ubercharged.net

There isn’t anything more fun is there, right? Being able to go all gun-ho into battle constantly, running in, throwing a few rockets at anything you see move, only to blow yourself up and be able to do that again in a matter of seconds?

Unfortunately, many people have this mindset when playing this lovely game, and it is beginning to cause a large problem in the team dynamic and in the skill of the average player.

I played a lot of instaspawn servers for a good couple of months (this is the main reason why i have 80+ hours as scout) which generally consisted of 2fort and nothing else. Capping intel and bonking snipers was so sweet knowing I didn’t have to wait 15 seconds to respawn and do it again. It was a throwback to the good old days where I would constantly play Unreal Tournament, Deck 15 with instagib mutator, killing bot after bot until I passed out on my keyboard. Those were the days.

But after a while i got bored of only seeing 66% of one map, and decided to go and start playing real servers again. Boy was i shocked.

I forgot how to play. I would run out and pay no attention to any sentry placements, medic partners or stickies. I was blinded by the fast paced devil spawn that had been birthed within this game, and it had twisted me into it’s thick skulled pawn, endlessly running into oblivion without a care.

The main problem with instaspawn/fastspawn servers is that it detours the player from using proper defence strategies. It is much like the strategies used on the Western Front in WW1, you just keep throwing yourself in there until a dent is made enough to get closer to your objective. The spawning timers were set in game for one sole reason: To make sure people played the way the game was intended.

It is essential to learn how to be a defensive player, no matter what class you choose to play. In normal gameplay if you don’t defend properly, you’re slapped with a harsh respawn time. This is intended to make people learn from their mistakes and adapt to situations that arise in the game. It makes you more alert, therefore making you not only a better all round player, but it will significantly increase your skills in offensive situations.

The timers were also, as stated when the game was being released, to intensify the actual experience. It’s always so amazing when you’re defending and your team is nearly wiped and you’re waiting anxiously to respawn, watching the timer tick down as the other side gets closer to finishing their objective. It’s a feeling that I never really experienced in any other game, and coming back to it after so long was so rewarding. Being on the edge of my seat and jumping up and down while gaming is something i enjoy, much to the bemusement of my family and friends, or people who have ever been part of a lan with me.

I still play them every now and then, normally if I am waiting in line for another server, or just when there are no other decent servers being played. It’s my little secret shame of sorts, but I now know for the sake of not only my skill, but my overall gaming experience, it is something I should not indulge in too much.

Server Details

• Server: ubercharged.net - 69.9.43.108:27016
• Password: none
• Location: New York

The Ubercharged TF2 server is kicking ass and taking names with this weeks theme:

Payload Partytime!

Goldrush isn’t the only place you can blow those filthy reds to kingdom come. Of course we’ll be playing there, but We’ll also be visiting Red Mesa,

an in development map Cliffhanger, and saving the best till last:

Yes, it’s Dustbowl Payload, just like you always wanted (though you may not have realised that until just now). We may use Heights instead in future, but for now we’ll see how the original Dustbowl fares.

Playtimes are the usual slots on Saturday, 10 pm in each timezone:

Or even better, just join the and you’ll get announcements when we’re online and kicking ass.

The server is up 24/7 and set to download maps, so you can log on wherever and poke around, but you’ll find things a lot faster if you download the maps yourself:

Black Mesa
Cliffhanger
Dustbowl

See you there!

Oops, reverse bump back to it’s original post date. This has been sorted now, and the negativity at the top of the front page for a week while I’m away was getting to me a bit - scroll to the bottom for the conclusion

The Macbook Pro I use for gaming had it’s video card blow up last weekend, much to my dismay. I checked the serial number, and it’s still inside the warranty period. Sweet. Should be a matter of dropping it in, and having repairs done.

So I checked the Apple website, and it turns out Apple has kind of “outsourced” (read “neglected”) service to local Authorized Service Providers. The idea is that Apple doesn’t want anything to do with you once you’ve forked over your cash and they’ve given you the hardware - you need to find a local store that is authorized to carry out service, get it there yourself, and then wait for them to fix it.

I’m sure some business analyst at Apple got a nice raise and promotion for coming up with that scam. Nice in theory, but not so convenient for customers in practice.

The problem is that I live in Melbourne, Australia. There are only a handful of service providers - and only 3 that are convenient for me to get to in the city, and two of those are different outlets of the same company. Melbourne has four million people. Quite a few of those people own Apple products, and quite a few of those break. And there are three places to fix them up.

So I dropped my Macbook Pro into Next Byte on Bourke St. This was on Saturday. I left it a few days, and then rang up today (Thursday) to see when it would be ready. Turns out it hasn’t even been looked at yet. At this stage there is a seven business day wait before a tech even examines it - let alone start to fix it. If it needs replacement parts who knows how long it’s all going to take.

It was an effort just getting some vague ballpark time for when I’d get it back (late next week at the earliest). The guy on the phone seemed fixated on when a tech would look at it - I don’t care about their in house process of who does what when. The only thing I care about is when I’m holding it working again in my hands!

I rang around to the other places to see if I could take it somewhere else for more speedy service. Same story all over town. My Mac Australia even told me I could pay them extra to get it bumped to the top of the queue and have it looked at quicker. WTF? This is under warranty for free repairs. I realize these stores are separate from Apple, but I’m assuming Apple still compensates them for the time and cost of carrying out repairs. And then they’re trying to scam a “protection” racket onto me for more money because the Apple hardware service and repair system is so f**ked?

