Then they found out it didn’t work. Apparently the source engine has G15 support, and they didn’t ship all the pieces with TF2.

But you can rejoice, for the secret of getting TF2 to work with a G15 (and, as a result, G13 and G19) has been discovered!

Requirements:

• Steam
• Team Fortress 2
• Zeno Clash (The Demo will work, and is what I tested with)

Recommended:

• GCFScape
• Text Editor of your choice (Vim is my choice)

Basic Setup

First, install Steam, Team Fortress 2, and Zeno Clash (or the demo). Run Team Fortress 2 and Zeno Clash (or the demo) at least once.

Once you have done so, open up
steam install dir\SteamApps\common\zeno clash\bin\
(or the zeno clash demo folder) and copy g15.dll.

Next, open up
steam install dir\SteamApps\your username\team fortress 2\bin\
and paste the g15.dll file there. If the folder now contains “client.dll”, “server.dll”, and “g15.dll” you found the wrong bin folder. Go up a couple of directories and try again.

Now that the DLL is there, all that is left is to tell TF2 to load it. Open up steam, go to your games list, and right-click on TF2. Select properties, then hit “Set launch options…”. There you need to add -g15 to the list of options. (Side note, I recommend “-novid -g15″ at a minimum.) Hit OK, then hit Close.

Run TF2, and you have a working health/ammo display on your G15, once in a server anyway.

TAKE NOTE: Getting the Zeno Clash g15.dll file may no longer be needed if Valve ever includes it in an update for TF2. The -g15 command line parameter will likely still be needed. This blog entry may or may not be updated should that ever happen.

Making it look better

Unfortunately, there is at least one problem. The TF2 logo is missing when you aren’t in a server!

Pop open GCFScape and open up “team fortress 2 content.gcf” in the SteamApps folder:
steam install dir\SteamApps
In there you should find a tf\resource folder. In there right-click on game_1bpp.ico and select “Extract”.

In the Browse for Folder dialog find your tf directory:
steam install dir\SteamApps\your username\team fortress 2\tf
If you already have a resource directory there then select it. Otherwise select the tf folder and then click on “Make New Folder”, entering “resource” for the name, then select it. Hit OK.

Now when on the “title” page a really crappy black and white TF2 logo will appear, which is strangely an improvement over the blank space that was there before.

Viewing other pages

The First two buttons on the G13/G15 under the display (or on the G19, the left and right arrow buttons) control what page is shown when TF2 is running. The left one changes the page, the right one changes the sub page. And there is a difference.

The pages are, by default and as of this writing:

1. Title – Only shown when NOT in a game
2. Health/Weapon Info
3. My Team (Dead/Alive)
4. Scoreboard Data (Score/Deaths/Ping)
5. Chat

Aside from the title and Health/Weapon pages, the other pages will likely not hold everything in the 4 lines or so you can cram onto the display. Hence sub pages to, for lack of a better term, “scroll” the page.

Customization

While you were in GCFScape you may have noticed a g15.res file, a couple of lines above the game_1bpp.ico file. If you put that in the same resource folder as the game_1bpp.ico file you can customize what your G15 shows you when in game.

To do so, open it up with a text editor.

You will notice that the file is in KeyValues format. If you don’t know what that is I suggest looking it up quick, or just following along to figure it out as you go. A //, at the very least, represents a comment, but you cannot use /* */ commenting for multi-line or mid-line comments.

I suggest leaving the “icons” section alone, as well as the “game” and “chatlines” values above it. The “replace” block, however, can be very useful. All replacements are applied last, just before the values are crammed into the defined fields. This allows for some interesting tricks. For example, you can change “Jar Based Karate” to “Jarate” with a single line. What is being replaced is on the left, what it is replaced with is on the right. Use “” for “replace with nothing” on the right. For example, I added:

"Flame Thrower" "Flamethrower"
" Launcher" ""
"Jar Based Karate" "Jarate"
"Battle Banner" "Partyhorn"

Although to my disappointment the Battle Banner doesn’t normally show up when selected. Bummer. The ” Launcher” one shortens the names of the Rocket Launcher, Stickybomb Launcher and Grenade Launcher weapons all in one go.

After the “replace” section you will find the pages. I suggest leaving the title page, the first page there, alone. In fact, I recommend doing ALL of your customization to the default page when playing, the first page, just after the title page. The one that contains your health/ammo values.

