Evening Reading

The StarCraft II beta is back, but was quite broken last night. Sad face. I did get a chance to check out the new achievements added to the game and they look fun. Still, everyone is probably too mad about Real ID to care about the actual game anymore.

I also (finally) got my iPhone 4 today. I'll let you all know if I have the reception issues.

Gaming News o'the Day

All the rest

From The Chatty
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    July 8, 2010 5:02 PM

    Wrench #100 just got awarded, so Engie update is on!

    http://www.teamfortress.com/engineerupdate/

    New reveal is the Gunslinger, a glove that replaces the pistol and lets you toss Mini Sentries as you go. Also achievements still confirm you can repack buildings, haul them , and redeploy them elsewhere.

    Still waiting for Guitar news.

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      July 8, 2010 5:02 PM

      I want this update now..... NAO dammit

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      July 8, 2010 5:03 PM

      gunslinger replaces the wrench.

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        July 8, 2010 5:04 PM

        wtf didn't it say pistol like 10 minutes ago?

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          July 8, 2010 5:04 PM

          [deleted]

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          July 8, 2010 5:05 PM

          I thought so too..wrench makes more sense though.

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            July 8, 2010 5:07 PM

            yeah wrench makes a lot more sense, giving up the pistol is well worth that tradeoff, but without the wrench you become offense only with maybe a support dispenser/sentry (assuming you can still use them). though I suppose a defensive engie could tend/upgrade them.

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            July 8, 2010 5:07 PM

            well, if you had multiple engies on a team, an engy with gunslinger could be an offensive engineer, where he builds his main sentry for defense, and let's a non-GS-engy build it up/repair it for him, meanwhile the GS-engy goes around putting harassing mini-sentries around

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              July 8, 2010 5:09 PM

              you could also build up your stuff yourself during setup and then switch to the gunslinger later. as long as an engie stays back to tend them it would work out pretty well I think (though he could have lots of spy troubles with double the amount of buildings to worry about)

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              July 8, 2010 5:14 PM

              I think it's great, engies were far too defensive of a class, now it can be on the front lines as well, it balances the class more. I might actually play engineer now.

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              July 8, 2010 5:15 PM

              can you have both a gunslinger and be able to build regular sentries?

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                July 8, 2010 5:16 PM

                I doubt it. Without the wrench, you're not gonna be able to upgrade them anyway.

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                  July 8, 2010 5:17 PM

                  the real trick is to see how 2+ engineers can interact. engineering is no longer a solitary death sentence

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                July 8, 2010 5:26 PM

                No, either Regular Sentries, or Gunslinger + Mini Sentries. My wonderment is: Can you manually direct mini-sentries with the Wrangler? Seems like, as that's a pistol replacement.

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                July 8, 2010 5:53 PM

                I don't see why you can't without actually trying. Deploying a sentry is your toolbox - you just can't repair and reload it w/o the wrench, but with other engies out there...

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        July 8, 2010 5:07 PM

        An Engie without his wrench is like a Demoman without his Scotch.

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        July 8, 2010 5:18 PM

        gunslinger will be great for arenas

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      July 8, 2010 5:04 PM

      Update isn't live yet :(

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      July 8, 2010 5:07 PM

      good to see some of those folks have some time invested. a LOT of noobs came out of the woodworks for this :(

      I wanted one, the glory of an uber WRENCH RUSH turning people to gold will largely go missing since I didn't get it

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        July 8, 2010 5:11 PM

        You realize you have to kill them to turn them to gold right? It's not like they instantly turn to gold or something. It really isn't that special other than there only being 100 in the world.

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          July 8, 2010 5:12 PM

          I realize that fully. like many other TF2 items, it's hilarious and fun. I want to uber gold wrench rush. it also crits like a motherfucker, so there would be some serious gold statues of awesomeness.

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      July 8, 2010 5:12 PM

      and we still have yet to see what the community wrench does

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      July 8, 2010 5:12 PM

      where is guitar?

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        July 8, 2010 5:15 PM

        Why did anyone think there was a guitar as an actual item? I always thought if anything that it would be a new taunt where the engineer pulls out a guitar.

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          July 8, 2010 5:19 PM

          Well, there's an achievement where you play the guitar and another where you kill someone with it by bashing it over their heads. I'm ok with it being a taunt thing too. Should be funny to see in action if it can be used to kill people.

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      July 8, 2010 5:15 PM

      DOWNLOADING :D

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      July 8, 2010 5:15 PM

      Steam Servers too busy to handle your request

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        July 8, 2010 5:16 PM

        same here :(

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          July 8, 2010 5:21 PM

          try again!! Its updating for me (it did that for like 10 mins for me, too)

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        July 8, 2010 5:26 PM

        I typically have better luck getting downloads to start if I just try to start the game.

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          July 8, 2010 5:29 PM

          That's what happens when I try starting the game even after restarting steam

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        July 8, 2010 5:27 PM

        I usually just switch to some European country and it works.

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        July 8, 2010 5:31 PM

        [deleted]

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        July 8, 2010 5:31 PM

        What the hell, TF2 was not set to automatically update, I wonder if a previous update did that. I switched the option and now it's downloading.

        Even says there was an update on the properties tab.