This is just not good enough Apple and Next Byte! This is an expensive piece of kit which I use for work purposes (…and gaming). AND IT BROKE BECAUSE OF QUALITY PROBLEMS. And now I have to go at least 2 weeks without it because you skimp on resources to repair this stuff under the warranty it was bought under?

COME ON! FIGURE IT OUT PLEASE!

(yeah, sorry for not having anything to do with TF2, but I needed to rant)

Update 23 June 2008

I got it back, it seemed to be working - for a day or two. Then it started crashing again. Not too bad at first, but got constantly worse until last night it was crashing every few minutes. This morning I couldn’t even boot it up without having it kernel panic (that means the equivalent of a “blue screen” for you Windows folk).

Here’s how it went down.

• June 10 (+11 days after dropping off for service). Got a call from Next Byte. Someone finally. Couldn’t initially find any problem with it. Said they’d leave some tests running overnight to try to reproduce the problem.
• June 11 (+12 days). I called Next Byte after not hearing anything from them. Still couldn’t find the problem. I asked if I could pick it up then. They said sure. They’d send it back to the Bourke St store, which would take a day. HUH? I thought it was AT the Bourke St store already. Not so. Turns out they ship everything across town to Ivanhoe to be worked on… If I’d known there were 2 days transit involved as part of the waiting period, I wouldn’t have bothered taking it there in the first place.
• June 12 (+13 days). I pick it up from Bourke St. It’s working… for the most part. Occasional crashes, but seems pretty well behaved.
• June 13 - June 19. Crashes get more frequent.
• June 20. MAJOR problems doing anything to do with 3D (ie - TF2). Runs for about a minute before crashing. Regular GUI operations are unstable, but mostly usable.
• June 23 (+24 days). Totally caked again. Cannot boot. Kernel panic occurs every time it is turned on. Even booting diagnostic mode, or from the install CD results in Kernel panic. Off to Next Byte again. They agreed to bump it up the queue, but it still has to be sent out to Ivanhoe to be worked on. The guys in the store couldn’t tell me much except to call the Ivanhoe store tomorrow afternoon. This sucks. I’m going away at the weekend for a week, and I was planning on being able to use it. (The guys in the store were actually pretty nice and helpful - even if I did bite their heads off a bit - sorry if you’re reading this, I was just frustrated with the situation ).

Man, why does this stuff have to be so hard? I just want it to WORK.

Update 29 June 2008

• June 24 (+25 days). Rang Next Byte Ivanhoe. Spoke to a tech working on it. He’d reproduced the problem, and confirmed the main board was dead, and needed to be replaced. Ordered replacement board from Apple (WTF? Aren’t these guys the main service center for Apple? Don’t they have stock lying around?)
• June 25 (+26 days). Rang Next Byte again. Spoke to someone else, as the tech working on it was too busy. Person I spoke to said that the replacement part had arrived, but he didn’t know more than that. Would get the tech to call me back. Didn’t hear anything else.
• June 27 (+28 days). Rang Next Byte again. Still couldn’t get through to the tech working on it. Guy I spoke to said that he’d get him to call me back that afternoon. Rang Next Byte again that afternoon, and got through to the guy. Turns out Apple sent a faulty damn part over, and they would have to reorder it. FFS. This part had been sitting there for 3 days and they only figure that out now? I said that I am flying out of Melbourne on Monday, and I really needed it fixed before the weekend. I asked if there was any way I could come out to the store to pick it up. The tech said that the replacement part should come in around 10:30 - 11:00 on Monday, and I should be able to get it. This is cutting it really fucking fine. I have to be at the airport at 4pm, and I have to haul my ass half way across town to pick up something that should have been fixed a month ago? I just really god damn hope they actually have it fixed by 2pm when I get there, or I’m seriously going to crack it. As it is, I’ll have to drag my suitcase out there, and get a taxi from the store. This has the makings of a grumpy madlep when I get off the plane at the other end…

Update 30 June 2008

GUESS WHAT? Still no joy. Who would have thought that by now?…
Anyway.

• June 30 (+31 days). Rang Next Byte at 11:00am (when the part was supposed to arrive). Turned out it had arrived, and the tech was working on it now (yay!). Didn’t speak to him cause he was tied up with it, but he would give me a call back in “5 to 10 minutes”.
• Still nothing from Next Byte. Called against at 12:00pm. Turns out the tech has gone out of the office for a couple of hours and no one knows what is going on! Talked to a manager. Turns out the second replacement part they sent over was faulty as well. This is getting ridiculous. Basically there is no way in hell it is going to be ready this afternoon. They’ll have to re-order the re-ordered part, and wait for that to turn up before they can do anything else. 1pm was the latest I could pick it up before heading off to the airport. No luck. They said they’d give me a call to update this afternoon, and would look at couriering it up to me while I’m away.

not happy

Update 3 July 2008

Sorted finally.
Basically it got escalated up to the manager (Ryan. Great guy. He did good stuff). I didn’t get the laptop back before I left, BUT they jumped to it, found a working replacement part, fixed it up, and had it working by the time I was sitting in Sydney airport waiting for my connecting flight when they called me to give an update. Then they arranged for it to be sent express courier to the place where I’m staying in Queensland, and it arrived in top condition a day later. In fact, I’m writing this update now from it sitting by the pool. Sweet.

