By John Walker on May 13th, 2010 at 1:20 am.
If I had my way, Portal guns would appear in all other games. Far Cry 2, Dragon Age, World Of Goo, Freecell, the lot. And they’d appear in real life. Imagine how great things would be if I had my way. However, if the modding project of one Pawn from 3-PG manages to escape some awkward obstacles, we could soon be seeing a mod that allows the Portal gun in Team Fortress 2. Called, rather wonderfully, Team Portress, the video below explains how the gun works in game, first demonstrating what it’s capable of, then showing you the weapon in a proper game. The catch? According to the poster, Valve has recently introduced a ban on custom items being given to players to prevent the anarchic distribution of hats.
Can I once more go on record saying that the hats in TF2 are the stupidest thing ever, that have caused more problems than anyone could ever have imagined for something quite so unimportant.
There is, inevitably, a petition to have Valve’s change revoked, to allow this sort of modding to take place. And if you watch the video below, you too might be upset that it’s no longer possible to attach entities to players.
We’ve contacted Valve to ask them whether they have plans to change the policy to allow items like this to be a feature in TF2. We’ll let you know their response.
13/05/2010 at 01:39 yns88 says:
I can’t be the only one who read that as Team Porntress.
13/05/2010 at 04:19 Thiefsie says:
Team Porktress for me. Ha!
16/06/2010 at 12:27 Original Mac Gamer says:
yaay not the only one
13/05/2010 at 01:40 Shalrath says:
I’m imagining the fun I could have as a spy with this…
13/05/2010 at 01:42 Mistabashi says:
Great idea, but would probably need all new maps and possibly a new game-mode to really take advantage of. Although Capture the Flag would be rather different if you could travel beyond the boundaries of conventional space…
Prophunt is way better though :D
13/05/2010 at 03:53 DarkNoghri says:
As I understand it, the Valve change disallowing the attachment of items also breaks Prophunt, though Valve apparently made it so that Prophunt is fixable. Pyro dodgeball is also broken, I believe.
13/05/2010 at 01:48 gildron says:
The map they are using in the video to demonstrate it looks unfamiliar to me, it could just be a custom map that I happen to have never played, or maybe they are designing their own maps based around portal gameplay.
Either way, they really need to hurry up and make this public.
13/05/2010 at 01:53 BobJustBob says:
I love TF2 hats so much.
13/05/2010 at 02:03 Theory says:
It teleports the player when they stand near to an object on the wall/floor. Sorry to be such a grump, but that is hardly Portal.
13/05/2010 at 02:54 Dave L. says:
It’s more than a simple teleport, the player retains their entry movement speed upon exit, and acceleration from falling is cumulative. The only thing it’s missing is the ability to actually see through the portals.
13/05/2010 at 12:19 Theory says:
That’s how ordinary Source teleporting works. It’s doing nothing special at all.
13/05/2010 at 02:07 Sushi says:
Hats are so pointless. Portal guns are not.
Pickles
13/05/2010 at 02:23 Ed from Brazil says:
I actually want every game to have a mix of portal gun, grav gun and the grapple+parachute from JC2.
Any game that has all 3 will be the BEST GAME EVER.
13/05/2010 at 02:27 Skusey says:
I really want to play this, but I can’t imagine playing it for long. I think I’d just get bored quickly and then go back to normal TF2/Portal.
13/05/2010 at 02:51 Jordan says:
yeah… you people are not thinking about others your only thinking if you had that portal weapon…. that is everyone and if everyone had it idk it would be boring really fast i meen it’s cool but that’s why we have laws so we dont become like mexico..
13/05/2010 at 03:07 Flaringo says:
Ohh, 3-PG! Thanks for reminding me about them.
I used to play on their servers all the time before TF2 turned to shit :D
13/05/2010 at 03:15 Oak says:
Tell us more, stranger, of this interesting parallel universe where TF2 has turned to shit.
13/05/2010 at 03:17 Flaringo says:
A wizard cast a spell on it
13/05/2010 at 03:27 bildo says:
I agree, TF2 isn’t what I remember it being. I stopped playing about 3 months ago and haven’t wanted to play since. It just got boring after playing since it came out and a slew of other, more interesting games, are here. Come to think of it, I don’t know why I spent so much time wasting away on TF2 : / The game is good but not for years on end.
