where we’re at, and the status of the project as a whole. We have been very busy porting the game to the new SDK and haven't had much time to reach out to the wider community who play our game day-to-day. So, here's the run-down of what's going on:

When we began the process of porting TF2C to the SDK, we quickly realized it would be a massive undertaking. We are trying to take our copy of TF2 with its 10 years of changes, and merge it into Valve’s copy of TF2 with its 15 years of changes. If we simply copy and paste our code into Valve’s code, things break. Lots of features depend on missing functions, or are incompatible with code Valve rewrote. In short, we are effectively remaking everything from the ground up, which takes a lot of time and testing.

We had also been dealing with manpower issues for this colossal task. While our website lists a lot of programmers, this is somewhat misleading; we do not kick out developers for being inactive. While it looks like we have over a dozen programmers, the total we had available for the port was… 3. We since have massively increased that count to about 8 which allows us to give this remake the care it deserves.

As of right now, our internal build is in a somewhat functional state. VIP and 4Team are mostly working, 18 of our 22 original weapons exist in some form, the item schema works properly for custom weapons support, and many lighting and visual improvements are trickling in. This may sound close to complete, but most of the game is missing visual flair and QA passes, and there is still a long way to go. However, we have reached a state where we can resume internal beta testing, and the beta is being set up as we speak.

We deeply appreciate the patience the community has with us, and we hope to be more interactive with the community in the future. Part of that is getting a better sense of what you want out of this project, and what is most effective at rekindling that feeling of early TF2. To help with that, we are hoping to send out many more surveys in the future, not just for what works in gameplay terms, but for what strikes that core experience we’re trying to evoke. The first of these, a survey on which of our weapons feel the most “classic” to you, will be out next week.

~ Nito

"Steam" is a mysterious resource created when coal is burned in certain situations — a harrowing thought to coal-lovers like the Civilian, to whom burning coal is like setting one's own children on fire. But maybe a foray into the Steam industry is just what the company needs to capture new eyes.

While porting efforts are underway, you can wishlist the game right now!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3545060/Team_Fortress_2_Classic/?utm_source=steam&utm_campaign=prerelease