Now if only the hotel could get the wireless net working in my room as well, and I’d be all set. But that’s a rant for another day…

You stand…

…silouetted against the rising sun. It’s heat washes over you…warming you…empowering you…preparing you for what lies ahead. The heat, it is symbolic of this day. Leering though the plastic of your mask, you assess the Builders League forces from your vantage point on the Spiral. Identical blue Pyro clones stare back at you, and the Reliable Excavation Pyro clones under you shift restlessly.,

They want a fight.

They want to take back the middle cap.

But most of all, they want the ultimate of weapons, the herald of doom for all their foes.

You smile. This is your hour. Only one more challenge awaits. One more achievement to make. Another foe runs around the corner. What is this? He’s not a Pyro?!
Instantly, the enemy Medic attracts the attention of the entire RED force. Excitment wells in their ranks. It is time, you have to get to that Medic before anyone else does. By killing him with afterburn while providing him with a deathcam of you getting backstabbed while taunting, you get the ultimate prize. Scanning the enemy Pyros, you realise any one of them could be a Spy. This is your chance. You press C & 3, and charge, leading the roaring horde into the heart of the BLU clones…

So, with the recent news…

…of the Pyro being the next to recieve achievements and unlockables (as reported by PC Gamer), it gets many thinking back to the *cough* glorious first days of the Medic’s release. Fortunately (or perhaps not) I missed the entire rush, having lost my computer to the evil demons at IT Warehouse (who are actually good blokes), trying to get the CPU Coolant Block replaced under warranty. Now while entire teams of Medics sounds fun, for a short while, I guess that this event passed any possible interpretation of “short” seventeen rounds back and started to get a wee bit irritating with it’s bloody persistency. The combination of this with the incessant public grinding by impatient idiots, loath to play the game without the new guns lest they be called ‘n00b’, rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. So maybe it’s understandable that some people look towards this coming release (whenever it decides to raise it’s head) with utter dread and contempt.

Though personally I can’t understand that, just imagine the carnage of the omnipresent Pyro wars. Fire everywhere, crits mowing everyone down, axing, shotgun blasts from the weak who retreat, two gigantic mobs of opposing teams charging into the fray, towards each other, the front lines crumbling under sustained fire, the suicidal uber from the odd and peerless Medic scattering the front lines, complete and utter chaos.

This is the Pyro’s world…

…and it is glorious.

Personal fantasies aside, when you really think about it, the class stacking is not the problem. Well, at least, not the problem for long. Over time the game gets back to normal (aside from the odd idiot grinding). The real problem is the achievements and weapons themselves, which is the basis for the following rant.

I’ll say right now that I support unlockables being tied to achievements. Rewarding players for playing a class well with alternate weapons to play with is a great way to promote good gameplay/teamwork and to make a player feel like he’s accomplished something. The problem is that all of the achievements have to support this, and I know I don’t have to point out those ones implemented with the Medic that have us scratching our heads (at the very least). And while it’s possible for a dedicated Medic to get all of the achievements over time through normal gaming, it’s not very realistic, especially taking into account some of the more ridiculous ones that completely counteract what is percieved as good Medic play.

The weapons themselves are the other problem. Although I haven’t had any personal experience with the Ubersaw (and it’ll be a while before I do, so if something I say regarding it doesn’t ring true, just ignore me), the thing is that the Kritzkrieg is the only weapon that is ‘balanced’, compared to it’s contemporaries, when you look at the logic behind it. The others, rather than opening up an alternate way to play, are simply ‘a step up’ from the base weapons. The Blutsauger is definitely an improvement from the regular Needler, as while you do crit a lot as a Medic, you cannot rely on that, whilst you can always rely on that steady stream of health you recieve while retreating. It cannot be counted how many times that gun has saved my life where otherwise I’d be a burning ragdoll lightening the mood with it’s utterly awesome flame effects. And from looking at the few who have it, the slightly slower swing of the Ubersaw is a tiny sacrifice for the upside of the massive charge it gives to your uber (although the fact that it’s melee means it’s still an unrealiable way to charge it, Spies excluded).

My point is that, when you have access to the Blutsauger or the Ubersaw, it seems to be pretty much a no-brainer. There’s little to no incentive to switch back to the old guns. And I don’t think that’s how it should be at all. The Kritzkrieg was a stroke of genius on Valve’s behalf and, while the other unlockables are very imaginitive and useful, they’re too good in that regard, in that the originals have nothing major going for them in comparision.

Team Fortress 2 was developed from the start to be a game of trade-off’s, and that was a big point advertised pre-release about these unlockables. They aren’t supposed to be ‘better’, just ‘different’. The problem is that this really isn’t true in my opinion. Situationally the old weapons are better, but in general you’re better off with the Blutsauger and Ubersaw. And that is a mistake (though it’s good if you’ve already got them).

All this said, unlockables are a great idea, as long as they are implemented properly. The Medic achievement pack was done generally well, and the weapon rewards are fresh and inspired (the Kritzkrieg especially so). You are still very effective without the unlockables, and they certainly don’t make the game inaccessable for those who don’t have them. But it can still be perfected, and should be.
If something is learned from the Medic release (unlockables not to be better/all achievements reflecting good, reasonable class play), and the Pyro pack made with regards to this, I think it will complement the game beautifully. It will be something to look forward to, unless you play Spy.

Until then, however, happy hunting.

Props to q3c for the Shirt’s Pyro Graphic.