13/05/2010 at 06:41 TeeJay says:
In just one year I’ve played over 500 hours of TF2 and still really enjoy it when I can get a decent game….
*however*
…for the last 2 or 3 months I have been disappointed by low numbers of populated servers, misleading listings of player numbers, servers with lots of stupid BOTS, periodic periods of poor connection/ping, application crashes and server disconnections. If things don’t improve soon I am probably going to jump ship over to BC2 or L4D2.
13/05/2010 at 06:50 DJ Phantoon says:
Teejay, those have always been issues. You want high server population? Wait for the Engineer update.
13/05/2010 at 13:17 Vandelay says:
The only thing I don’t like about current TF2 is the overabundance of increased player cap, instant respawn servers. No server ever seems to play just the regular game and instead insist on adding completely pointless and redundant extras that ruin the balance of the game. Instant respawn is the biggest culprit for this, but a massive proportion of the servers run it.
I just wish they would add an option to display servers that run particular rules or at least show servers that aren’t modded. The tags are pretty hopeless, as everyone uses a different tag for the same settings.
13/05/2010 at 15:23 Malibu Stacey says:
Couldn’t agree with you more Vandelay. Instant respawn with 32 players is pointless. Thankfully there are some communities which prefer to play the game the way it was designed.
I’d recommend favouriting the servers run by http://www.viaclan.com/ & http://www.thehh.co.uk both have nocrit votes after map change which succeed more often than not (VIA is 32 player but it’s normal rules for everything else).
13/05/2010 at 17:51 Arathain says:
Agreed, Vandelay. The game is finely balanced around its respawn timers, and mucking with them really does throw it right off. I also like people on 32 man servers complaining about Demo spam. Well, yeah. 24-man Dustbowl is a joy. 32-man Dustbowl is a ‘nade filled nightmare.
I wish more servers ran Highlander, actually. That one’s fun. And I also sincerely wish there were more vanilla servers out there. You can keep your nocrit nonsense, though. I like my crits too much. Yes, even the random ones.
14/05/2010 at 14:01 Malibu Stacey says:
nocrits disables random crits only. Stuff like kritzkrieg, backburner etc. still work as before (and are thus more powerful for it accordingly).
Random crits are pointless. Funny how you complain about nade spam but advocate random crits. It’s almost irony.
14/05/2010 at 14:09 Oak says:
Random crits are not pointless, and certainly not comparable to the war crime that is grenade spam.
14/05/2010 at 14:13 Malibu Stacey says:
That’s funny as I’ve never found nade (or rocket) spam to be a problem except on servers with random crits on. Guess I must be doing it wrong.
13/05/2010 at 03:30 Xian says:
I concur with Dave L. and it is my theory that Theory has never played portal since he obviously doesn’t recognize the familiar orange and blue… Oh wait, that’s right. PORTALS.
13/05/2010 at 03:42 nukenin Hidan says:
salut à tous ceux qui comprendront ça! si j ai bien compris la video leur serveur (config) permet de contourner le systeme valve en parentant des objets genre le portail ou les chapeaux! enfin bref! c est peut etre amusant mais vla les défaut
-anti jeu le mec qui va ou il veut vla le bordel en plus le systeme de portail on peut jeter l inge a la poubelle ce qui me déplairait fortement
-triche gagne des chapeaux plus rapidement si ils sont ataché aux joueurs (serveur) et ceux qui craft ils se pendent ? et ceux qui jouent longtemps ils se pendent aussi?
faudrait ajouter tout ça comme commande interdite du sv_cheats
toujours le bordel les mecs qui inventent des trucs ! pas de game-play j espere que tout ça sera supprimé (comment prendre team fortress 2 au serieux sinon?
13/05/2010 at 07:43 TeeJay says:
My translation:
Hello to all those who will understand this! If I have understood the video correctly their server (configuration) bypasses Valve’s system and permits objects like portals or hats! To summarise: it might be amusing but here are some problems:
- Griefers going wherever they want = chaos plus with a system of portals you might as well scrap the engineer, I really don’t like this.
