Valve shadow drops TF2 SDK to players’ delight

In typical fashion, Valve just made the Team Fortress 2 client and server game code public without much fanfare. However, this move has the potential to make a huge impact on the 17-year-old free-to-play shooter’s life going forward.

Valve released TF2’s game code to the public today, making it part of the Source SDK (Software Development Kit) on Feb. 18. Why is it big? Because this makes TF2 as close to open-source as possible. “This update will allow content creators to build completely new games based on TF2,” reads Valve’s blog post.

While you can expect full-blown games based on TF2 down the line, this also brings relief to some of the existing TF2 mods that were operating in a grey area. These mods include the likes of Team Fortress 2 Classic and Open Fortress, which were reportedly made on leaked Source files. Now, the mods can finally be released on Steam in an official capacity, just like any future TF2 mods. 

“TF2 mods may be published on the Steam Store, and after publication will appear as new games in the Steam game list,” Valve said, and laid out the general procedure the mods have to follow. This is quite akin to Portal 2 mods like Portal: Revolution or The Cleaning Game that got their own Steam pages.

As for your cosmetic items, Valve mostly leaves it to the better judgment of mod makers. “We’re asking TF2 mod makers to… not make mods that have the purpose of trying to profit off Workshop contributors’ efforts,” the blog post reads. “We’re hoping that many mods will continue to allow players access their TF2 inventory, if this makes sense for the mod.”

While not entirely related, TF2 also got a decently chunky update that adds a few graphical knick-knacks and fixes some longstanding technical issues with the game. Here are the full patch notes.