Man, these quality new posts just keep coming. Yet another ubercharged.net first timer, and another big welcome for General Balls (love the name)
- madlep

Unless I’ve very much mistaken, I do believe I’m the only avid reader of this site who doesn’t play the PC version of the game. Instead, I divulge myself in playing the game on the Xbox 360, and during my time there I’ve gained a good few insights into the differences between it and the PC version. So allow me to share some of them with you, and try and press the true joys and horrors this rather different experience has to offer onto you…

You’ll play in a lot of small games. Most of them on 2Fort.

One of the things that bugs me from the very start is the fact it’s rather difficult to get into a good game that you’ll enjoy, without having to suffer first. There are two reasons for this, with the first being the cap on the level of players in a match, based on the host’s bandwidth. The positive side of things is that this cuts out a ton of the lag issues, but the negative is that most players have a bandwidth level so low that only 8 people can get involved in a scrap. Which can be fun, but I think we all know that more players equals more carnage.

The second reason it’s hard to find a good match is due to the twisted fascination Xbox 360 owners have with 2Fort. This may be down to the fact it’s the first map to come up when the host sets up the game, or because there was a twisted love affair in the past that I don’t know about. Either way, you’ll be capturing a lot of intelligence, even if you’re like me and wouldn’t mind seeing the map die in a fire. Created by a Pyro.

The levels of human stupidity will amaze you.

Yes, I know there are idiots wherever you go, but I can’t help but shake the feeling the console Team Fortress 2 is a breeding ground for a special kind of idiot. These are the type of idiot who can run head-first at a team as an angry Pyro, but nearly get away with it because the said team are too stupid to know how to react. These are the type of idiot who’ll switch to the class the most successful player is, even if it’s Spy. Heck, you might get a bunch of 6 or 7 idiots who all go Engineer, yet none of them actually build a sentry guarding the control point, allowing Spies to act terrifically smug and swear at you on voice comms when they sneak through.

Indeed, my frustration towards these types of people has led to the point where I’ve smacked my joypad on my forehead so much there’s a permanent analog-shaped print there now. It also does nothing for my sanity, but to be honest, I don’t think that was completely stable to begin with.

You’re limited in what you can do, but you can still bug medics.

Ok, here’s a quick list of some of the things you can’t do on the console version; Drop the intelligence for a Scout to run it. Use sprays. Use voice prompts such as “Need a dispenser here!” (Damn it). Play user-created maps. Now here’s a list of what you can do – Shout for a Medic. A LOT. The fact someone thought there had to be two ways to switch weapon (The d-pad and shoulder buttons) makes it so there’s very few buttons left for some of the more interesting commands, but it seems someone was hall-bent in getting in a way to easily call for a Medic. They put it to activate on a click of the right stick. Which, as you’d expect, it very easy and fast to do.

Oh, the pain of being a Medic.

All of a sudden everyone thinks they’re really witty in spamming the command. Or they’ll call for a Medic when as much as a Sniper sneezes on them. Or they’ll just do it at random points or rapid-fire style the second they here “I am fully charged!”. This makes it impossible for the class to ever be played to it’s full potential, and it becomes more of a game of call my bluff, which is no fun. And damn it all, how can I easily call out my dispenser needs?

You’ll never get updates or new stuff. Ever. No, seriously. Never ever.

I can put this simply – You got Badlands months ago and I’m still impatiently tapping my foot for it. You can play in all these weird maps such as Circlejerk while I get stuck on 2Fort again. You can enjoy the superbly executed achievements for each class while I ju- Oh wait, I take back that last one.

It’s not like we’ve not been teased, either… Valve mutters they want to make the stuff free to us to keep us pleased, but all they ever seem to do in the pleasing stakes is attack a lag problem which will never fully be solved. Instead, we’re stuck with the same old story over and over again, and it’s perhaps this more than anything which makes me long for the PC version. But after saying all this, though, I have to say…

You’ll still have fun.

Because that’s what Team Fortress 2 does, and it will always do. And it’s what keeps me coming back for more.

Another ubercharged.net cherry just got popped - welcome and congrats to supremsonic. There is some good stuff coming through with the new peeps writing on here
- madlep

I’ve been sitting at this screen for god knows how long now, almost catatonic, trance like, thinking “What the hell do you have to say that’s worthy enough to be put up on a website viewed by quite a few people?”

After much meditation in high mountains and all that junk, I decided i would start with my tf2 pet hate. Class stacking.

Now, we have all recently seen it with the Medic achievement fiasco. A server filled with almost an entire class, making the game almost impossible to play and enjoy yourself. But what i find worse, is if even a minor amount of your team decides to play the most useless class for the map.

Let’s take gold rush for example. Everyone is playing it, it’s a bunch of fun, but it is a useless class hotbed. Snipers are rarely effective (up until stage 3) yet i always see a good 3, sometimes 4 on a team of 12. I just don’t understand it.

I know that everyone has their own favorite class and want nothing more than to play that class all the time, but there has to be a time when you have to stop and think “Ok, time to be a team player” and pick something that either no one has yet, or is needed at a certain point ie. to break a stalemate situation.

I think a lot of people seem to forget the title of the game: TEAM Fortress 2. That means playing the right class to fit the team and their objective. I could go more into the selfish play styles of TF2 and their origins, but I think I’ll leave it for another post, I don’t want my first to be long winded and everyone thinking “Oh god, this guy is going to be painful…”

So people, please, for the sake of my monitor/keyboard/headphones/microphone/neighbors/father/dog/voicebox, I urge you to pick your class for the team, not yourself. If I find some people stacking on a server who refuse to change, I may start screen capping and posting them, in similar vain to the clan stack images (which reminds me, I have a few of those).

