Back in the old days of Team Fortress 2 when hats didn't exist and shirts or pajamas weren't yet here, it costed money before you could even play the game and people played it like it was just some cartoony first-person shooter with added objectives to make the game more fun. To make it unique, the 9 classes had different abilities that made them fill in a better role for different objectives.

Eventually GabeN along with Robin decided to make the game Free-to-Play and this whole entire thing of hats and their shiny and magical effects flooded the game and became the big thing of what currently keeps Team Fortress 2 alive and active for newcomers that are curious to play or rich kids that want to show-off their lovely pixelated hat. Not only did it bring amusement to some, it also attracted players who were eager to take control of the updates as well as criticism from previous players that bought the game which soon gave all these misconceptions as time passed by. What Valve had brought largely contributed to the current trading status of Team Fortress 2 with the help of supportive players gave a caption for TF2, the best hat simulator game of Valve!

And that's pretty much where everything and this whole unusual debates and misconceptions arise....

The moment Valve decided this game would have hats to apparently "prove a player's manliness on the outside", people criticized that the game would now be based solely on hats and that it would die. Though the first part was indeed correct, the game hasn't surely died which I will explain more later.


With the introduction of hats and the Free-to-Play Update, players who previously paid for the game were given premium status, allowing them to trade items where new players that just played the game after the update were considered "F2P" and can only become a premium if they purchased the "Upgrade to Premium Gift" from the Mann Co. Store or if some generous soul donates the gift to a F2P and consumes the gift. Additionally, players who had purchased Team Fortress 2 before the Über Update(also known as the F2P update) received the Proof of Purchase hat.


What many new and old premium players remain disgruntled(until today) were the massive amounts of players that suddenly entered the game. Most new players found the game confusing and were ridiculed by older players as well as being casted aside for not wearing decent hats as they did. In some cases, players quit Team Fortress 2 in their belief that the game wouldn't last long with hats being the main thing and F2P's that make the game look bad. To compensate the new players who haven't purchased the premium gift, Valve gave F2P's a chance to receive a hat by dominating a player that is happening to wear a Ghastly Gibus or by playing on Halloween servers and receiving Halloween cosmetics and hats with the downside of these items only visible on a server with Halloween enabled.


Basically, this whole misconception is simply like a hat-job literally. You don't wear a hat, you're not better or you suck. You wear one and now you're suddenly very good at the game. Imagine yourself as a criminal robbing a bank without a painted mask(P2P) compared to a mask(F2P) that isn't colored. Sure it's weird to even color your mask just to make people stare on you for having brighter colors but does it make you any better? No. Simply put, it is your skill and capabilities of playing Team Fortress 2 that defines how good you are. Sadly, most people treat the game as a capitalist economy than an actual first-person shooting that gives a false impression of what Team Fortress used to be.


It doesn't mean that a cosmetic or a simple decorative item makes you better, it's just people either bickering you that you're good at scoring kills(if you're a F2P that just killed a premium on a pub server) or as a F2P, you love to kill everyone on whatever server you went into. In this case, P2P players that you killed on a trading server give another false impression on you and the entire F2P playerbase that they are bad and cancerous.

Since the beginning of the F2P Update up to the present day of Team Fortress 2, unsatisfied players have been bringing up the "TF2 IS DED, LOL BAD HAT GAME I QUIT" protests and chants. Most complaints come from their belief that the game is just a hat-vending capitalist game and there haven't been enough updates that actually contain actual content that can improve the game's quality or adding more maps frequently.


This is certainly not true. It has been eight years Team Fortress 2 was released and four years and a few months that it has turned F2P. Is the game already dead? No. Does Valve still add content to the game? Yes. Does it bring new players to the game? Obviously yes, with new modes such as the PASS update and the recent Alien Invasion Update which brought new unusual effects for hats. Not to mention the upcoming Halloween Update will be a community-based update than Valve releasing it.


