14 DAY TRIAL // With all the complaints video games received for twisting and destroying the mind of the young and online games, especially MMORPGs being shoved against the walls and blamed for alienating kids, many developers have taken special steps to protect themselves from further accusations. One perfect example is World of Warcraft's tips from the loading screens that urge us to take a break every now and then and interact with some real-life people. But for online games to try and purposely divide players and punish “friendship” is something very strange indeed. Nevertheless, Valve may be trying to do just that with its Team Fortress 2 and an upcoming patch.
Dug up by Kotaku, a brand-new set of TF2 announced messages have been found, and presumed to be part of a future patch, they have gamers everywhere in a twit. The main themes of the messages are “friendship” and “betrayal” and, upon a few listenings, they become quite addictive to listen to. Also, one can't help but have their thoughts drift to Megadeth and its “Trust.” Still, the best guess is that these new announcements will reveal a new game mode, but what exactly it is proves to be a mystery bigger than even The Longest Journey could provide.
“All you ever do is disappoint and betray me. Cheating. Stealing. Friend-making! It's not too late to repent. Kill your friends now, and end this.” These are just few of the recorded messages present in the audio, and one must admit, if these are hints towards a new game mode, this could be incredibly disturbing and fun to play at the same time.
Some plausible suggestions would indicate that this is related to Steam's Friends service, and other possibilities range from a friendly-fire/ betrayer mode in some way to some simple, random, team-mixing. The problem with these ideas is that most of them are rather dull and boring, compared with the teased message of the leaked audio, and it's doubtful that Valve would release something anything short of brilliant. A full hearing of the voice-over can be found here.