Although, Engie ho-downs are still, and always will be acceptable.

Welcome and congrats to /D/irection on his first post on ubercharged.net. He’s one of the new authors, in hopefully what is the first of many rants
- madlep

Chances are that you probably haven’t heard about the latest fiasco involving the Team Fortress 2 crew and their run in with the Department of Homeland Security. I would have expected it to be very big news. However due to the sensitive nature of it, it’s been hushed quickly up by the government.

What happened is that Valve booked the TF2 guys for a whirlwind world promotional tour. The usual junket: They travel around to different cities, sign autographs, do media interviews, radio appearances, you know the kind of thing. They’ve done this a few times already domestically, and Valve (wisely) packed them onto a private tour bus to avoid “complications” with local authorities as their made their travels.

For international though, it’s not quite that simple. They did have a Valve chaperon, and the people organizing the trip at least made sure they weren’t packing live weapons while they went through security - but lets face it, these guys aren’t exactly nuanced in the modern security expectations with modern air travel. They’ve had a pretty sheltered existence so far, and something was bound to give.

And that something happened to be a bunch of paranoid security staff at the airport. Thanks to the war on terror, a bunch of well meaning, cartoon shaded, ultra-violent video game characters can’t travel with dignity and respect. Basically they all got hauled over by airport security under heavy suspicion, searched, interrogated, beaten, and ultimately all got shipped off to Guantanamo Bay for a while. Apparently Gabe Newell had to call George Bush personally to get them off the hook (he had some compromising pictures of him or something for some reason).

The government tried to brush this under the carpet, and Valve wasn’t too keen on talking about it either. So ubercharged.net being the bastion of trust, honesty, and BS that we are, made an official request under the freedom of information act, and now reveal the documents detailing what went on.

Department Of Homeland Security

Airline Transport Security Incident Report
Summary: Group of 9 travelers acting suspiciously. Detained and interrogated. Individual summaries attached.

Scout

• Refusal to disable personal audio devices while seatbelt signs were active during take off and landing.
• Suspected meth-amphetamine use. Hyperactive demeanor. Rapid, often offensive speech. Difficulty to remain still. Blatantly disobeyed “walk, don’t run” signs.
• Inspection of carry on luggage revealed scout to be in possession of a number of classified documents.

Soldier

• This individual wasn’t acting in a suspicious way - in fact we were pleased to see he expressed interest in fighting anyone the US has ever been at war with - Terrorists; Communists; Nazis; Redcoats etc. However inline with DHS policy directive 6721, the soldier is considered Guilty By Association due to his travelling companions.
• Appeared to have grenade shaped objects on his person, although these were physically attached his clothing and could not be detached. They just appeared to be for show.

Pyro

• Refused to remove headgear for purposes of passport identification. In fact, we’re not even sure who this individual actually is, what nationality they are, or even what gender they are.
• When asked if checked or carry on luggage contained any aerosols or flammable materials, simple gave suspicious muffled laugh and refused to answer coherently.
• Caused smoke alarms in airplane toilets to be activated in flight resulting in oxygen masks needing to be deployed, and emergency descent to be carried out. During emergency descent refused to return to seat, and was observed to run up and down the main cabin manically laughing and using a broken dinner tray as a makeshift axe.

Demoman

• Exceeded allowed duty-free alcohol spirits limit by approximately 3 gallons.
• Appeared to be intoxicated, and was abusive to security personnel.
• Chemical bomb scan found traces of explosives residue on luggage, clothing, and teeth.
• Offensive thrusting gestures made toward cabin crew and other passengers.

Heavy Weapons Guy

• Did not declare food items: uneaten sandwich, and rasher of bacon.
• When asked reason for travel, shouted “WE MAKE GOOD TEAM!”. No other reason given.
• Refused to purchase extra seat during check in, as per airline policy when flying obese travellers.
• Cried when separated from medic for individual questioning.

Engineer

• In possession of plans for several classified military defense systems in carry on luggage.
• Inspection of checked luggage revealed a number of kitset military defense systems in direct violation of export regulations.
• Attempted to “upgrade” drinks cart while in flight resulting in Jim Beam and Coke being auto-fired when cabin crew tried to approach it.

Medic

• Illicit narcotics identified on scan of carry on luggage. Further inspection revealed large number of hypodermic needles.
• Practicing medicine in boarding queue without valid license.
• Did not declare to quarantine that he had been in a farm area recently.
• Acting in an anti-social manner most of the time while under observation in the airport baggage check area, and later in the security quarantine area. When questioned about this, stated that “I am griinding zee acheevementz. I vant zee uubersaaw!”

Spy

• Could not identify this individual. Was traveling with multiple false passports and aliases.
• Suspected involvement in a number of recent assassinations and sabotage attempts.
• Tried repeatedly to impersonate DHS security agents. Would strangely walk tight up against a wall when real agents approached.
• Somehow managed to disable the candy vending machine in the DHS staff room.

Sniper

• Claimed to be travelling on an “Australian” passport - which is a country none of the DHS agents here had ever heard off. We don’t even think it exists. At any rate ,”Australia” sounds foreign and distant, so we suspect it has something to do with state sponsored terrorist activity in that part of the world - wherever that is.
• Called the DHS supervisor a “wanker”.

I’m just glad none of the TF2 guys were dumb enough to wear a Transformers T-shirt through security.

