Intro
Few games come to mind that has managed to withstand the test of time, like Team Fortress 2, and for excellent reason. It’s a timeless game that deserves an overall review on this website because of how much of an underappreciated gem it is. Sadly, the underappreciated part has become genuinely apparent on the developer side of things, with apathy running rampant through the state of the game. And with apathy comes an opportunity for a variety of characters to plague Team Fortress 2 with a disease that is slowly killing the game from the inside out: Bots.
Sniper Bots
For those who don’t frequently play Team fortress 2, the title has had a malignant bot issue that genuinely began to take root in 2020. The reason why it’s become so severe is that bots are practically making the game unplayable for those who wish to play on Casual or Competitive servers due to how unfair bots make the game. Just how unfair, you might ask? For example, the most common character that bots use in the game is the sniper class.
This is because with their aim-bot mechanics, these bots can get immediate headshots without even trying, even while the character model infamously looks upwards with their scope. The problem increases a hundredfold if there are a group of these sniper bots, which doesn’t even give the players on the other team a chance to retaliate or even have a shred of an opportunity to win.
Player Response
The players in the game are powerless to stop these bots, either. Years ago, simply banning the bot would have solved the issue, but the cheaters and creators of these bots have since changed up their tactics. They often have been programmed to take the names of the players in the game so that a ban against the bot could accidentally ban the actual player, leaving the bot inside to continue to wreak havoc.
Throw in the many programs and countermeasures that the cheaters have installed to slip through Valve’s anti-cheat measures, and these bots can continue to run amok with no penalties or consequences.
Valve's Inaction
Valve itself has shown little gumption or desire to develop any further countermeasures to attempt and curb this influx of bots. In fact, one could see that they’re uninterested in fixing Team Fortress 2 and improving it as a whole. To prove this, one needs only to see that the last major update came out in October of 2021, with many still waiting for a significant update for the Heavy class. This has led to many players believing that Valve isn’t fixing the bot problem simply because it’s low on their priority list since they don’t solely rely on the game to make their revenue. It’s a fair assumption, even though it’s doubtful Valve would ever admit this. Valve is practically printing money at this point since most PC games are sold through their Steam Platform, with their only real competition coming in the form of Epic Games.
With them making so much money from that platform, it stands to reason that the development of Team Fortress 2 would be low on their priorities, even if it is one of their biggest success stories.
Consequences
Sadly this leaves players in a very frustrating position, with many famous TF2 YouTubers voicing their grievances ever since the bot problem became prevalent over two years ago.
It’s become such a problem that it’s rare to play any casual or competitive game without a bot showing up, which is especially bad for the latter since competitive ques take so long.
With no tangible update to solve this issue coming, cheaters will have no deterrents that prevent them from playing the game, which has led to many players, including the writer of this article, to rely on playing on community servers for better security. This has ironically led to community servers growing in popularity, but even though it’s offering a sanctuary of sorts, it isn’t solving the underlying issue, letting the bots run amock throughout the main servers.
Status Quo
As the days pass on and players begin to protest en masse against Valve’s inaction, one has to wonder if it will change anything, even if YouTubers who are fans of TF2 make more videos about the problem. As mentioned before, Valve is making plenty of money off of Steam and other games that they’ve created throughout the years. Team Fortress 2 is a timeless game with a massive player base after over a decade of existence. It seems like such a shame that a title like this is suffering from its developer’s success when this title is clearly capable of bringing in older and new players alike.
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