So then why are certain players saying Team Fortress 2 is dying? Simply put, they are just people who base their minds on the game with one thing - unusual hats/cosmetics. Why? They no longer have the drive to even play the game with nothing of the thought of hats and by the time they get tired of it, they complain it's just a dressup game. I've noticed that although cosmetics and hats are the main thing these days, think of it this way do you really think Team Fortress 2 would still be alive WITHOUT hats or cosmetics? Would it be fun if everyone would just be going control point, payload, deathmatch, King of the Hill gameplay all day and there wouldn't be anything else than just playing those missions over again until you get bored and realized that this game is just a cartoon first-person shooter rip-off of any other first-person shooter game? At the very least, Team Fortress 2 did stand out unique not only with its current status but also its supportive community thanks to Valve allowing players to have the ability in creating cosmetics/hats that have the chance to be put in the game. Not only that, those players also got paid from Valve for their services. It encourages supporters and also new players that have either just turned premium or are fairly new to the game that something else has indeed been added and they become curious to know why; eventually getting premium gifts too and receiving all those lovely hats and cosmetics.


There has always been a conflict between two factors, player satisfaction and company profitability. What do these two mean? Player satisfaction means getting your current players happy with the game they play. Company profitability is how much money(hence some companies also call it player support) the company makes from their game. These two factors always contradict one another and is the cause of disgruntled players in just about every video game company including Valve(Team Fortress 2 and CS:GO). Why? Not every player has the same likes from one another. Just like in our daily lives, not everyone likes to eat chocolate. To put this in TF2 perspective, means not everyone likes hats or cosmetics especially when most updates have always been about hats and cosmetics. But think of it this way, will Team Fortress 2 ever be alive without them? Also, would CS:GO ever had been successful if not for skins and unboxable knives? As long as those two factors often meet, there will be no end to the argument of whether a game has truly died or not. The only sure way to know is if both sides have already ceased on their operations which means player satisfaction is gone and at the same time company profitability is no longer achieved which is doubtable for TF2's current state as Valve still creates content and there are players who are still playing the game until today.

Ahhh, this brings me back to 2014 when I made a forums account there. On a funny note, people there know who I am so should you ever stumble to some familiar names, try asking them who I am and you will get a strange response.(or a friendly/serious one)


Back on topic, since the creation of hats and cosmetics was rampant and people had no idea what to do with these when Steam Trading was introduced to Team Fortress 2, everyone was literally confused on what they should do. Valve had already introduced the smelting of weapons to metal and in many people's minds, if they can just smelt weapons for infinite metal, then this would be the perfect tool as a "virtual currency" for trading. Back in the oldest of days in TF2, weapon drops were infinite and had a small chance of dropping. In present day, weapon drops were rehauled to having a certain amount of drops and once you have reached that cap you cannot have any more drops until the next reset day. So the problem lied before, how much should people be selling their items for metal? There were some people that had sold their hats for more than what others had and some had sold alot less than the other had.


Then the price war started...


Spreadsheet.TF(now defunct) had emerged and devised a simple goal; to create a website that can price weapons, hats and just about any tradeable in Team Fortress 2. The idea was great that the fact people wouldn't hesitate from others that wanted to trade items or feel nervous if the price is right in correlation to how much they value said item. Just when things seemed good, something bad happened found in the link below:


https://www.reddit.com/r/tf2trade/comments/yk9ji/psa_i_believe_the_tf2_pricing_spreadsheet_at


The owner of Spreadsheet was accused of price manipulation and since he was the only person managing the prices, he had power to change how much an item should actually be priced at thereby rigging an item's value and gaining easy profits out of it. He was banned on Reddit after being found guilty of price manipulation towards the TF2 community. At that time, backpack.tf had already existed and curious players who were seeking to find the right price for their items were unsure what pricing site is the right choice. After hearing the controversy of Spreadsheet, nearly every player flocked to backpack.tf and has since then been home to just about every TF2 trader's item exchange.


Jumping forward to present day, backpack.tf still prices any tradeable item as well as special untradeable items that do have potential value that other players are willing to trade.(example: Hat of Undeniable Wealth and Respect) To prevent price manipulation and the mistakes Spreadsheet had, players can now suggest prices for an item and only price moderators(people assigned by the backpack.tf admins) can approve of the newly suggested price provided they have given substantial proof that the item indeed is selling what it really is worth and the price is parallel to the amount of solds it has incurred. The price moderators in turn cannot suggest prices since they have the ability to even accept their own suggestions made even if they give a solid amount of proof that an item truly is reflecting the price.