(Cheers to TF2 Wiki for the images)

So I’ve been a little quiet of late on this site. However, things are not as they seem on the surface.

ubercharged.net Forums

After a few people have mentioned it to me, I’ve started looking at setting up a forum for the site. It’s really taking me way longer than it should, but I’m a perfectionist, and most forum software out there is crap (at least for how I want to set it up).

I wanted the integration with WordPress to be a little tighter - as in each article posted on the blog becomes a thread in a specific forum, and each comment on a blog post to become a forum comment in that thread. It’s relatively easy (but non-trivial) to set that up, but it has issues with the anonymous posting on ubercharged as it works at the moment - I’m a big fan of anon posting , but I don’t know if I can be bothered with coding a custom work around for it. So I might just leave that separate for now.

I did start coding up some stuff in Rails that nicely integrated with WordPress, but this site is running on an ultra cheapo shared host ($13 a month cheap), and Rails isn’t really an option unless you can start a bunch of long-lived Mongrel server processes - which you can’t do on an ultra cheapo shared host. PHP runs ok, but PHP (and especially most PHP apps) makes my head hurt, and I try to minimize my exposure to it.

Anyway, I’ve got forums set up and running as a test (not online yet), so you’ll probably see them sooner rather than later.

I guess I should ask - would anyone actually post in them?

Other People’s Stuff on ubercharged

I’ve been having a bit of a discussion with a few people about expanding the content that goes up on here. It’s just been me so far, but I get cranky and distracted and often don’t post anything worthwhile for weeks on end. So, I’m looking at opening up the author list on here. If you think you’ve got something worth writing about, give me a yell on madlep@ubercharged.net, and we’ll see what we can do.

MacBricked

My trusty MacBook Pro has gone kaput. It should be ok, but the video card, or the video memory or something has fried itself. It’s under warranty still, but it means no TF2 for a while until it gets fixed. So if you don’t see me around much, that’s why.

When I boot it up now, the screen looks something like this:

Interestingly, it happened after a prolonged bout of playing Ignite People On Fire. Is this related? Dunno.

SaDOS and a bunch of Control Point groupies have put together this nice little machinima piece.

Soldier meets medic. Soldier and medic frolic around merrily. Pyro kills medic. Hilarity ensues.

As some of you may be aware, I’m a bit of a Mac fanboy. My TF2 time is spent on my MacBook Pro laptop, which rocks for gaming. Apple going Intel was the smartest thing they’ve ever done. Now I can triple boot OS X, Ubuntu, and Windows. Yay.

Anyway. Some TF2 stuff.

Spotted this one over at Macenstein.

One of the most underrated classes in TF2, and one that has sadly gone overlooked for far too long in Valve’s promotion of the game.

I mean, come on! The train would easily get the top score on Well, but Valve didn’t even have the balls to register The Train’s kills on the score board. This is blatant discrimination.

The Tetris-Inside kids (who are Russian - I think, at least judging by the website) have addressed this injustice and produced a Meet The Team interview with The Train.

Team Fortress 2 - Meet The Train from Daymon Smith on Vimeo.

I totally agree with The Train’s point of view. He makes a better argument than the pyro even.

The kids from 2fort2furious.com have been hard at work with more quality research into the more obscure side of Team Fortress 2 physics.

Turns out you can goomba stomp enemy players, Mario Brothers style - even if they are ubercharged. Cool huh?
(Or this might just be a mod they’re running on their server. Dunno)

TF2: Goomba Stomping from FLOOR MASTER on Vimeo.

And if that wasn’t cool enough, here’s a double goomba stomp to shut down an ubercharged.

Double Goomba Stomp from The Pope on Vimeo.

I went to the Game On exhibition at ACMI in Melbourne the weekend before last and had a kick ass time. At least I did when I could get on any of the games - it was pretty busy. Tip from the wise - go mid week.

Then I noticed at the end of the last Zero Punctuation review that Yahtzee was going to be on a talk panel there. So I figured it could be kinda interesting to head along and see what he had to say.

I’m a Zero Punctuation fan, but even considering how popular Zero Punctuation is, I figured it was still kinda niche and it probably wouldn’t be that busy. WRONG. Seems most of the gamer geeks in Melbourne had the same idea. Now gamers are still a pretty small minority here, but Melbourne has a population of four million, so even if we only make up 0.01% of the citizenry, that is still a good few hundred people.

It was a free event, but they had a ticket system to stop overfilling. Apparently tickets sold-out about 4 hours before the talk started. By the time I turned up about 20 minutes the start, there were lines going the whole way around the entry foyer queueing for the stand-by tickets.

Basically the place was like waiting outside a major sold-out rock concert trying to somehow get some tickets to get in. It totally had that rock vibe. You could catch the excited chatter. Some young geeks waiting in line next to me were talking about how “I saw him! And he was wearing his hat!”. In fact, quite a large proportion of the attendees were actually wearing the trademark 1950s hat Yahtzee is so fond of. It’s entirely possible they actually just saw one of those guys (I don’t know which set of geeks are sadder…). The whole thing was really surreal. I’m glad I had my iPod, cause I was getting a little scared… And I’m supposedly one of those people. Imagine how the general public would have taken it!

I asked a staff member, who seemed quite overwhelmed and flustered by it all. She said to queue up at the ticket sales line to get tickets to get in. I got half way through there, and another staff member was directing people to a different line for stand by tickets. Kind of a wild goose chase.