- Cheaters gaining hats faster if they connect to these servers and people who craft can screw themsleves, along with those who have been playing for a long time?
It would be necessary to add all this to the banned sv_cheat consol commands.
People always mess things up when they invent stuff (but?) not game-play. I hope all this will be got rid of (otherwise how can I take TF2 seriously?).
++++++++++++
Sorry if I have got things wrong, I am relying on 20-year-old school lessons plus google etc.
13/05/2010 at 13:22 Tei says:
“People always mess things up when they invent stuff (but?) not game-play. I hope all this will be got rid of (otherwise how can I take TF2 seriously?).”
This trigger all my alarms. Theres a group of players that not only ignore mods, but don’t want mod to ever exist. On these people ideas, modding is somehow a type of cheating. (??). Ironic, because Team Fortress itself is a mod itself.
13/05/2010 at 15:28 Malibu Stacey says:
2 different types of mods Tei. One is creating a whole new game using the engine (and SDK created for this exact purpose) of another game. What we have here is server side plugins changing the original game slightly.
Pretty different scenarios & you’re clever enough not to mix them up by accident.
13/05/2010 at 17:13 Vandelay says:
It is quite sad that we don’t see quite so many of the former mods anymore. I’m all for those existing and I really enjoyed some of the early ones that came out for Half Life 2 (Dystopia and Plan of Attack being the ones that immediately spring to mind,) as well as many of the classic ones from Half Life. Unfortunately, the creativity seems to be much harder for people to put into place nowadays and the tech behind these games is so complex that the mods never seem to emerge. Modding was an exciting scene that always developed some of the most interesting projects.
Instead, we end up having to put up with the more annoying mods, such as ranking that doesn’t work very well, altered gravity, increased ammo, changed spawn times, faster firing weapons and numerous other wank ideas that some people thought would be cool, when all they end up doing is destroying the balance of the game for people that just want to play the game that a developer has spent months fine tuning.
A separate tab for these games would be so much better, but it is something that server owners don’t want. I remember seeing arguments about this very topic on the always fun Steam L4D2 forums, where the vast majority shouted down someone saying they wanted an option to avoid such servers as they claimed no one would then play on their servers. I’ve even seen people in such discussions defending the use of a mod that removes the ability to call a vote to return to lobby! They just don’t seem to understand the reasons why people would not want to play on these servers.
13/05/2010 at 20:34 Tei says:
“2 different types of mods Tei. One is creating a whole new game using the engine (and SDK created for this exact purpose) of another game. What we have here is server side plugins changing the original game slightly.”
I get it. The hate originate on mods designed to make the experience of a server different from other server (maybe gravity, health, speed, or other stuff). But people sould not blame modders. Modding is good, open new options. You have to hate the interface, that is not good enough to let you select servers that provide a “faithfull” experience to vanilla version. To a point I suspect most servers are modded in a way or another.
EMBRACE THE DIFFERENCE!. I say.
I would love to change the mind of all these people that don’t want to play something different than vanilla, but I can’t, and I must respect these people wills, options, desires. Is hard to me.
But thats not my point, my point is the the Very Existence of these people make me really sad. Is even more sad on the console world, where any trait of modding is marked as cheating. I think no modder whatsoever has made a mod with the only purpose of cheat. Modders just want to provide new experiences. GOD DAMNIT, THESE PEOPLE DESERVE A BIT OF LOVE, EVEN IF TAINT YOUR BELOVED VANILLA EXPERIENCE!!
14/05/2010 at 14:10 Malibu Stacey says:
Vandelay, VALVe have essentially implemented that in a ninja manner. They delist servers which people don’t stick around enough on. See the blog post explaining it here -> http://www.teamfortress.com/post.php?id=2338&p=5
13/05/2010 at 03:44 A-Scale says:
WHERE IS MY ENGINEER UPDATE.
13/05/2010 at 03:54 Mr. Quackers says:
Yes, yes you are….
13/05/2010 at 04:23 Mad Doc MacRae says:
Hopefully valve keeps updating stuff because it’s driving off all the people who take the game too seriously, which is excellent.
