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Blogheads rise up! We're cutting through the malaise of this not-quite-standalone, not-quite-Steam transition period to tell you about the TF2C Mapping Community's new Custom Map Wednesdays.

Custom map servers often fall victim to the tragedy of the commons. When confronted by a vote-list of 80 maps they've never played or seen before, most players will just vote for whatever sounds funniest. Thus, people who are bored of official maps, but also don't want to irradiate their SSD by forcing it to download pl_fartworld_rc2 or arena_hogsucker_b5, have nowhere to go for highbrow novelty.

But no longer. Starting Wednesday, September 17th, AltTAB's custom map servers will be running a locked rotation of 10 maps every week—selected at random from a curated high-quality map pool. If you join the TF2C Mapping Community Discord server, you can select a role that will notify you every Wednesday when the switchover happens, so that you and all the other novelty perverts can hop onto the AltTAB custom map server and try the new batch with a full lobby. If you like the maps, stick around all week and play them to death. If you don't, sit on your hands until the next Wednesday.

Pull out your blog-reader issued BlogPhone® and scan the QR code above (or click here) to join the TF2C Mapping Community Discord and make those arrangements!

Image from comptf2c.com, credit Güven

It's been a minute! The process of getting TF2 Classic ready for Steam is involved and laborious. Or so I'm told from the team members actually doing it. I just write blog posts here. (Expect a more detailed Steam progress report soon!)

Last summer, we spotlighted the TF2C Competitive Discord. To reiterate, CompTF2C offers traditional TF2-style competitive gameplay with TF2 Classic's improved gamefeel and unique weapon/map library. The comp plugins are specially tailored to TF2C — Highlander factors in a team's Civilian when a match includes VIP or VIPR maps, teams' starting points in Territorial Domination are standardized, and (at time of writing) all our weapons are allowed.

This summer, we want to get you up to speed on where they've been:

• CompTF2C's official website and blog, comptf2c.com, is the primo source of information about TF2 Classic's competitive scene. Rules, ladders, and installation guides are all there.
• Starting May 30th, CompTF2C is teaming up with the TF2C Mapping Community — see last summer's spotlight — for an event called the HAMMER MONTH. (All-caps is mandatory.) For three weekends throughout June, competitive pick-up games in the Discord will take place on gorgeous community-made maps. Great opportunity to get into the hobbyist comp scene if you're timid, since vets won't be able to outplay you with layout knowledge.

Get involved! There's probably no better time to buy in.

Today is Saint Valentine's Day. And—believe us, we know. Things have been moving steadily over the past decade. It's hard for us to believe it's been that long, ourselves. We've put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into our relationship with you, the fans, and ensuring that things are healthy between us. But the best way to rejuvenate from a bad fever has always been with a new update and a fancy short to pair it with. Not that there's anything that a sandwich and some healing-plasma couldn't fix, however we'd be remiss not to mention our enamorment with the response we've gotten to our new update. But Cupid, who's surprisingly Australian, has instead been doubling down on ammunition. Yes, while his relevantly heart-shaped arrows are deadly, they're also arrows sent to their victims with love. And with all the love that's in the air, it'd be hard for us not to come clean with our own feelings.

There's been many ways that we've been able to share our love for our fans, and the dedication to our craft through our work; including the posts we've made here. Naturally, now that everyone can flame where they aim, we want to keep providing that kind of content to you in ways that help add to our collective insight. As developers, there's many things we've learned through our mistakes and our successes over our years making this grand modification. But the best way for us to maintain that? Is through our upcoming developer blog posts, little letters of love we'll be delivering to you all with more frequency going forward. Like a volley of heart-shaped arrowheads, that's the future we're delivering to all of you through this blog. And now our hope is that you'll learn just as much as we have through the years to come.

We love that you love our game. And we love that you loved this new update. And the short? We love that you love that too. There's plenty of love to go around this season, and "Cupid" won't be running out of those lovingly hazardous arrows any time soon. So this Valentine's Day, let's all enjoy ourselves with a few close matches of our favorite levels with a bit of domination and revenge along the way. After all, there's only so much time left to enjoy the love the day gives, when Lupercalia comes in the 'morrow. Like an eager pyromaniac slowly sharpening their scythe, that day is where more warmhearted violence may come.