Everybody loves free stuff. So that’s what we’ve got for you. Actually it’s ra1n you need to thank for this, with the help of the KK|GU admin team, Santa Heavy, and some friends. All the KritzKast servers will see winners over the course of about 1.5 hours on May 11, 2013 - 10AM HST / 1PM PST / 3PM CST / 4PM EST / 9PM GMT 

Every few minutes ra1n will randomly select a server, from which he’ll randomly select a winner. Check out the full details and the prize list here.

We’ll see you on the servers tonight. Or on the live stream, always.

Once again we’re asking for you to submit your questions but in the spirit of automated systems Geel9 has had a brainwave. He’s set up a section of his site where you ask questions and vote on other peoples’ submissions. If we end up using your questions you’ll win a vintage Lo-Fi Longwave and both priority and priority+ on scrap.tf for life! Even if you didn’t get your question in there’s still 100 unique Lo-Fi up for grabs. To enter that draw all you need do is vote on someone else’s question.

The competition ends midnight, Sunday 12th May (GMT+1). Good luck to you all. We’ll be keeping an eye on the questions as they come in (to check for horse sized duck submissions).

Update: Please submit your Qs here –> http://scrap.tf/voting or else they won’t be counted.

Once again we’re asking for you to submit your questions but in the spirit of automated systems Geel9 has had a brainwave. He’s set up a section of his site where you ask questions and vote on other peoples’ submissions. If we end up using your questions you’ll win a vintage Lo-Fi Longwave and both priority and priority+ on scrap.tf for life! Even if you didn’t get your question in there’s still 100 unique Lo-Fi up for grabs. To enter that draw all you need do is vote on someone else’s question.

The competition ends midnight, Sunday 12th May (GMT+1). Good luck to you all. We’ll be keeping an eye on the questions as they come in (to check for horse sized duck submissions).

Update: Please submit your Qs here –> http://scrap.tf/voting or else they won’t be counted.

Sounds familial doesn’t it. Of course something similar was done a long time ago. When steam was added to Mac’s, they added in the Earbuds, which could only be acquired in a similar way, but with the use of a mac instead of Linux  If you are interested in the trading scene in the slightest, then you’ll know that Buds are a staple of trading, due to the limited number of them in the game. Having an item that will not increase in quantity makes it perfect for trading. Its “Value” remains fairly consistent as no more of them will be added to the game.

“Where are you going with this Tempest?” I hear you type in the comments box below. Well, when the tux was added to TF2 some people thought that we may have another Buds on our hands. Some people were also quick to dismiss this statement. I want to truly look at the possibility of this action and see if it has any merit at all. Firstly there is 1 massive flaw with the theory……..the Tux is not tradeable. So the answer is no……end of blog post

Oh Ok, Lets assume for a moment that in the near future it might be made tradeable. What would happen to the item. Would people jump on it? Would it get ignored or would it become a staple of Trading? Personally I feel that all 3 possibilities could happen. Let me explain why.

Firstly we need to look at numbers. One of the things that made the Buds so valuable was how few there were of them. But is that the same with the Tux? Back when TF2 was added to the mac was when the player base was much smaller than it is today. It was before F2P exploded the game into every bodies pockets. As such it is naturally going to be a smaller number. In fact, I have the numbers right here.

7.6% of players own Earbuds
18.51% of players own a Tux

So as you can see, Buds win out on numbers. They are much more rare and as such will be the traders choice. But does that really mean that the Tux is worthless? It is still rare in comparison to other items. Plus, unlike Keys, Scrap Metal and other items in the game, there is now a set number of them that will not alter under any circumstance. Personally I feel that the Tux could have a place in trading. Say an item is worth half a bud. What do you do, You trade with a mountain or keys or scrap. Why not have Tux fill that gap?

However for this to work 2 things are required. Firstly, the aforementioned lack of trading on the item. But if we were in a dream world where you could trade it away, it would still require everybody to agree that it is worth anything. Just like Real life money. We all agree that a Dollar is worth a Dollar, a Pound is worth a Pound and a Yen is worth a Yen. That’s how money and items worth trading work. If the TF2 Community as a whole agreed to the value of the Tux, Then suddenly it would be worth something. However if we all agreed with was worthless, that’s how it would remain.

But really this whole post has been massively hypothetical. Until Valve let us trade with him, he is worth nothing more then bragging rights and sentimental value to those has him. but if that day does come it will be incredibly interesting to see how the community accepts or rejects him as a trading commodity. But until that day, Tux will remain our bondage clad friend strapped onto the back of our belts.

UPDATE

So apparently I missed a trick here. If you read through the comments (I recommend that you do) You’ll see that the stats I gave you, although correct, don’t reflect the number of Buds in the game. As pointed out to me, some people could (and do) have multiple copies in their backpack. This has thrown off my stats. So lets refresh.