13/05/2010 at 04:41 make my bub bubs BOUNCE says:
if youre bored of TF2 try PIRATES VIKINGS AND KNIGHTS !
13/05/2010 at 06:04 rugh says:
WAY TO GO HATS. way to go.
13/05/2010 at 06:27 Raiderzz says:
So if this they allow this will the heavy have a cake instead of a sandvich??
13/05/2010 at 07:08 Andrew says:
A yo dawg is perfect for this situation. Anyone on that?
13/05/2010 at 08:10 coca cola says:
hehe engi should get it ^^
13/05/2010 at 09:31 Sarlix says:
Presumably you can fire weapons through the portals too? Like rockets and sticky bombs. How about setting up a sentry in-front of a portal, would it be able to track players walking past the other side I wonder? The possibilities make my head spin.
13/05/2010 at 15:31 Malibu Stacey says:
Nope.
These aren’t Portals like in the game Portal. They’re func_teleports with Portal effects added to make them appear roughly like the Portals like in the game Portal. Very different & they’ve even made them destructable by damaging them with weapons.
13/05/2010 at 16:55 Dave says:
Awww. Was hoping you could portal sentries around with it. :D
13/05/2010 at 19:10 Sarlix says:
Me too man. [sad face]
13/05/2010 at 10:01 Shotgun says:
This would mean the blue spy could put a portal at his base and sneak into the red base steal the intel and put the other portal there. Then distroy the portals once hes gone through them :P
To easy
13/05/2010 at 12:35 Malcolm says:
You could make it impossible to carry the intel through a portal (or prevent you entering a portal with the intel – much like the existing teleporters in fact).
Anyway, interesting idea but it all looks a bit chaotic. Probably a fun blast for a bit though.
13/05/2010 at 11:12 i74s says:
Oo its so unacceptable. BAN them all !!!
13/05/2010 at 11:26 Brumisator says:
So…nobody remembers the exite mod from 2006, or the garry’s mod portal gun from 2008?
Or the simple way to play all source games by importing the maps into portal?
I don’t see the “wow” factor here, it’s just about breaking tf2.
13/05/2010 at 12:48 Labfiend | 3-PG says:
The full story is that the modder for the 3PG community (Pawn) had been working on this since the day Portal 2 was announced and didn’t intend on letting anybody know until it was much further along. However, valve put a policy in place last month that bans custom items from being given to players, in an effort to stop servers from giving people valve made hats. He was ready to scrap the whole thing until we found a temporary hack to bypass the ban and now he just wants to show off what he has done while he still can.
I have heard rumors that valve has as of last night started reversing this policy, so now we can get back to work polishing this thing up for a full public release. From the way Pawn talks I assume the full version will be exclusive for a month or so then released publicly.
A few things that I don’t believe are mentioned in the video:
-The portals can be destroyed by shooting them, so if the enemy is doing something like setting up a portal between the two flag rooms you can just shoot the portals and shatter them. The current HP is about that of a sentry but it can changed to make it fair.
-The gun physically replaces the secondary weapon for the classes that get them. The medic and spy don’t get them as the game treats the medigun and the diguise kit as their respective secondaries.
-The third person view in the video is just for demonstration to show that it is indeed in TF2.
-It is apparently possible to add textures that are immune to portals in the map editor, so a map made specifically for the mod would hopefully be grief proof.
-The intention is to make this a whole new game mode with its own unique maps designed around the new gameplay.
-At this point the early alpha version shown in the video is only available on our secret internal test server. I would rather open the test server up to the public, but the others prefer not to let most people use it until it is further along.
13/05/2010 at 13:26 Nimic says:
I love Portal, and I love TF2, but I find myself completely underwhelmed and uninterested in this, for some reason.
It might make me go play regular TF2 again, though, which I haven’t played for quite a few months now. Then again, that’s the way it’s been since it came out. Play it all the time, don’t play it for a while, play it all the time, etc.
13/05/2010 at 13:42 Bogdan says:
Good bye Teleporter and hello portal!
13/05/2010 at 16:56 Dave says:
Need a portal here! Need a portal here! Need a portal here! Need a portal here! Need a portal here! Need a portal here! Need a portal here! Need a portal here!