By default, that page looks like this:

	"page"   // Player health/wpn info
	{
		// Only show this if the player has a player entity in the game
		"requiresplayer"	"1"

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"4"
			"w"			"150"
			"text"		"Team:  team_%(localteam)m_szTeamName%"
		}

		"static_icon"
		{
			"x"			"144"
			"y"			"4"
			"w"			"16"
			"h"			"16"
			"name"		"icon_%(localteam)m_szTeamName%"
		}

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"18"
			"w"			"150"
			"text"		"Health:  - %(localplayer)m_iHealth% -"
		}

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"32"
			"w"			"150"
			"text"		"(weapon_print_name):  - (ammo_primary) -"
		}
	}

Basically, that means put “Red” or “Blue” in the upper left, a non-existent icon in the upper right, your current health to the left in the middle, and your current weapon with ammo under your health. I didn’t like that.

I won’t go into all the details of how to put information, largely because most of it is useless, but here is a handy list of ones I find useful:

(ammo_primary)

Current weapon’s primary ammo, AKA the current “in the clip” ammo, or for single reload/non-reloading weapons all of it.

(ammo_secondary)

Reserve ammo for the current weapon. Will be 0 for a number of weapons.

(weapon_print_name)

Current weapon’s name

%(localplayer)m_iHealth%

Current health

%(localteam)m_szTeamName%

Current team name (valve prefixed this with team_ for replacement above, or with icon_ for the non-existent icons)

%(localplayer)m_iAmmo[1]%

Primary weapon ammo

%(localplayer)m_iAmmo[2]%

Secondary weapon ammo

%(localplayer)m_iAmmo[3]%

Metal (100 for everyone but Engineer, who can actually USE metal)

Due to the way things work, I recommend something like this:

	"page"   // Player health/wpn info
	{
		// Only show this if the player has a player entity in the game
		"requiresplayer"	"1"

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"4"
			"w"			"100"
			"text"		"H: %(localplayer)m_iHealth%"
		}
		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"right"
			"x"			"110"
			"y"			"4"
			"w"			"50"
			"text"		"team_%(localteam)m_szTeamName%"
		}

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"18"
			"w"			"150"
			"text"		"(weapon_print_name): (ammo_primary) / (ammo_secondary)"
		}

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"32"
			"w"			"150"
			"text"		"A: P: %(localplayer)m_iAmmo[1]% S: %(localplayer)m_iAmmo[2]%"
		}

		"newsubpage"	"1"

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"4"
			"w"			"100"
			"text"		"H: %(localplayer)m_iHealth%"
		}

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"right"
			"x"			"110"
			"y"			"4"
			"w"			"40"
			"text"		"team_%(localteam)m_szTeamName%"
		}

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"18"
			"w"			"150"
			"text"		"(weapon_print_name): (ammo_primary) / (ammo_secondary)"
		}

		"static_text"
		{
			"size"		"medium"
			"align"		"left"
			"x"			"10"
			"y"			"32"
			"w"			"150"
			"text"		"A: P: %(localplayer)m_iAmmo[1]% S: %(localplayer)m_iAmmo[2]% M: %(localplayer)m_iAmmo[3]%"
		}
	}

This creates two pages (see that “newsubpage” “1″ thing? That says make a new sub page). The first will show your team in the upper right, your health in the upper left, your current weapon with ammo below your health, and your current ammo supplies for primary and secondary below your current weapon. If you hit the sub page change button it will toggle your metal showing up. It does away with the – around the health/ammo, and removes the non-existent icon. It could likely use some work, but it works well enough for me.

I would go into more detail, but there is only so much I can say I know in the day I have messed with this. I know that x is horizontal position and y is vertical, that w is for width and h is for height. The align value can be left, right, or center, and I have seen small, medium, and big sizes. Yes, big, not large.

You apparently CAN’T show cloak, rage, or charge levels properly, nor can you show ubercharge levels, or easily show your own ping. I tried all of that already.

Go ahead and check it out – http://www.tf2newbs.com/build/crab_spy_calendar_2010/

Since the calendar was incredibly popular last year, be sure to spread the word so that no one misses out on it.

Also a quick update on Newbsmas, due to me not being able to dedicate the proper time to the contest I’ve extended the deadline until Midnight Feb 14th (Pacific). Be sure to get your holiday themed entries in with this extra time I should be able to get some ‘unique’ prizes in to hand out =)

A big thank you goes out to Control Point for featuring our little contest on their podcast, I think its really kicked things up a notch – Thanks again!