There are currently 61,333 EarBuds in the game
and a tiny 44,525 Tuxs in the game

Wow. I Just want to say I’m shocked. I’m shocked for multiple reasons. The first is that Earbuds could possibly be more common than the Tux. It was released at a time where there were less players and on an Apple Mac, which you had to own. As apossed to Linux where there was a larger population playing TF2 and the way to acquire it was off a free piece of software. But the biggest wow come from the comments themselves.

Multiple people commented on the numbers and still responded with something like “I still don’t think Tux could replace the Bud”. Why? We have just proven that the Tux is more rare than the buds, Yet people still don’t want to use it. This all boils back to what i was saying about currencies. People will only believe the TUX is worth something, if everybody thinks the tux is worth something.

If you happen to be hosted by Hypernia, all the better. We don’t mind showing a little favoritism for our own server provider.

Communities we’ve invaded so far:
Jan 16th 2013 – Bottle-Crew
Jan 23rd 2013 – Trashed Gamers
Jan 30th 2013 – Evergreen Terrace
Feb 06th 2013 – Couch Athletics
Feb 13th 2013 – Playstuff.net
Feb 20th 2013 – TF2 Outpost
Feb 27th 2013 – Really Awesome Gaming Experience
Mar 06th 2013 – Fortress of Gamers
Mar 13th 2013 – Gaming Masters (interviewed during #36)
Mar 20th 2013 - The Black Night Gaming Community
March 27th 2013 – ???

This is it! Kritzkast have finally broken into the big time. We’re interviewing Brad Pitt! No, not the one with the star on the hollywood walk of fame, not the one saddled with Angelina Jolie. The one who created and runs the ultimate tool for hard core and casual traders alike, backpack.tf!

Backpack.tf gives you a window into the item stash of every single layer in the TF2 universe.

It will allow you to roll back and see the evolution of the backpacks of the most hardcore collectors, track item positions, and set up trades. The site is an excellent mesh of functionality and user experience and draws in thousands of unique visitors every day.

We’re chuffed that he agreed to talk to us, speechless in fact. So you guys are going to have to come up with the questions. To sweeten the deal, if your question is asked during the interview, Kritzkast will throw in one of our very own Vintage Lo-Fi Longwaves, and Brad will put a unique, limited edition badge on your backpack.tf profile for all of the world to see.

Either of these on their own is something to be reckoned with. But both toghether will stand as a warning to all traders that they are dealing with a sharply dressed mastermind.

Update
Thanks to everyone who submitted a question. There were rather a lot of them. If you include the ones about lifting and ducks (strangely none about lifting ducks) we had over 6000! We’ve have the slightly onerous chore of sifting through them all now to find a dozen really good ones for the interview itself.

Update 2
We’ve gone through all the questions and got it down to just 1337. I know right. Anyway, we’re still culling them like crazy and should have it down to the 8-16 we are actually going to use by the end of the week. Fingers crossed we’ll have the interview out shortly after that.

While Gamingheads have created models that stand a foot high and ironically cost an arm and a leg, NECA are looking to push out their fully articulated 7″ figurines at a price more relevant to Team Fortress 2‘s Free2Play audience. The first two models, Demoman and Pyro, will be available in January 2013 but only 10,000 of each will be made in the first run. Considering a player base reaching into the millions this seems like an narrow sighted move, though it leaves the door open for further runs if the figurines prove popular.

We’ve found the models available for pre-sale in UK @ Forbidden Planet International, US @ BigBadToyStore and AU @ Popculture. Needless to say, I’ve ordered myself a Pyro.

Agro: What makes you think you’re entitled to lead a SFM group after just 3months of animating?
Zachariah: 10 years of machinima experience, 2 years leading litfuse, and 6 years of cinematic work
3 months of animating means just three months of character animating, but I have worked with animations and done cinematography and modding for much longer. I just in the past usually worked with animation splicing, instead of fully creating animations from scratch, so I say the stuff before sfm doesn’t count. if I need further qualifications I could point to my 4 years doing proffesional game cinematics for triple A titles like mass effect 2 and 3. winkey face

Agro: MJ made a pretty cool SFM video a few weeks back. What is it with BioWare that you guys have so much time to make SFM vids?
Zachariah: He got sick for a week and a half and had to stay home
I’m just a monster who pushes myself to reach specific release schedule goals.

