Video Game / Open Fortress

Open Fortress is a Game Mod for Valve's Team Fortress 2, designed with the intent of being free, easily distributable and easily modifiable to anyone's liking.

However, most of its players use it to play Quake in a TF2 coat of paint.

Granted, the mod has quite a bit more than that, but the Deathmatch mode is currently the most polished part of the open alpha version of the mod. It adds a new class of its own, the Deathmatch Mercenary, who gleefully bunny hops around gravel pits, warehouses and wherever else he can find other mercenaries to reduce to Ludicrous Gibs. He has an extensive array of various weapons and enough hats and clothing options to rival the 9 classes of live TF2. The mod can be downloaded and played by following instructions on their official website, which can be found here.

Here's a list of some of the most important features and changes compared to Live TF2:

OF Changes

• Removal of nearly all the hats, taunts and weapons from Live TF2, leaving the classes bare-headed and using only their default weapons.
• The Deathmatch Mercenary, a Jack of All Stats class who mainly plays in Deathmatch, but can be allowed to play in normal matches depending on the server. He also has enough cosmetic items to rival the 9 classes from Live TF2.
• The mercenaries from Team Fortress Classic, including the Civilian. However, they are still in development, and mostly use placeholder models.
• A number of custom game modes, including the aforementioned Deathmatch, as well as modes like Infection or Mercenary Capture the Flag.
• Various "mutators" for the game, which do things like only allow specific weapon loadouts.

Compare Team Fortress 2 Classic, which shares some past and present developers with this mod.

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Open Fortress provides examples of the following tropes:

• Action Genre Hero Guy: The Deathmatch Mercenary fits this to a T, and it's probably at least partly deliberate considering his love of Film and Television.
• Air-Vent Passageway: A few maps have traversable air vents, which often provide alternate pathways, and sometimes lead to a secluded area with specific weapon spawns.
• BFG: A few of them, but the Superweapons take the cake. The best example is the Giant Isotope Blaster, or G.I.B., which in earlier versions of the mod outright was called the BFG! It launches a powerful energy blast that explodes on impact into smaller energy explosives. It's powerful enough to obliterate anyone in one shot if all the explosions connect.
• Bloodier and Gorier: Compared to Live TF2, the game has much more graphic blood effects, and even allows for ragdolls to be dismembered and have their limbs (and head) be reduced to a bloody stump. If an explosive weapon doesn't reduce you to Ludicrous Gibs, it will leave parts of your corpse missing. And of course, while Live TF2 has Pretty Little Headshots when someone is sniped (Hitman's Heatmaker nonwithstanding), getting headshot in Open Fortress will leave little above your lower jaw intact.
• Boom, Headshot!: Doable with the Railgun and Sniper Rifle by default, but servers can be set to allow for critical headshots with any weapon, or even set to allow headshots to be the only way to deal damage.
• Chainsaw Good: The Chainsaw is a very powerful melee weapon, able to make short work of anyone on the business end of it. In case someone's running away from you, you can charge with it akin to a Demoknight from Live TF2.
• The Chew Toy: The Civilian. Back when he used his TFC model, taunting with his Umbrella resulted in him falling over flat on his face and even the class selection screen mocks him, saying "Be completely useless!" as a tip.
• Color-Coded Multiplayer: Even more so than Live TF2, since the Deathmatch Mercenary (and all other classes, if they're allowed in Deathmatch mode) can be painted any color the player desires, which often results in pink, lime or other garish colored mercenaries running around.
• Critical Hit: Downplayed compared to Live TF2, since Random crits have been removed. On the other hand, most maps feature a Crit Boost power-up, giving temporarily guaranteed crits to whoever picks it up.
• Crowbar Combatant: The Deathmatch Mercenary's default melee weapon is the Crowbar. It swings as fast as the Scout's bat, and deals a bit more damage. It's also the default weapon of most Classic Mercenaries, as it was in their home game.
• Death Is Cheap: Every time a player dies, they will make note of the fact they've just died upon respawn. In Live TF2, this only happens when they're revived by a Reanimator in Mann vs. Machine mode. Averted in Arena Mode, where players only respawn at the start of a round.
  Deathmatch Mercenary: Oh. Guess there is life after death!
• The Faceless: The Deathmatch Mercenary always wear a ski mask that only shows his eyes. Like the Spy, he wears it under any other hat he can wear.
• Gatling Good: In addition to the Heavy's minigun from Live TF2, the mod also features the Gatling Gun, which has a lower ammo capacity (100 compared to 200) and damage, but the Mercenary moves at full speed while firing it.
• Guilt-Based Gaming: Whenever the player wants to disconnect from a server of quit the game, there's a popup either pleading for them to stay or mocking them for wanting to quit.
• Guns Akimbo: If the Deathmatch Mercenary manages to kill another Merc with the starting pistol, he can dual-wield them. Said stock pistol is also the only weapon that can be dual-wielded. Curiously, the Dual-wielded pistols still have full ammo even if the single pistol is empty and they don't even share an ammo pool.
• Helpful Mook: The Cam-bots from Lethal Lockdown. They are very slow, armed with only a crowbar, and have 30 HP. And unlike any other robot in that game mode, they drop ammo packs.
• Hyperspace Arsenal: True to its Quake origins, the game has a very sizable selection of weapons, and if you're the Deathmatch Mercenary or the server allows for all classes to pick up dropped weapons, you can carry all of them without breaking a sweat.
• Jack of All Stats: This is the primary role of the Deathmatch Mercenary. He has medium health, average movement speed and a mediocre starting weapon. However, he is also able to Bunny Hop by default, can slightly zoom his view in for better aiming, and can use every single weapon in the game.
• The Juggernaut: A custom class for the in-development Overpowered game mode. The titular Juggernaut has vastly more Health than anyone else, and it's his job to singlehandedly kill the entire enemy team. Concept art has him looking like a very buff prisoner, but in-game, his placeholder model is a modified TFC Civilian. The game mode is based off the popular VS Saxton Hale Game Mod for Live TF2.
• Jump Physics: Noted here because unlike Live TF2, Bunny Hopping is very much functional and outright encouraged. Rocket Jump off a wall to gain momentum, and b-hopping allows you to easily outrun even the Scout, and it's an essential mechanic in Deathmatch mode.
• The Load: The Civilian plays this role in the VIP game mode, where he's only armed with an Umbrella and needs to be defended as he gets to an escape point.
• Ludicrous Gibs: Death by any explosive weapon can reduce any player to little bloody chunks. Then there's the dismemberment, as mentioned under Bloodier and Gorier.
• Macross Missile Massacre: The Quad-Launcher Superweapon fires 4 rockets almost simultaneously. Using the alternate fire allows the shooter to guide the projectiles a la Half-Life's Rocket Launcher.
• Magnetic Weapons: The Railgun, which functions like a Sniper Rifle that can't charge its shots, but deals more damage per shot and can still headshot without scoping in. Like the Machina from Live TF2, firing it leaves a visible color-coded trail which allows the shooter to be tracked down.
• Manipulative Editing: The Half-Life/Team Fortress Classic announcer had to have some of this in order for it to mention things such as the invisibility powerup, as while the VOX system does have a massive library of words to use, it's not that massive.
• Mecha-Mooks: Robots from Live TF2's Mann vs. Machine mode return in the special Lethal Lockdown game mode. They are generally easier to kill to compensate for the lack of an upgrade system for the players.
• Nail 'Em: The Nailgun from the beta of Live TF2 returns as a Mercenary weapon here.
• Next Sunday A.D.: The game's sparse lore only confirms that Open Fortress takes place after the Gravel War and the Robot Wars, but nothing aside from very minor tidbits in map briefings.
• Parasol of Pain: The only weapon of the Civilian. It deals the exact same damage as a crowbar, but since the Civilian isn't meant to be a fighter, kills with it are rare.
• Pop-Cultured Badass: The Deathmatch Mercenary is described as growing up on action movies and television. As a result, a good number of his voice lines have him quote famous movies or TV shows.
• Revisiting the Roots: Not only are this mod's deathmatches reminiscent of Quake, which Team Fortress 1 was a mod of, the mod also features a Team Fortress Classic mode in which the TF2 Mercenaries are replaced with their TFC counterparts, right down to their original loadouts.
• Revolvers Are Just Better: The Mercenary can acquire a Magnum Revolver, which deals slightly more damage and is more accurate than the Spy's revolver.
• Robot War: the Lethal Lockdown game mode pits the players against the MvM robots from Live TF2.
• Rocket-Tag Gameplay: Even moreso than Live TF2. All the powerful weapons in the game combined with the average HP of the Mercenary makes it very easy to die unless you are a good dodger.
• Schmuck Bait: A few loading screen tips are this. The most notable one is one where it claims The Civilian is the strongest class in the game, and suggest charging Snipers head on with his powerful umbrella.
• Shock and Awe: The Lightning Gun.
• Short-Range Shotgun: Aside from the Scattergun and Shotgun from Live TF2, Open Fortress also features two powerful Double-barreled shotguns: The Super Shotgun, which can reduce anyone short of a Heavy to paste in a single point-blank shot, and the Eternal Shotgun, which deals less damage, but allows you to use a meat hook to close the distance to your desired victim. Both are mostly ineffectual past close range.
• Shout-Out:
  • Customization options for the Mercenary include ones based on Doomguy, Ranger, and Terry Bogard.
  • "Duel of the Mercs" is a Team Fortress 2-style take on Duel of the Fates.
  • The hit and kill sounds from Quake III: Arena are selectable alongside the ones TF2 has.
  • The Mercenary calls for Medics by going "Excuse me! I'm in need of medical attention!"
• Sticks to the Back: Usually averted, with most weapons being in a given player's Hyperspace Arsenal. However, superweapons like the G.I.B. and Quad-Launcher play this straight, for easy recognition of who has the big guns.
• Throw Down the Bomblet: The Dynamite Pack explodes on impact, leaving a few smaller bomblets to deal even more damage afterwards.
• Unstoppable Rage: The Berserk power-up induces this in the player who picks it up. For a short amount of time, they are restricted to using their fists, but having increased movement speed and doing a One-Hit Kill to everyone they punch, reducing the victim to Ludicrous Gibs.
• Virtual Paper Doll: The Deathmatch Mercenary has a wide enough selection of hats and other cosmetic items to rival the Mercenaries from Live TF2.
• Walking Armory: Any player who's lived long enough in Deathmatch mode will inevitably be this.
• Zombie Apocalypse: The Infection game mode. One team is humans, the other is zombies. Any time a zombie kills a human, the human respawns as another zombie.