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      July 8, 2010 5:17 PM

      Gunslinger will be great for Arenas

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        July 8, 2010 5:17 PM

        ugh supposed to be a reply to pyide

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      July 8, 2010 5:17 PM

      [deleted]

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      July 8, 2010 5:17 PM

      too busy to handle my request!?!? Valve, you better fucking MAKE time to handle my requests!

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        July 8, 2010 5:24 PM

        Restarting steam seems to work

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      July 8, 2010 5:19 PM

      Full Changelog

      http://store.steampowered.com/news/4043/

      Engine
      - Fixed client crash related flashlight usage.
      - Fixed several issues related to alt-tabbing (invisible players, etc).

      Team Fortress 2
      - Added The Frontier Justice.
      - Added The Wrangler.
      - Added The Gunslinger.
      - Added The Southern Hospitality.
      - Added 35 Engineer achievements.
      - Engineers can now pickup & move their buildings.
      - Added Engineer main menu music.
      - Added 4 new maps:
      *** Thunder Mountain, a 3 stage Payload map.
      *** Hightower, a Payload Race map.
      *** Upward, a Payload map.
      *** ColdFront, a community built Capture Point map.
      - Item tuning:
      *** The Sandvich now uses a cooldown timer, instead of the health pack recharge mechanic.
      *** The Gunboats now reduce self-damage by 60% (was 75%)
      *** The Tribalman's Shiv bleed duration reduced to 6 second (was 8), and its damage penalty increased to 50% (was 35%).
      - Added better feedback sound for Pyros on when their flamethrower is doing damage.
      - Fixed blood effect on bleeding player.
      - Added a glow effect to Payload carts.
      - Added Romanian language support.

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      July 8, 2010 5:24 PM

      550 MB

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      July 8, 2010 5:30 PM

      Look at that graph hit the top! http://store.steampowered.com/stats/content/

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        July 8, 2010 5:33 PM

        Even when it's down Steam is always slow for me, no matter which server i choose. :(

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          July 8, 2010 5:34 PM

          I was pulling 6.2mb/s last night. Couldn't believe it. Some days steam just flys.

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            July 8, 2010 5:36 PM

            I can get full speed from US fine, even youtube is pretty fast. :(

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      July 8, 2010 5:32 PM

      so now that the update is out i have to go and find the items? :(

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      July 8, 2010 5:35 PM

      remember to change your download location in steam's settings to get better speeds. Ukraine is doing wonders for me right now, though I have to sleep :(

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        July 8, 2010 5:36 PM

        [deleted]

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        July 8, 2010 5:42 PM

        Yeah, I moved to Ireland for the duration of the download.

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        July 8, 2010 5:43 PM

        Ukraine is working well so far. thanks. made me restart tho :(

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        July 8, 2010 6:06 PM

        ty sir switzerland is beast and I am done!

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        July 8, 2010 6:49 PM

        Remember to change it back through. I forget to switch to back from Russia and kept getting weird people joining my L4D games and high ping servers.

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      July 8, 2010 5:41 PM

      Cart glow is pretty cool, gives you an outline like seeing teammates through walls and whatnot in L4D.

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        July 8, 2010 5:46 PM

        that's a nice touch :)

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        July 8, 2010 5:48 PM

        Picking up deployed stuff is just a matter of right-clicking it. You get a blueprint to lay it out just like when you first built it, and it takes about 3 seconds to be re-built, keeping whatever upgrade level it had before. Whacking it with a hammer doesn't seem to speed up the re-deploy speed.

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      July 8, 2010 5:49 PM

      Is Dallas updated yet?

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      July 8, 2010 6:00 PM

      [deleted]

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      July 8, 2010 6:09 PM

      Can't stop laughing at the hordes of engineers

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        July 8, 2010 6:23 PM

        hrmm I should jump in some games and get some non-Engie class Engie-building-destruction/Engie-owning achievements tonight...

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          July 8, 2010 6:27 PM

          It's a great time to be a spy!

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        July 8, 2010 8:02 PM

        [deleted]

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      July 8, 2010 6:13 PM

      SERVER?

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      July 8, 2010 6:25 PM

      [deleted]

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      July 8, 2010 8:10 PM

      So much fun. Thunder Mountain is great, featuring these tilted sections where the cart will go downhill by itself if not pushed. They make for great inflection points.

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        July 8, 2010 9:24 PM

        Goddamn and the final stage is incredible.

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      July 8, 2010 9:13 PM

      anyone else lose the menu music with this update?

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      July 8, 2010 9:38 PM

      rydogg you need to update the rtv maps so we can play the new ones.

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      July 8, 2010 11:29 PM

      the new maps are tremendous

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      July 8, 2010 11:31 PM

      love the gun slinger. love love love it. frontier justice is nice, but i wouldn't mind not having it at all.

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        July 8, 2010 11:34 PM

        Frontier Justice really makes the engineer a threat if I don't incidentally kill them while blowing up the sentry.

        On a side note, playing soldier is really fun since everyone else is going engineer to try and get the achievements.

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      July 8, 2010 11:42 PM

      At this point I feel like the Guitar might be a new taunt, perhaps the Engineer's kill taunt.

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      July 9, 2010 5:07 AM

      Ok the new payload race map is seriously awesome, just played on it for like 2 hours.

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