All people who participated won 1 years worth of reserve on the Newbs servers, a forum honorz (will be added tomorrow hopefully), and 1 year of !hatme access (enables you to wear any classes hat). If you participated and want the Newbs server rewards contact me on steam, most of the participants I couldn’t find in the stats db under their entry name so I don’t know their steamid :) I can be reached @ http://steamcommunity.com/id/octodhd

I would like to take this chance to announce the next Newbs Contest… (drum roll) The next contest is the – Newbs Team Fortess 2 Christmas and other Winter Celebrations Contest. All entries will be TF2 and winter solstice themed. Entries can be winter decorations, confections, other food stuffs, songs, snow sculptures, or any other creative work. I will be announcing further details very shortly. If you want to keep track of the latest Christmas contest news please join http://steamcommunity.com/groups/TF2Xmas/. I’m not certain on the prizes yet (looking for some sponsors) but I promise that it will be worth your time :)

Back to the Pumpkins…..

The participants (in alphabetical order) -

Winners:

• Gearpunk
• kitty_tiky
• LlamaMaster

Runner ups:

• binjin
• nfreak
• nil.kemorya
• odinspeed

These were the winning Pumpkins, I’ll be posting all entries in our hall of fame soon (which means by Christmas).

Lets hope valve takes this idea and incorperates it into the client.

[Edit - The live generation of custom lists seems broken (it shows unverified servers in the list), I recommend using the lists that can be found @ http://tf2app.com/blacklist/lists.php until this is fixed]

Annual TF2Newbs Pumpkin Carving Contest - This contest is set to end on November 2nd - First place is L4D2. As always with the Pumpkin contest all people who enter will receive a prize (Reserve Slot on a Newbs server of your choice for a year) so its definitely worth the effort. So far we have 4 Entries and hopefully many more to come today - but if we don't then the odds of winning are VERY good :) Last Years TF2 Pumpkin Entries. Entering is very simple, just go to this link and Enter Your Pumpkin (tf2 themed) here for prizes

In other Pumpkin News, a big atta-boy goes out to everyones favorite heavy, Scott Eats Bullets (And Arrows). Recently Scott sent in a letter to the Control Point podcast about our TF2 Themed Pumpkin Carving Contest and they read it during their broadcast! A huge thank you to both Scott and the folks at Control Point. People that help out others in the gaming community make up for a lot of nights dealing with idiots and griefers :) I know a lot of our regulars listen to the podcast, but incase you don’t usually check it out. Here Scotts Letter – it starts @ 37:49

The preview Demo of L4D2 comes out this evening (11pm Pacific) I’m sure it will be a good time for all (slow downloads, crashing, qq’ing, death, etc). Since L4D2’s release is fast approaching lets take a look back at psychonics L4D2 hypocrites page..

As you can see, the graph looks even more like pacman than it did before.

For full details, once again check out the man responsibles page L4D2 Boycott Lulz

Why are you looking at me funny?

…

Cut it out.

…

Ok, there were barely a handful of entries, and I went through them all in an hour or three. Happy? Moving on…

THE MAPS

“First, find a map that is not already installed on #10 that you think SHOULD be installed on #10 and put into the rotation. Best map (as chosen by me with a multitude of criteria) wins! You don’t have to have made the map.”

There were eight maps submitted for the contest, and no two were really all that alike. This is a good thing.

Judging the maps was a three stage process. In stage 1 I evaluated the maps from one purely technical standpoint:

Would the map work with round timers (if any) removed and win conditions disabled?

I came to the conclusion that three maps would not, in fact, work under those circumstances. Incidentally, the LAST three maps submitted. In order of submitting:

cp_towerdefense_beta, submitted by NFreak, is too tied down to the base gameplay. There would be no easy way to make it so that the map would function without the control point enabled, and the kill zones are problematic to say the least. What good is a map to goof off on if you are literally walled off from the enemy by killzones?

plr_vegas_b01, submitted by Binjin, is a multi-round payload race map. Since the winning condition would be disabled in the first round the multi-round part alone would not function, and enabling all spawns despite rounds would cause issues with players never finding each other in some cases, I came to the conclusion it just wasn’t going to work.

sg_portal_b3, submitted by Bacon, is more of a single player map. Basically, learning to take out semi-attended sentries. There is no way I can see to make it multiplayer-friendly, even after removing the “spawn ten bots to randomly spawn, drop a sentry, and upgrade the sentry” components.

This left five maps for stage 2, wherein I ran the maps at work to make sure they wouldn’t crash out lower end computers. Over a remote connection, no less. All five functioned in that environment, so I moved onto stage 3, my personal opinion on them.

At this point I am actually ranking maps, so lets go from worst to best.

