VanillaTF2

Leftism — Although not TF2 related, this issue will affect everyone that will read this site. On November 6th, the Steams User Forums (SPUF) were defaced. Valve originally closed down the forums for unclear “maintenance” issues. The company later learned that the intrusion went much further than just the Steam forums alone as the investigation has revealed the intruders gained access to a number of other pieces of information relating to databases of the Steam client service. A full statement from Gabe Newell can be found after the jump.

It is stressed, however, that private information such as passwords and payment details are stored behind both encryption as well as passwords being hashed and salted – go and wiki/google/<insert preferred search method here> it if you don’t know what that means, I’m no computer security expert by any means. The investigation into Sunday night’s intrusion is still ongoing however there has been no evidence yet that any sensitive information has been cracked. Although account password changes are not being enforced at this moment in time, it is being advised by Valve as “not a bad idea”.

Team Fortress 2 has just received an update. Now, before you go “Oh god, what did they do now?”, the latest update is actually a community map pack. The 233MB update adds three new maps; PLR_Nightfall, PL_Frontier and KOTH_Lakeside. The update also fixes a server exploit in the Source engine itself. The map pack update has it’s own dedicated page, you can check it out here.

We’ve been listening to our community’s famished cries for content, and damn it, we decided to do something about it. Unfortunately, the button that bans everybody in the community at once doesn’t seem to be working (every time we press it we just get sparks and the smell of burnt fur). So we went with our tried-and-true Plan B: an all-new map pack, featuring some community favorites including a new map from the guy behind cp_mountainlab, the winner of TF2Maps.net‘s Art Pass Contest.

- a.

Ah, the ever generous Valve, churning out content update and fixes like there’s no tomorrow! Well pre-pubescent boys and fat girls in their mid 20s, Valve has released a special Halloween update for Team Fortress 2 — including two custom maps and goody Halloween-exclusive stuff! Put that razor blade away and read on, here are the interesting changes:

• Added TF2Maps.net Art-pass contest winners:

1. Mountain Lab
2. Mann Manor

• Significantly improved engine vertex compression (large reduction in per-model memory usage)

Halloween 2010 Event -

• Mann Manor is haunted by the Horseless Headless Horsemann.
• Random gift drop in Mann Manor.
• 4 new Halloween achievements.
• Added new Halloween hats.
• Added a new Halloween weapon.
• Added Gift Wrapping of gifts to the store.
• Added a health penalty to the Rocket Jumper.
• Added the Sticky Jumper for Demomen to practice jumping.

CP_Coldfront also gets a slight facelift with some tweaks from the creator, Icarus.

A complete changelog can be read here. As always, launch Steam to acquire the update.

- Abhorrence

This might be old news for some, but the UI is said to be ready for release. A lot of you have already tried the beta version

Source: Steam news, with info about what’s new here

As with anything steam related, this might impact the game, so be careful about scheduling too many officials on Monday.
The steam for Apple was said to be released this month too, but there are no news on that promise being held.