Browsing through Kotaku today, I ran across this interview with Dylan Loney and his TF2 scripted map.  If you have played Canabalt, (try it, it is great fun) then you probably will be familar with the side scroller runner genre.  Mr. Loney's TF2 map is a side scrolling runner where you can switch classes (!) to solve obstacles.

"Technically, it's a map," Loney says, "because it runs straight from TF2. There's also no custom coding, which I think people usually associate with a mod. With that said, though, it uses a huge amount of in-game scripting to completely modifiy the gameplay. So I guess it is both."

One of the biggest problems in the game's creation is special abilities for each class.  Valve has done a fantastic job of endowing each class with a unique identity, and for the most part I have tried to use abilities that fit.  The Heavy's wall smashing ability, for example, was taken directly from the 'Meet the Spy' video, where he breaks down the door in the opening scene.

You just have to love the TF2 community.  How brilliant is that?  I mean honestly, deriving so many good things from a single game, the TF2 community just rocks.

[Source: Kotaku.com]

When a developer creates a game, funding is provided by a publisher with the hope of creating revenue off that title for x amount of years, (usually 2-3). During the building of the game the developers are paid based around "milestones" or checkpoints through-out the process; Alpha, Beta, Gold status for example. After a game ships the developer is granted "royalties" which is a set percentage on each unit sold. This percentage is usually low, somewhere between 1-10%.

Today, court papers arose that state that Infinity Ward controls the "Modern Warfare" brand, the royalties Activision is contractually obligated to give them and Infinity Ward, can act independantly of Activision, and that all titles by Activision that use the MW2/IW game engine are thereby supervised by Infinity Ward...if West and Zampella win. To read more on the subject head on over to Kotaku to read the offical papers.

"After all we have given to Activision, we shouldn't have to sue to get paid," added Zampella. Jason West adds, "We were shocked by Activision's decision to terminate our contract. We poured our heart and soul into that company, building not only a world class development studio, but assembling a team we've been proud to work with for nearly a decade. We think the work we've done speaks for itself."

[Source: LA Times ShackNews Kotaku]

Now, there's not a whole lot of videos to post that don't consist of just text streams. However, as of March 3rd. There's now a new ending to Portal.[SPOILER]

Not very different, but it could mean something to connect the story for when Portal 2 comes out.

Last, but not least, this! and this!

And with all that, feel free to comment or put in your two cents here.

The Engineer update is presumed to be the next update for TF2 and probably the only class to have no unique weapons (apart from his buildings and maybe a wrench).  TeamFortress2 programmer/game designer Brandon Reinheart released some juicy tidbits about their playtesting and design decisions leading to the Engineer update on their blog.

He's an interesting class to work on, because he creates a larger footprint in the game than any other class. This means we have a lot of options to work with, and the resulting set of ideas is truly daunting. Since we've already built and playtested some things that haven't worked out (with no false modesty, I think we've mastered the art of rapidly making things that aren't fun), we thought it might be interesting to give you some of our failed experiments.

After reading through it all, I'm kinda proud of valve doing their best to prevent turtling so we don't have to worry about having every other map become 2fort.  They also mention some previous design decisions about the medic being more combat class now resulting in those minges who run around and dont heal anything.  Discuss in our forums here.