Social Spaces & Payload Races (Patreon)

New video is up!  This time I look at TF2 and Overwatch and how they sculpt their individual communities. 

I don't know how common this sentiment in the video will be, though.  For a while (this was probably five or six years ago) I was very much involved in a TF2 server - I ran trivia nights and made friends. We had custom mods that could play music to the whole server and we'd all sing along in a broken, laggy cacophony of doom. We played at a level that was just serious enough to be engaging, but just laid back enough that a bleary-eyed player at 3 AM could find it relaxing.  It wasn't perfect, but it was my little corner of the internet in the same way an IRC channel or web forum can be.  And if you've never had that, I think it becomes way harder to understand why some may argue for anything approaching the chaotic, offensive, and dangerous environments TF2 servers can offer.

That Overwatch plays so much like TF2 makes the comparison between the two unavoidable. And while Overwatch is undeniably more accessible, more safe, more friendly, and more inclusive - all of which are good things, and all of which are necessary to get more people into games - I still kind of lament the loss of the sort of community-focused play TF2 used to support.  That said, without a community to root me I know which game I'd rather play - and it isn't the one with racist macros spamming the chat, random porno sprays, and constant friend requests for trades.