Page 43 - PC Gamer - UK (February 2020)

GAMES OF THE DECADE

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HI ST OR Y HAL L OF F AME EA R L Y A C C E S S I LO CA L P L A Y TA C T I C S I PREDICTIO NS

TEAM FORTRESS 2

RELEASED October 10, 2007 | DEVELOPER Valve | PUBLISHER In-house
Evan: Between 2009 and 2012, Valve subjected its FPS
to an amount of change and experimentation that
would have killed a lesser game. What launched as the
stylish comeback of a 1999 shooter became a guinea pig
for Valve’s ideas and larger initiatives. In the process,
RED vs BLU became a platform for inventive
storytelling, new technology, and business models that
would change Steam and PC gaming forever.
Crawl through the list of 684 updates (and
counting), and you notice the escalating pokes, prods
and full-body transplants Valve performed on TF2.
In 2011, ‘going free-to-play’ was an unusual move
for any FPS, and for western-developed games in
general. Team Fortress 2’s shift from a paid game to
now-mainstream microtransaction model invited other
developers to adopt the same scheme. But the genius
FORTNITE was the way TF2 entangled narrative with all of these
changes. The surprise addition of co-op to a five-year-
old competitive game wasn’t a gimmick, it was an
invasion of robots within a surprisingly intricate family
RELEASED July 25, 2017 | DEVELOPER Epic | PUBLISHER In-house
feud storyline paired with its own trailer, ARG, free
webcomic, cosmetic items, microsite, and special set of
James: Who said it? Who at Epic Xbox Live, or Googled ‘free PC “Machievements”. A replay system wasn’t just a new
Games – during whatever meeting games’, Fortnite was there. feature, but the debut of an annual community film
about the questionable outlook of its Fortnite was poised to be a festival. Winners would receive one of the rarest
cooperative base building game temporary craze, but Epic kept it in-game items: the Saxxy, an Oscar trophy wieldable as
finally entering early access after growing with an unprecedented a melee weapon, and the golden incarnation of TF2’s
nearly seven years in development, update schedule, introducing new insane obsession with Australia.
announced in 2011 and delayed weapons, items, vehicles and major This is the true impact of TF2: using storytelling to
multiple times since – who said, balance changes on a near-weekly add meaning to game updates. We see it in every major
“Maybe we could basis. In-game competitive game that’s followed. Fortnite’s ambitious
turn it into UNLIKE PUBG, events like the brand cameos are built on TF2’s playful hat tie-ins.
PUBG?”. There’s meteor impact or Usually lab rats die off. Instead, these mutations
never been such a FORTNITE: BATTLE epic mecha vs kaiju made TF2 stronger, and the entire industry learned
rapid, derivative, battle took Team from Valve’s discoveries.
and successful ROYALE WAS AND Fortress 2’s
pivot: Fortnite’s narrative and
barebones battle STILL IS FREE- update integration
royale mode was to a new damn
made in two TO-PLAY dimension.
months. And it Fortnite was
wasn’t even good. already massive,
But, unlike the but then Ninja
then-phenom PUBG, Fortnite: Battle streamed with Drake. Suddenly,
Royale was and still is free-to-play. It Fortnite wasn’t just how you became
didn’t matter that the building system a successful Twitch streamer, it was
wasn’t made for twitch shooting in a how you became a star. In just a few
100-person free-for-all or that the years, the game legitimised a new
map began as a featureless wasteland. kind of celebrity, changed what we
What mattered is that when kids expect from F2P and service-based
with no money logged into PSN, games, and made flossing cool.

AUG 1 , 201 2 OCT 18, 2012 OCT 25, 2012
OCULUS RIF T STAR CITIZEN FROG FR AC TIONS
Oculus VR releases The space epic For a week we’re all
its f first virtual reality launches its baffled by a
hea dset, in the Kickstarter, raising nonsensical
proc cess kicking off a over $2 million. Its educational browser
mo dern wave of crowdfunding game that unfolds
d
con sumer virtual campaign continues into a surreal journey
real lity technology… to this day, and the that defies all genre
and motion sickness. game still isn’t out. and convention.

FEBRUARY 2020 43