KritzKast

TF2 modder, InstantMuffin, joins us to talk about his and Stice’s creation Prophunt TNG. The update drought has ended with a fairly liberal smattering of fixes and improvements. 3A releases images of their new Robot Pyro model. In the community there’s fan made greetings cards, lego classes, hand carved models and the truth behind the end of the line. Speaking of which we also bring you further news of the EotL map.

This week we disprove that old adage, “two items added to the UGC Higlander whitelist does not a podcast make.” Also worthy of note is that they defiantly haven’t been testing the End of the Line map. Exclusive to KritzKast, FRaGiMuS_MaX reveals part 1 of his 6 year effort to bring his Team Fortress Universe to life. Sin has his own Sunday production now, though there’s some descorde between presenters as to whether this constitutes content or just more of the same from him. And lastly Babies. Need I say more? No.

It seems fitting that in a week were only the things were changed in the updates we have only three hosts to share them with you. Tempest, Chronos and Agro; far from TF2 n00bs themselves share this distinctly n00bish flavoured show. Starting with the next of the Valve “bi-monthly” comics. This of course came out a month from the last one, just in time for free comic book day. Now that everyone is up to speed on the comic books it’s time to bring your friends up to speed on the game itself thanks to DYKGaming. When your friends know everything, but are woefully lacking in experience enter them in the Highlander Open. You final mission is to sit everyone down, even you, in front of Muselk’s Mythbusters videos to complete your understanding of TF2.

Joining us on the show this week we have Zemnmez, the second person to get a unusual hat given to him by valve because he found security loopholes in steam. He joins us this week as another unusual has been given out that has caused a bit of a ruckus. Exploits all round as we discuss what they did to earn said hat and also an exploit you can try at home. With very little else this week, we discuss the minor changes in the latest update (unless your Australian, in which case,they are,minor changes). We also show you a hud in development and the latest news on the end of the line.

There’s a new generation on the horizon. TF2lobby has been usurped by TF2Center, we are joined by Foxy and Mastern00b to help explain the reason for their site. Steam have been attracting attention recently. Steam Guard was broken and it looks like the controller for their Steam Machine will be out in Fall (Valve time). An exploit for using the Giftapult as a key was found and reported in.  In other Valve news; the 3A Sandvich is back in stock and we have new ETF2L medals. There’s a new version of Prophunt to look out for. Wolfenstein has some pre-release promo items, Die Regime-Panzerung and Der Maschinensoldaten-Helm. Finally here’s an April Fool’s joke you may have missed, the Bush Belly.

So that’s both new maps and new weapons confirmed as coming with the “End of the Line” update. Although James McVinnie also made it clear that there would be no new voice lines recorded for his SFM lead update. Reddit and Tumblr will be facing off again in their 2nd annual (valve time) series of matches. You can put your name down to compete here. Finally! At least that’s what you’ll all be crying when you discover there’s every HUD under the sun available for download in this new site, TF2HUDs.net  made possible by  omnibombulator. Friend of the show and prolific artist, ProtoWilson, has been busy again making this amazingly lifelike celebration of all things dead the Voodoo Juju. Finally we take a look at the new guys of TF2 let’s plays, TFTools.

It finally happened, the update we’ve been waiting for, no not end of the line, an update to our backpack and it’s interface. New crates with killstreak kits and chemistry sets. Plus strange weapons can now be placed on the market. To wrap this altogether, we also have the latest issue of the comic series. Another great read, but suddenly it starts to tie all of the lore together in a way that only sir grey can understand. Plus we’ve been shown what valve are currently working on. We’re going to the moon guys, we’re going to the moon. We also experienced April fools day this week. Some great sites that played with April fools were scrapbook.tf, tf2outpost and tf2maps. Listen to the episode to see what they did. Elsewhere we found out about the promo item that comes with the 3A robot heavy figure, we talk about skial closing servers, extremely fast artwork based on the comic, plus more epic tf2 Lego.

Last week we talked about the Meet Your Makers event that we ran, this week we talk about how valve decided to put it on the front of their blog. It’s been nearly a year since the last none valve promoted item was added to the blog. So why us? Why now? Tip of the hats also happened last weekend and raised over $100,000. They did an awesome job of making a very entertaining stream for the weekend. don’t forget to vote on their charity hat. In light of the event, star_ did an AMA on reddit, which can be found here. We also talk about TFCSA’s one night cup, princess cherry’s massive SFM picture, Doug’s ukulele and 2 great videos TF2 mythbusters and of course wub wub wub.

Joining us this week is void. Not only is he a superb contributor to tf2, but he is also the mind behind the meet your makers event we ran this week, documenting how the workshop has changed the life’s of those now earning a living from it. Also featured this week, we talk about the ongoing issues with Mann up mode, plus we look at how people are using bots to game the workshop in dota 2…But does the same issue affect tf2’s workshop? Not to mention the discovery that the level of control while turning as a charging demoknight is actually effected by the FPS on your computer……..WHAT!? However is charity is your bag, then there are 2 charity events you want to look at. The first is a Montage of market gardener kills produced by MrMuselk in a bit to get over $1000 worth of donations. The second is Tip of the hat 2 which is on this weekend. Be sure to tune in for all the sweet content they have in store for you. Also on the show is this awesome minecraft pyro (above) and out video of the week, Shrink Ray.

