For years passed since its debut in 2009, Valve had been celebrating Halloween in Team Fortress 2 by releasing special maps with objectives and hats/weapons to collect. This year however, is a change from the norm. Rather than releasing their annual Halloween event and adding even more insane lore to the strangeness that is TF2 lore, Valve has thrown the event for the users. In order to continue tinkering with a much bigger update for the game that has yet to be revealed, they won’t be focusing on the event.
According to the blog, the Halloween event will feature the best user generated, Halloween-themed items and maps. As incentive, Valve is pushing for people to create content and tag them as Halloween in order to have their content be in the actual game by October 18th. It is also reminded they have to be quality Halloween-themed. It is also mentioned that these items chosen won’t be restricted like older items that can only be seen during the Halloween event and full moons. As an addendum, all previous Halloween event maps will be available to play during this time.
Valve’s decision to work on their next big update instead of this annual event is in no way or shape a cop out I feel. Sure the lack of a new event is sad to see, but opening up to user content which has been a huge part of TF2 for years now means there’s more accessibility for people to get their workshop content noticed. It also means they can offer a few of their team to sieve their way through the workshop for the Halloween event while focusing all their attention on the new update which will include new maps, game modes and items.