13/05/2010 at 13:47 Rinox says:
@ John
The hats are only causing problems because of people who are obsessed with them and have the OCD disease (gotta catch ‘em all!). Don’t diss the hats or Valve idea of putting them in there, ditch the kiddies and OCD freaks for making them such a big issue. Because for all normal players who don’t take TF2 too seriously, they’re a pretty fun extra.
13/05/2010 at 13:52 mrrobsa says:
@Vandelay:
I’ve got quite a few servers favourited which play with standard respawn, player cap, no stupid server plugins etc. Exactly as Valve made it. They have the unlocks too, so I can’t help if you wanted to play without those. Have you tried searching for ‘vanilla’ server tags? I could sort you out some IPs if you have no luck (I am in London, so the servers I use get good pings for me, dunno where you’re based man).
Still hopelessly in love with TF2.
As for these portals, respect for the implementation, think there’d need to be some sort of cooldown after use if they were to give them to everyone in an MP game or some other balancing tool.
And Mr. Walker: “Can I once more go on record saying that the hats in TF2 are the stupidest thing ever, that have caused more problems than anyone could ever have imagined for something quite so unimportant.”
I thought you were a gentlemanne sir, but I see now you are an uncouth commoner. A pox upon thee!
(I am delighted with my shiny new Spy magistrate’s wig :D )
13/05/2010 at 15:17 Vandelay says:
I think I have looked for vanilla tagged servers before, but I was never certain whether those contained unlocks or not. I always mean to add the good ones to my favourites tab, but they are so few and far between I always end up forgetting to do it.
If you could PM me some good servers (names would be fine, should be able to find them,) that would really be much appreciated. I’m UK based too, so ping shouldn’t be an issue if they are good for you.
13/05/2010 at 16:03 Malibu Stacey says:
I didn’t care much for hats. Until a few weeks ago when I received the Towering Pillar of Hats in a random drop.
Tarnish notte the majesty of my TOWER of HATS.
14/05/2010 at 12:39 mrrobsa says:
@Vandelay:
Theres a PM function somewhere on this doohickey?!
OK so the best server IMO is Uberium – UK Public Server
But also great are: PC Gamer
Lokalen TF2 #01 & #03 (though one of these I think might have recently changed to no-crits)
Hampshire Heavies #1 & #2
SpecialAttack.net :: All maps #1 & #2
Theres a Eurogamer.net server I’ve got favourited but thats always been empty but could be alright I imagine.
I think this French (boo) server is OK, been a while since I went there: [FR] Communaute CPC – Uber
Hope that helps!
Add me if you like, my Steam ID is mrr0bsa
13/05/2010 at 16:29 NightWolf says:
I could see this as being something fun to play after playing the real TF2 maps…that’s basically what we do with Prophunt…sorta breaks up the grind a little…
We do run an unmodded server and are always looking for new people to come play…check us out on –
http://www.taw.net
TAW – The Art of Warfare, is multi national and we have over 900+ members playing several different games, TF2 being one of them…the TF2 Division has servers in the US and in the UK…always looking for more friends for fun and frags…stop on in and tell ‘em Wolf sent you…
13/05/2010 at 17:05 Hug A Probe says:
It takes ALOT to even make a portal or this game, so complaining that its not impresive is very rude. I would LOVE to see u make a portal game not using there engine,but making your own,and make it have awesome mutliplayer, =.= i would really like to see if it would work and if it did how ur view point would be after. Also :D awesome idea.i would toaly give up hates and junk just to use that,but have the portal thing in a different mode or something not give it to everyone on every sever, that would be terrible. Also i think u can’t see threw th portals as well because think about it. A spy cause just watch everyone by shooting a protal ont he roof or something. then drop down and kill everyone,with the vision of th eportal cut off u can’t see where ur going thus,an enemy could pop threw the portal as u pop threw the portal and just make a base swap and u can just see what the enemy is doing once again lol.
13/05/2010 at 21:54 Avandas says:
I Really Hate this MOD !!! i Cant imagine Anyone spending more than 5 hours of gameplay !!! with portal gun…
-1
13/05/2010 at 22:17 Hmm-Hmm. says:
Hats are important. Apparently.