Eventually a staff member came along and told everyone that they basically were not going to get in. About all we could do was to contact ACMI and request a repeat session at a bigger venue. *sigh*. This is after I made the effort to put shoes on and leave the house - that takes a big effort on a Sunday afternoon. So no talk session for me

I’m hoping the Escapist magazine starts shelling out for a security detail and bullet proof car when Yahtzee goes out in public soon. At this rate he’s going to need it.

Just incase you all missed the original post, or you forgot, or you all thought it would be funny to mass-boycott behind my back, and then be all like “HAHA madlep is on a server by himself playing with a 300ms ping!”… *sigh*

I’ll just drop a quick reminder that the server-warming party for the new ubercharged.net TF2 server is kicking off tomorrow, and you’re all welcome to turn up. Kicks from from 10pm Melbourne time, and pretty much 10pm at every time zone around the world through Saturday. Basically just join when you feel like it, and I’m sure that someone will be there.

The idea is to herd all the ubercharged readers onto the new server, and have me beat the crap out of them some wonderful games.

More exacting times are as specified back in the original post, cause it’s friday night, and I can’t be bothered reposting.

I was just reading about that “other game” on Rock Paper Scissors and how they don’t mind being compared to Team Fortress 2. I haven’t had much to say about Battlefield Heroes yet, but I’m beginning to think that a better comparison would be with the Village People.

Example. Compare:

And

I think I see where they are going with the business model. It’ll be free to play, but you pay for unlockables such as the YMCA arm dance taunts, custom clothing such as indian chief headgear, engineer outfit (HA! TF2 has that for free - at least until valve makes you grind an achievement for it…), chopper mustache, and aviator sunglasses, leather fetish biker outfits - no wait, those last three seriously are actually in the game. Hmm.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I just find games based on 1970s costume theme bands to be humorous. Someone should do a Kiss game while we’re at it (oh wait, they did)

Luke has posted a sweet article over at lowpings on the recent medic achievements dumb-assedness that has been going around.

That might seem awesome, every TF2 server a magical medical Mecca with free healing for all where no-one ever dies - but further highly scientific study reveals a disturbing problem:

So true about the retarded medics. I had a heavy on the other team doing non-stop blunt trauma grinding for his medic buddies on gold rush last night. We won the game easy cause every time we started to make progress, they’d respond with an uber. But instead of the usual chain gun of death, we just had this big red glowing lard-ass come out trying to punch everyone helping his team 0%, but getting lots of achievements for the dumb ass medics on his team. Wish I’d gotten a screenshot of it. So stupid…

He also sent me an image that didn’t make it into the article, but it kind of sums up what most public servers have been like since the update (except on the server I’ve been on the medics have been uncontrollably drooling more, with bigger and more mindless s**t eating grins).

The real shame is that medic uses to be my favorite and most played class. I didn’t mind being the helpful healer the whole time. It was a good feeling to know that you’re helping the team a lot. Since the update though, I’ve barely touched medic. Playing that class now just feels… dirty…

Wow, P_R_O_Z_A_C just dropped the motherload of spy tip goodness in the comments for How To Play Spy Tutorial Video.

So good I had to repost on their own.

Cheers

Here a little guide for those getting into Spying!

Engy / Sentry - stab engy in back, immediately change to sapper, sap sentry, followed by teleporter and dispenser. Works 4/5 times. Sometimes the sentry turns on you too quickly. Engy hiding in a corner? Jump on his head and stab him top-down! Believe me it works! By the way - it’s pointless sapping a sentry unless you kill the engy protecting it first. Kill him first you get all his structures… sapp while he’s nearby you normally get nothing… maybe a teleporter… unless you can coax him into a sapping/repairing war, which you will win eventually (if his buddies don’t take care of you before that happens).

Random spy checking - only seems a major problem when you have a VERY annoyed pyro, who was probably another class that got backstabbed too many times… which means that a spy is doing his job! Most the time you only get spy checked if you’re acting suspiciously eg. running the wrong way! Looking directly at and constantly at enemy ‘teammates’. Usually people will leave you alone if you act right… if you play like the class you’re disguised as should be playing.

Medic / Heavy combo - juicy opportunity. Harder if the medic is constantly turning around looking for spies… Usually best timing is when they’re engaged in combat and their attention is forward. I once back-stabbed a heavy while he was be healed by 3 medics at once… they looked so disappointed! Go for the medic then the Heavy. If the medic suspects you as a spy, just hit the heavy and run, leaving the medic undefended

Full 24 player maps are harder for spies than 16 player maps, more players = harder to get behind enemy lines. Then less players, the easier it is to dominate… unless they’re all scout or pyros… in that case don’t use Spy!

A futile class you say HAVOC? Maybe for a noob… An experience spy is often the number #1 point scorer on the team! “Team members spy-check each other all the time, and they WILL find you no matter how good you think you are.” - Not to blow my own horn HAVOC, but I’m often #1 point scorer for the level…normally I’m only spotted after it’s too late. Sometimes, yes, you get spy checked. Maybe 1/10 respawns, depending on how good you are / aren’t. 2/3 if you suck. My record number of backstabs (backstabs NOT just kills) without dying is 9.

Sniper - easy - the have tunnel vision while looking down the scope. Best timing is to hit them when they’re lining up a shot. If they’re standing in a corner, either jump on their head’s, or use your pistol - 3 shots point blank is all it takes to kill one.