Agro: What kind of monster? Headcrab or Vortigore?
Zachariah: History’s greatest monster, El Chupacabra

Agro: surely you mean Cuthulhu
Zachariah: thats pre-history’s greatest monster

Agro: So I take it you’ve been playing the crap out of BlackMesa?
Zachariah: haven’t touched it yet. went straight into playing with the assets in SFM. I havent’ played any games since SFM came out, except for a few rounds of MVM. but when I finally managed to beat a mission, all I got was a bonk and an ambassador
so I had to stop that madness

Agro: What class do you play normally?
Zachariah: in MVM medic, everywhere else spy or whatever the team needs

Agro: So Critter week is going pretty well then?
Zachariah: for being 10 hours in, we’re doing allright. still trying to figure out what the rhythm of the theme week events needs to be. the first one was a fluke. It was a standard I was holding myself to, to try and release one video a day on a specific theme.
then someone told me to include other people in it, and it took off

Agro: Before this was Turret Week. Do you prefer to animate the inhuman?
Zachariah: so far I’ve gone with the inhuman for a couple of reasons
but the biggest one, is that in SFM it’s somewhat unexplored territory
If I’m going to motivate people, I’m trying to motivate them into directions where SFM hasnt’ explored yet. In doing so we can help everyone get a little bit out of their comfort zone, and maybe learn some tricks as a result
also BMS just came out and I really love all the xenian aliens, there’s a lot of untapped potential that got dropped on the community so I’ was eager to jump in there and get knockin

Agro: is there a point for you in training up a secret army of SFMers? A BioWare mission of world (animated) domination?
Zachariah: it’s more of a personal choice. I’ve been in a small team of very skilled people, and that was really fun and powerful, having specialists and a group you could count on. but it was just a few people.
OSFM is my second stab at that, trying to find that group of talented specialists, but do it in such a way that it’s open to lots of people, more of a film collective than a film team or group
and I figure the best way for me to get people to help me out is by helping out other people where I can.
so it’s all very selfish

Agro: Any plans for a week beyond Critter Week?
Zachariah: Definately L4D week for halloween
right now the community is still kind of hitting alot of walls with the L4D assets in SFM, I hope that by focusing a theme week on it we can all get together and work out alot of the issues that are making it hard to use the L4D stuff

Agro: Last one.. have you seen any animatiors work, either through your own group or elsewhere on the internet that’s made you want to call your bosses at BioWare and sign them up?
Zachariah: Bioware has had a pretty good record when hiring people out of the machinima community, so it’s definately something that I look at and the situation has come up in the past. People should be encouraged to swing by http://www.bioware.com/career if they are interested.
though disclaimer, everything I do with OSFM and youtube is strictly seperate from what I do at bioware and I do not represent them in any capacity here.

Agro: Great thanks. Anything we can plug for you?
Zachariah: my channel is fine http://www.youtube.com/user/Ronaldthecock

Yes Zachariah, your YouTube is fine. We heartily recommend everyone to loose a few minutes in there today.

That’s all, folks! Let’s hope Agro can push me to do another one next week – I’ll certainly do my best.

“What is it?”, you may ask…  As of now, all that we know is that it’s a “Collector’s Edition” of the soundtrack for Portal 2, and is scheduled to be released on October 30th.

Now you may ask yourself, “What correlates the soundtrack of Portal 2 with Ipecac Recordings”?

I think it may have stemmed from Mike Patton’s earlier collaberation with Valve.
Mike Patton is not only an accomplished musician that partnered with a fellow of his to form the record label, “Ipecac Recordings” (in the year 1999); he also created the vocal sounds of ‘The Infected’ in Left 4 Dead; (you may have also noticed some of those same sounds coming from the Anger Shpere in Portal).  Ipecac Recordings is a record label known for some of their unique bands and musicians that like to expand the envelope.  On top of that, they always do a fine job with the artwork and packaging that encase their musical releases.
I’m guessing this Collector’s Edition is a version of the soundtrack on vinyl with great artwork on the record itself…  Only time will tell.

Source: http://www.ipecac.com/artists/portal2

Download the “Songs to Test By” Soundtrack: http://www.thinkwithportals.com/music.php

UPDATE (9/5): travislopes on reddit contacted Ipecac Recordings, seems like the Collectors Edition will be released on CD and Digital initially, but in the future there might be a Vinyl release. - Source: http://d.pr/i/3tvL

- Zbot

UPDATE (9/29): This Collector’s edition will consist of 4 CD’s.  Three of the discs will be the same collection of songs available that you can already download.  The 4th CD will contain 13 songs from the original Portal soundtrack, (previously unreleased).  This Collector’s Edition will also come with the mini-comic Turret Lullaby.  (Here’s the link for the digital version of the comic: http://www.thinkwithportals.com/turret_comic/).

UPDATE (10/20/12) :  “Portal 2: Songs To Test By”, is now available for the pre-ordering. -http://www.amazon.com/Portal-2-Songs-Test-By/dp/B009DJB8I2

Also, “What’s in the Portal 2 Soundtrack Box?” – http://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/What%27s_in_the_Portal_2_Soundtrack_Box%3F

-MIRV

UPDATE (10/30/12) :  Release Day!

From the Ipecac Recordings website:

“Gamers, rejoice!

http://www.ipecac.com/news/494