14/05/2010 at 00:33 Fear57 says:
This game is now dead.
14/05/2010 at 05:27 leo says:
I aggree with you.
shizlburger
14/05/2010 at 06:39 FATE says:
OMG IMA JACK OFF TO THIS AWESOMENESS!!!!!!! OH GETTING SO SORE…………YEA!!!!!!
i want this. so much
14/05/2010 at 08:03 C. says:
It might be a good thing, if the winning team gets one (only one person)
14/05/2010 at 10:25 PJ says:
Well I do have to say its impressive in terms of a concept and i also agree that the idea of a portalgun combined with the gravgun and the grapple would lead to hours of fun… although I dont see why we would have to get silly with the base idea… Ok so base the portal system on that of a rubics cube with each square on the rubics cube representing a room in the game.. constantly moving in a random rubix style then use the portal gun to jump between rooms etc.. whilst introducing fun items to grapple too and swing on. Obviously you could introduce gravity variences in each room and a little 3d map showing you which room your in of the matrix. becons that can be dropped as a portal return point for speed and introduce hold the fort(room)/ capture the flag/ team death match etc… now there is some multiplayer mischief! This would also allow campers and move shoot gamers to co-exist as the room moves regardless of if you do or not! I would love to see the rooms based on the tron type of graphic all neon and dark with modern lighting and transform effects. I would also like an included peice of software that autowraps a standard photo to a 3d head type and allows the player to have there own in game avatar/player! wicked!! Finaly software as a developers pack that easily lets you design your own cube sets and rooms with downloadable content and addons this could be quite the next gen 4 dimensional game … or is my concept alteration just jibberish?
14/05/2010 at 18:44 Labfiend says:
Public test this weekend! Anybody that wants to come is welcome! First come first serve, as we’ll only be doing this on one server. See our steam group or website for details.
14/05/2010 at 20:58 Dragonboyjgh says:
did I just see 3 blue portals on the filed at once? How do you know which one you come out of? “Oh, look a stupid sniper left the portal up behind him. I’ll just go through too and beat his little head in!” *goes in. Comes out in front of a Heavy with Mini-gun* “Güd Times! Cry sahm moar!”
15/05/2010 at 11:05 Kuusi says:
How this could also work, is that you’d place a portal in the enemy base / spawn point, then put another portal to a safe place, then start bombing the portal and all the fire is coming to the other place! (Not necessarily in spawn points, but any ideal spot where enemies usually go, however this is only if bullets really go through the portal o.O).
15/05/2010 at 15:51 Labfiend says:
Currently we have it so the portals take damage from projectiles instead of having projectiles go through. This is so if someone tries to set up a portal you dont like you can shatter it. It is possible that we may add the possibility for projectiles to come through later.
15/05/2010 at 19:11 Squanto says:
I agree. If you want to have Team Portress, just import the TF2 maps into Portal and fire away.
17/05/2010 at 22:48 cody says:
saying that would be same as saying team fortress 2 is boring all its doing, no all its meant to do is add some more stratagy to the game not turn it into something new.
18/05/2010 at 04:46 Steve says:
I see Portical problems
20/05/2010 at 01:51 paincode says:
now i after watching this clip i have noticed you haven’t added anything visually to show what stops height damage, it would make sense to at least add the leg springs but only ones that activate after going through a portal so as to not destroy another part of the original game………oh wait…….instant respawn mod……never mind.
22/05/2010 at 05:25 Lionelion says:
you know, i was just thinking about how cool it would be to have the portal gun in TF2, and here we are!
08/08/2010 at 14:29 teamorfitea says:
can dont download this game or not ??? all crazy team portal
08/08/2010 at 14:40 killerwhatj says:
pls help me to download game me are admin me can dont download game help help
!!! /admin abbe
08/08/2010 at 14:43 killerwhatj says:
and all must shut up to team portal shut up pls i ban all
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! /admin abbe
18/09/2010 at 07:01 dollar stores says:
can dont download this game or not ??? all crazy team portal
01/12/2010 at 21:16 Icechen1 says:
Whoa, this is awesome!
01/12/2010 at 21:18 Icechen1 says:
This is pretty awesome!