At the bottom of the list, holding the title of “worst Team Fortress 2 Deathmatch Map CmptrWz has EVER had the displeasure of installing,” dm_hangemhigh_tf2, submitted by Chase. None of the must-have elements of a TF2 map, IMO, are there, and there are hints of more interesting things since removed for whatever reason. The only way I could see this working is if a true deathmatch mode were ever made available in TF2. It will not be installed on #10 until such a mode is made available, if then.

Next up, ctf_moonwalk_v2, submitted by DracoEx. When looking over this map I had the feeling that the battles for intel in the middle, low gravity area, could be EPIC with the right teams. Since nobody really needs to care about capping the intel on #10, and that was the only thing I found interesting about the map overall, it gets a fairly low score. By association with dm_hangemhigh_tf2, though, it is good enough to get a place in #10’s rotation.

In third place we have rats_tequila, submitted by Banhammer. Visually interesting, capture points that will likely be fun to cap even if you can never actually win, and enough stuff to goof off on/around scattered all over the place, the map should be a solid addition to #10. The only way to make it better would be if it worked well with gravity turned down, but certain parts of the map freak out a bit if you do that.

Coming in second, the only map submitted with music in it, cc_capture_cube, submitted by Andy. While the name may seem a bit redundant, as I think the cc stands for Capture Cube, the map will likely play a lot like dm_biosphere. Just with the added catch of being able to claim the cube for your team AND fight over the music. The map lacks visual interest in many ways, though, and a couple of issues I have with it kept it from the #1 spot.

Finally, in first place, ctf_hoops_beta, submitted by Jigen. I don’t know what the most amusing part will be for people at first. The voice-command spamming to the stands from the spawn rooms, the giant basketball hoops you can get to via a number of methods, or trying to get the scoreboards to read 69. As an added bonus, it still works in low gravity mode, should I decide to enable that on the map.

THE REMIXES

“Second, find a song (from OCRemix) that is not already on #10 that would rock on #10. Best song (as chosen by me) wins! You don’t have to have made the remix.”

I got a lot of people wanting to give me music from everywhere BUT OCRemix, for varying reasons. Still, got a good number of entries, even though there was griping about the only good songs being taken already a couple of times. At least one person decided not to enter because their choices were taken by someone else, or so they said.

The remixes were a lot harder to rank. First, I evaluated them on technical merits, namely format compatibility with TF2. They all passed, which didn’t make ranking them any easier.

I then tried to eliminate any song I wouldn’t mind hearing once, but would have problems with if it repeated. I figure a good submission should either make me mentally scream “NO, NOT THIS SONG” on the first play through or be suitable no matter how many times I play it. Unfortunately, I don’t think there is a single song on OCRemix that would fail this test, so I was still stuck with ranking them all.

So I threw them all into a playlist, in order of submission, and looked over the screenshots, took a second look at the maps, and then looked at the screenshots again.

Once I was done with that, I went back and started moving them around in the playlist, ordering them from best to worst. Unlike the maps, I don’t really have concrete reasons as to why one song is better than another.

In the end, I came up with a top five submissions, and then went and dug up the information on who submitted them. They are, from best to worst:

sephire, SGX’s Mario Paint: Intense Color submitted by Medic Lobster
djpretzel’s F-Zero: Mute Radiology submitted by Banhammer
blind’s Final Fantasy IV: Golbez ‘N Goblins submitted by Medic Lobster
HappyBivouac’s Jet Set Radio: Late Night Sneakin’ submitted by Chase
Jivemaster’s Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine: Blobby Blob Disco submitted by NFreak

All five, will end up on #10. I will likely add more, plus some songs of my own pick, as well.

THE SCREENSHOTS

“Third, provide me with a screenshot from #10 that makes me laugh the hardest. You DO have to have made the screenshot (or rather, have had your game make the screenshot), and old screenshots don’t count.”

“Old” screenshots, in this case, would not have had the distinctive orange TF2Newbs.com in the lower corner of the screenshot. That would also apply to any screenshot taken somewhere other than #10, providing an at-a-glance pre-check for me. This was stage 1 of the judging, and I did so as the submissions came in so that people could make/submit new ones.

I did not specify what format, size, etc the screenshots should be in. TGA, PNG, and JPG are no-brainers. Static GIF files would not have been bad. Animated GIF files were stretching it, but out of desperation I included them too.

Yes, I said out of desperation. Not for entries, but for funny. See, before I took into account the animated GIF files I hadn’t even smirked at the screenshots, let alone LAUGHED.

Unfortunately, after I took into account the animated GIF files I was left wishing I hadn’t. They didn’t help.