So now, what seems to be the whole misconception about backpack.tf? Even with all the changes made in providing a fairer and healthier economy for TF2, some believe that since people only stick to backpack.tf, they only pay what backpack.tf says. And what backpack.tf says, only will they either sell at this price, save for unusuals. Unusual hats tend to be valued differently by other people that they would sometimes mark its price based on what they feel should be sold at or at what price they want to sell it even though their unusual had already been priced. Take for instance, an inexperienced player buys a Burning Flames Magnificent Mongolian for 29 keys from an experienced trader in the belief he can make profit and that he checked backpack.tf, it costs at an average of 30.5 keys. Unknown to him, the hat itself is despised in TF2 Community as one of the worst hats and the fact it is a Heavy unusual. The only thing he knew was that the Burning Flames is a god-tier hat so he lists the price for 50 keys. The next he knew, players would laugh at him if he could even sell the hat for 50 keys and instead curses backpack.tf for being a "price dictator" and tells everyone that the hat he bought isn't well-deserved for profit than he had hoped for.


If you read the paragraph above carefully, it means that what backpack.tf has displayed in price, it must be followed. So does that mean backpack.tf is a price dictator and that we must follow it so that we will know all the prices? Obviously no. If it did, people wouldn't even support backpack.tf in the first place. Backpack.tf provides a reflection of the item's value in what SHOULD be sold for, not what MUST be followed by all. Literally put this in-real life perspective, look at yourself in the mirror and what do you see? Yourself duh. So what's in yourself? Of course something unique but what should it be? A good person or someone that looks ugly? Neither of those matter as what's truly important is what you SHOULD(take note of this word) be in life and not what others think of you.(this becomes a MUST if you subdue to their beliefs) See the difference of should and must? And if backpack.tf was a dictator, wouldn't it ban multiple people for selling lower than what was stated? Wouldn't they ban quicksellers of their cheap items? Of course not and they never will ban quicksellers unless they are from scammer alts. Every TF2 player has the right to sell their item at what price they wish, but be wary as selling an unusual at a low price will make you lose all the opportunity you had or selling it too high, is up to your choice. But do not expect that your item will even get sold at such a high price especially when it comes to unusuals or unpriced items.


In this current state of TF2, it is every trader's responsibility and right to sell their item at a fair price that does not go for too much as its value is expected. Though you may get lucky, it really depends at certain times.

This is actually very hard to prove it's a misconception especially when its influence has already spread not only throughout Team Fortress 2 but also to Dota 2 and CS:GO for the past years.


Quoting from SteamRep's FAQ:

Originally posted by Obviously SteamRep's FAQ:

SteamRep is a non-profit site that partners with community administrators to improve the safety of game-related trading. The site was created by Ðiego and, through the help of trusted volunteers and community admins, it has grown into the most popular scam prevention tool for Steam trading.

It's important to note that SteamRep is an independent site and has no affiliation with Valve Software or its products and services.​

SteamRep was originally designed to keep TF2 trading a safe and secure place eventually adding Dota 2 and CSGO to their 'watchlist for bans and to keep Steam Trading scam-free from would-be scammers, hijackers, phishers and any sort of illegal activity that may threaten the economy of Valve's three major games. So what many people(mostly from TF2) argue about Steamrep is that getting banned from their website or any websites that affiliate with it means you are deemed a scammer and should no longer have the capability of trading at all. Though this does seem like a "justice served" for people who do try to scam others, the question itself lies in that trading with a scammer ultimately means you are benefitting the 'black market' of trading. It may seem strange that it's just a game of hats and virtual items being traded and it should be nothing to fuss about right? Well, that point is wrong as items here do have value but why is it so controversial about Steamrep?