No update this week, not for the game anyway, but there is an update as to which NECA figure is next. It’s the smooth looking spy and the robust engineer. Both look like great additions to the collection and will be available from June. Following up from lasts week’s discussion of account hijacking and phishers, another high profile trader has been hacked (RandomBrother). Also HelenAngel has written a great guide to keeping yourself safe from these attacks. Over at TF2maps.net, they have finished the first stage (making a themed, balanced map) and have starting the 2nd stage of the mapping contest; making the maps aesthetically pleasing. While you’re clicking links here’s the HY:PE Train and our video of the week. Check out our KritzKast sub Reddit /r/KritzKast that received a huge life-pumping shock to the heart this week. We all hang out there and we’ll be looking out for your content to bring to the show.

A few maps received fixes this week, though none of that matters compared to the hugeness that is hud_combattext_batching_window. I know what you’re thinking, and yes we did explain what that means in the show. On a equally dramatic note, The Guardians of Destiny are now officially on the same network as KritzKast, “thePodkast.com“, the same place you’ll find content from Reachcast, How to Murder Time and Podtacular. Go take a listen and let us know who you want us to drag on to our show. Gabe Newell did a Reddit AMA and let slip his TF2 habits. He could be anyone! TF2maps.net drop their big Japan content pack. In trading news, Pink Taco gets hijacked, the highest value trade (in TF2’s history) goes down and Pika decides to go on the offensive with phisher fighting. We shall leave you with some excellent End of the Line themed cosplay to browse through while you listen to this week’s episode.

The best websites are the ones that when they appear you think to yourself, “I’ve been waiting for this forever” but you’re not actually sure you have been until just then. This is the case with Loadout.tf and TF2Center.com. The first a dress-up site for your classes and only really in early beta, the latter a lobby-replacement which is pushing into release candidate status. In lieu of an update Sir Grey pulls up a soapbox to give us something to think about. Mainly with regards to Premium Accounts servers, in particular how they may be breaking what’s left of TF2 community quickplay with their evil botish ways. There’s a slew of art for your attention with Pixel Medic, TF2 Lineart, Ceramic Archimedes and an updated TF2 paint swatch. Lastly ETF2L are recruiting. I know of at least two previous senior admins who’ve gone on to have careers in gaming, so if that’s what you’re aiming for, and you love TF2 there could be worse ways to spend your evenings while you listen to this week’s show.

Did you hear the news. We have an interview with Gary Schwartz. The voice of the Heavy & Demoman. Click to to listen to it now…..NOW! Of course we’ll be talking about the interview, but in this episode we’ll be talking about the Thief promo items added to the game this week. Over at facepunch, its Competition season. They’ve just finished their Arms race weapon mod contest providing the workshop with gallons of weapons for valve to look at…..and add to the game…..we hope. But they’ve started the Vehicle Prop Contest. Where people are encouraged to make props of all the possible vehicle in the TF2 univerise. Why? facepunch feels that map makers need a little more love now and again. We agree. Then there’s the lego. All the lego. Some of the things people have been making this week are amazing. Imagine a working (minus death) scatter gun made out of lego, Or PL_upward or even a gunslinger. Also take a look at the End of the Line train Gif, the trailer for the Free to Play documentary, artwork for 1 refined Plus the VIDEO OF THE WEEK

You may recognise Gary Schwartz by name alone but for those looking puzzled I’ll clue you to his clones. He’s been one half of a double act of mimes. He’s Trekked across Deep Space hundreds of times. As a kid playing in Our Town the crowd called for more! Much later he lent his voice to Pleo the dinosaur. He has acted with Hollywood hits, like Tobey Maguire, not bad for the idiot who thwarted The Quest for Fire. He’s raised over fifteen thousand dollars in his Kickstarter aims, to share with the world Viola Spolin’s Theater Games. In a Jackie Chan fight he relived his childhood, using ADV like only the Walla-Washington guys could. Got it yet? What would give it away would be sharing this memo, His is the voice of the Heavy and Demo Listen to the interview we recorded with Gary, exclusively here.

This week’s update was all about the fixes, baby. Valve adds tags to their game descriptions which means we can now officially list TF2 as hats and our guest host STAR_ can list Towns as scam.  Steam’s VAC utility seems to be tracking your domains. ==UPDATE== After recording this week’s episode Gabe Newell, CEO of Valve, released this information to reddit explaining what what going on. In the community we get to go “oo” and “ah” at DarkLitria’s interpretation of pyro as well as her more dystopian cyborg team fortress 2. We take a look at tophercrez‘s Pyromancer ceramic mask. Over in ozfortress the 9th Ultiduo event was opened, closed and played out on the same day. [update: And here’s the video, thanks to ooloops] Staying on comp for a moment, ETF2L Highlander Season 6 signups have opened. You have until Feb 27th to get your team signed up. One of our brave/reckless listeners, Voltz, had offered to compose an image of your favourite class and its loadout in SFM. Since we pushed out the message in Facebook the demand for his images was somewhat overwhelming and we were forced to lock the thread. Since then an overflow thread was opened and we’re looking for budding SFM artists to give it a go. ==UPDATE== Looks like we’ve had a couple of artists, ?UP | Darkbluematter and >{GHS}