The pistol - underrated weapon. Rather accurate at mid range, and does a significant amount of damage. I’ve killed heavies with the Spy’s pistol before. Especially good when running away while being pursued, you can often get extra kills this way, cos nobody can catch you except for a scout. Great in long corridors, such as the sewers in 2Fort. Pistol is great for shooting a sapped sentry too, to speed up it’s demise significantly. Remember - the damage is distance-dependent.

Bottlenecks - juicy opportunities. Find a narrow spot where the enemy is condensed, where their focus is in one direction. If you can get behind them, you can get a magnificent run - hit the back first, work your way to the front, then run back to your frontline for re-disguising. My personal record is 5 in 5 seconds. Yesterday I got 3 in 2 seconds on Gold Rush.

Scouts - a bane if they see you stab someone. Don’t waste your time trying to backstab them… unless you have a chance too! Very satisfying… any self respecting Scout ill be very embarrassed to be backstabbed by a Spy!

Other Spies! - “Takes one to know one” is a very true statement. If you’re good at playing Spy, you’re good at spotting a Spy… especially noobies! Looks for the guy running to the enemy’s frontlines wearing the wrong coloured clothes.

When respawning / running to frontline - Disguise as a pyro of your own team (on the disguise menu hit ‘-’ then choose your disguise). Why? Spies attract a lot of attention when in plain sight… Especially enemy spies. Disguise as a pyro of your own team, and enemy spies will leave you alone… trust me! Also, it tends to save your cloak until you need it. When disguised as pyro teammate, no-one will suspect a spy coming. Leave it till late as possible to disguise as an enemy, then cloak to get behind enemy lines - you’ll get deeper than being forced to cloak early because you’re already in enemy disguise.

Demomen - Rather easy… they’re normally either waiting for some to walk into their mines to they can detonate, or they’re placing mines… wait for either.

Soldier - Make sure you kill first stab! Usually it’s easiest to just follow them as they’re running to the front, since they’re easy to catch up with.

Fall in behind them - when cloaking to get behind enemy line, put yourself in a spot where the enemy will run past you on their way to the front, but will only see you hiding if they look behind them. Great way to choose your targets as they run past, and to join their ranks without suspicion. When a Heavy or soldier runs past, just fall in and stab the slowies! or follow them to a bottleneck at the frontline an see how many you can get!

Like MADLEP said - sap sentries just before your buddies start attacking it - gauranteed to take it out!

Teleporter stabbing - want to be cheeky? Find an enemy teleporter and stab them as they come through - they never expect it!

Cloaking - by far the BIGGEST mistake people make here is they his the right mouse button to cloak, and run out strait away, only to be seen by the enemy as a silhouette of your teams colour. It take a good 2 seconds to cloak. Cloak, count to 2, then run out.

Exit strategy - always plan ahead… After you stab, when are you running to? Will you have enough cloak to get away under fire? Are any of the victim’s teammates going to see and pursue you? Will you hide again behind enemy lines for a second run rather than running to the safety of your teammates? Or are you planning an all out assault on the enemies front lines which you do not expect to survive?

Spy… the thinking man’s class. I think that’s why people think they’re useless, they forget the thinking part when they play as one. By far, the Spy is the most in-depth class in TF2… can’t wait for the new weapons and achievements - hope the Spy is next in line!

Cheers,

P_R_O_Z_A_C

The kids from Atomic Spark (creators of the great unofficial Meet The Pyro video) have put together another “Meet The” video. This team it’s about the entire Red team. The effort on this one is amazing. All done with the standard voice and taunt animations, but with some kick ass editing. Very professional, and it could pass for one of the official Valve TF2 videos.

Everyone knows RED is best.

Team Fortress 2 - Meet the Red Team from Laurence Oliver Chase on Vimeo.

Cheers to garry’s mod news for the link.

Here’s a cute little animation set in TF2 by GeneralCacti.

“The engineer invites the Medic and Soldier to dinner…”

As usual when there is an engineer involved, there are spy shenanigans.

Spotted this one over at FRAGWAGON.

Luke, who rocks in all kinds of undescribable ways (and did the Team Fortress 2 motivational posters a while back), has gotten us set up with our very own ubercharged.net TF2 game server. I also set him up as an author on here, so if you see any posts not from me, don’t freak out like it’s some kind of ooberservers.com sell out scandal (again). It’s probably just him posting server stuff.

It’s live now, and good to go, but we’re planning a series of official kick off server parties to get it rolling. Why a series? Well, I live in Australia, the server is in New York, and there are a bunch of people that read ubercharged.net all around the world. Pretty much any time is gonna suck for everyone, so why not have a few sessions?

Yes, I will be playing with a 250+ ms ping. If you hate what I do here, and want to see me humiliated come along. I’ll be the engie running into walls on my l337 connection.

It will be a rocking good time.

Server launch party details

• Server: ubercharged.net - 69.9.43.108:27016
• Password: ubercharged (might make it unpassworded in a little bit)
• Location: New York
• What to Bring?: Alcohol. Singing voice. Willingness to let madlep win.
• To do what?: I dunno. It’s a TF2 server. Shoot people and stuff. You’ll figure it out.

Times

Hell, you can log on whenever and play. But we’ll try to organize a bunch at the following times. Note that there is a 10pm session for each of the time zones. I figured this was prime time, but if anyone really wants a different time, I’m sure we can figure it out.

I’ll be along to the first session, but you guys can occupy yourselves at the other ones.

Initially it’s running CCP CircleJerk (the map rocks, don’t mind the name) as a starter. You can download the map when you connect to the server (slowly…), or you can grab it from the direct link.

See you there