Either my sense of humor is broken, too refined, or just plain not in tune with the rest of those who play on #10. In some of the screenshots I couldn’t even determine what the person taking it thought was supposed to be funny. Others I had to think about, which is a sure way to ruin a laugh, and I am still not sure if I got it right. The final group I could tell EXACTLY what the funny part was supposed to be, but either due to over-exposure or just finding it stupid from the first time I saw it or something similar didn’t find it funny myself.

Still, I thought, there are entries, and I need to pick a winner. Or did I? The contest was to provide a screenshot, taken on #10 in the contest period, that made me laugh the hardest.

As I didn’t smirk, smile, or even grin at the screenshots, let alone LAUGH, I hereby disqualify the whole lot for not meeting the criteria set forth in the contest.

THE RESULTS

The grand prize for each contest is a copy of L4D2 and a copy of Borderlands. Recipients of the grand prize are as follows:

Map contest: Jigen
Remix contest: Medic Lobster
Screenshot contest: NO WINNER

Wait, I have three contests, three prizes ready to go, and only two winners! Well, that won’t do. I have a quarter here, and I am going to flip it. Heads for Maps, tails for Remixes. Best two of three flips. I don’t have a camera handy, so you will have to trust me on this one.

Flip 1: Heads
Flip 2: Tails
Flip 3: Tails

Tails it is, remixes! Second place in remixes was…Banhammer. Thus, our prize winners are:

Map contest: Jigen
Remix contest: Medic Lobster and Banhammer

I will be in touch with the winners to determine where to send their prizes in the next day or so, either via Steam Chat or forum PMs.

Contest ends November 1st – Midnight. Email entries to andyisgreat@tf2newbs.com

Private Steam Community Page
His Stats This Period

First off the TF2Newbs 2009 TF2 Pumpkin Carving Contest is underway, I havn’t checked if we have any submissions so far, but I’m pretty confident that we’ll have a better turn out than last year (See last years TF2 pumpkin entries). We have decided via poll to allow craft pumpkins, which is good news for those of you who hate pumpkin guts, or wish to save their pumpkin to display next year. For the rest of the Rules for 2009 TF2 Pumpkin Contest check out the link just before these words. The tl;dr basic idea is that you (using a tf2 theme) cut a pumpkin or other pumpkin like thing, take a picture, enter into contest, and get a chance to win L4D2.

As far as L4D2 boycotters go it looks like the boycott movement is sliding even more. Previously when we reported on this, the numbers were at a 2% hypocrite level. This has swelled to 3.8%! As always, be sure to check out the official L4D2 Boycott Lulz Webpage that psychonic has blessed the world with. I’d also like to remind everyone to mark down tomorrow (Oct 18th) on your calendar as Master Server Day. There will be much rejoicing and booze.

Three contests, all judged by myself and only myself.

First, find a map that is not already installed on #10 that you think SHOULD be installed on #10 and put into the rotation. Best map (as chosen by me with a multitude of criteria) wins! You don’t have to have made the map.

Second, find a song (from OCRemix) that is not already on #10 that would rock on #10. Best song (as chosen by me) wins! You don’t have to have made the remix.

Third, provide me with a screenshot from #10 that makes me laugh the hardest. You DO have to have made the screenshot (or rather, have had your game make the screenshot), and old screenshots don’t count.

The prize? Grand Prize (and there is nothing but the grand prize) winner for each contest gets a copy of L4D2 AND a copy of Borderlands. Yes, PREORDERS FOR BOTH GAMES.

You have until sometime on the 23rd when I decide to finalize my judging, owing to the fact that borderlands is available a few days later.

Edit:
To consolidate information:
Screenshots must be taken from the point the contest started.
Entries should be posted here or PMed to me. OCRemix ID numbers may be used, or album number with track number. Maps should be by name, or with a link to download. If I can’t find the map, I may request a link to download before considering the entry valid.
Maps already on the server include cyberpunk, harbl_hotel, dm_biosphere, ctf_convoy, ctf_aerospace, ctf_blackhole. Probably a couple others that are never switched to due to not really fitting the server.
Songs already on the server are OCRemix IDs 15, 1286, 1400, 1661, 881, 1367, and 1507.
You can enter 1 map, 2 songs, 5 screenshots.

Entries to date:

Contest 1: Map
rats_tequila
ctf_hoops_beta
ctf_moonwalk_v2

Contest 2: Song
OCRemix ID 1893
OCRemix ID 1760

Contest 3: Screenshots
NONE

Read / post about @ http://www.tf2newbs.com/forum/index.php/topic,4090.0.html