The problem lies within two reasons. First, with the introduction of Paypal and money-transferring websites, SteamRep does take things seriously when it comes to high-value items being traded away for real-world money. We may never know what the true intention these people do with the money but if it's from a scammer's hands, it is by their default thinking that it comes from either from a hacked/stolen credit card, laundering money for real-life illegal activity or basically robbing people online. Two, when SteamRep places a mark/bans you on their website or by its affiliated partner, you're pretty much toast to ANY trading servers on Team Fortress 2. Players nowadays often check a player's Steamrep profile when doing high-value trades before trading with them and seeing a single "Unconfirmed Report" or a "BANNED" would mean your chances of trading with other people are either very low or 0%. This means your hopes of trading are gone, your enjoyment of the game really goes down without your shiny hats or dream unusuals for trading up and the only thing you can ever do is play the game like it's just some normal first-person shooter all over again.


To top it all off, does this SteamRep means it's truly the one that decides who we should be trading with or that we are capable people of doing our responsibility in trading? It may be as hard to say but it's actually NOT the one that decides who should be trading.


SteamRep's job is to keep the community a safe place for trading and it does its job fine for that. But the inner problem simply lies within its own moderators. Since 2012, strange things happened to the website. Reports weren't getting done in time, moderators don't respond as early as possible and most importantly, the only time they would quickly respond is if a very high-valued unusual was scammed. I'll give a real example for this on the link provided below:


http://forums.steamrep.com/threads/report-76561198061374527-tf2-team-fortress-2-items.113314/


A very high-value hat was scammed not too long ago. It took 1-2 days for the person to get banned after all the proof was submitted. Not too bad indeed especially that the scammed owner of the Darkblaze Team Captain had miraculously recovered it shortly after it had been traded to someone else and decided to return it back to him. However, look at these reports below:


http://forums.steamrep.com/forums/report/


There have been reports dating back at least 1 year ago that haven't even been touched or at least archived. Heck if you even research on my steamrep profile, my own report is already more than a month old(turning 2 months soon), well formatted and I already repaid the guy back and what do I get? Still pending just like several other reports left untouched. Is this the so-called safety security system what the community has? One that has lazing moderators around busy with their real life jobs? To quote Silentreaper's signature who happens to be a Steamrep admin:

Originally posted by Silentreaper's Signature:

SteamRep has around 25000 reports and 900 appeals open at the moment (as of May 2015), and less then a dozen active VOLUNTEER admins with their own work etc. Don't expect your report/appeal to be handled soon™

It's this fallacy that because of Steamrep's now very slow and snail-paced service has been given its reputation not as a judge but as a punisher(and not a redeemer as judges are considered both a punisher and a redeemer) towards high-value traders should anyone receive a ban. An appeal can take more than months or even a year to finish in these times that have made some people frustrated and disillusioned by Steamrep's slow service.


But, this doesn't mean Steamrep actually prevents you from fully removing your trading capability. Only Valve has the power to completely remove a player's ability to trade and only trading servers with SteamRep as part of its affiliated websites will not allow you to enter to their servers. To cut things short, though it may be true that SteamRep does have an iron grip on the community, they do not actually prevent you from fully restricting your trading ability. It just so happens that its influence has gone to the point that even players decided to follow it and although it is in some way right, it doesn't really mean everything is true in what Steamrep says.

I just wanted to say if you've read the entire guide from the first word up to here, I would like to thank you for reading this far and I actually wrote this entire thing up myself. Please do find some grammar errors or point out some factual errors if I may have made any or if you have found the correct facts that I didn't put in.


Basing on what Team Fortress 2 is right now, the game is still in great condition. Just because the game releases similar contents from previous updates doesn't mean it's dead. The Alien Invasion Update has been more of a filler update to me than a large scale update but it still brings in something new and look, we even have new Unusual effects. The trading economy seems fine but Steamrep currently needs to fix itself. The idea of having a community to keep its players in trading is a good sign to show how dedicated its players can be to the game. The problem exists only with the current ones running it by either hiring new ones or even start anew.(though that would destroy remaining proofs currently submitted there)


Anywho it was fun making this guide. Originally I had wanted to put in Outpost as part of the misconception but I couldn't think of any of its features nor players complaining about it as it's just a website designed to keep help you list your trades and seeing what other people trade, nothing to set an opinion with.


If you have any criticism or comments below, feel free to post here and I'll be willing to answer.