 Good evening. TF2. It's a classic game we all love, and the big reason why is because it has a super unique cartoony style. But what if it didn't? This is what 2-4 might look like if TF2 was created with the realistic vision instead of a cartoony one. What you're looking at is a map called FY2-4 created over 15 years ago for the game Counter Strike Source, and I find it fascinating. Seeing 2-4 in a more gritty style really highlights the absurdity of its design and paints it in a whole new light. Unfortunately this version doesn't include the basement areas because it wasn't made for capture the flag, but it's still really trippy to explore coming off the hundreds of hours I've played on the original. The sewers, the bases, and the bridge, or bridge is, are all lovingly remade with an old school gritty source engine look, and I've never really seen anything else like it. It is a bit orange though. I tried pumping up the blues on a screenshot of the map, and I think that actually does make it easier on the eyes and even a bit more recognizable. Nevertheless, despite these quirks there's still always been something captivating about this map to me, and when I came across it again recently it got me thinking about what other realistic versions of TF2 maps might be out there to explore. I mean, surely this isn't the only time someone tried something like this, right? And that thought led me down a pretty interesting rabbit hole. So if you didn't know, Team Fortress 2 was the first and basically only game in the Team Fortress franchise to feature its cartoony style. The original Team Fortress takes after Quake, and is by extension a bit gothic. A lot of the maps look like abstract castles, and the characters are all brawlic space marines fighting with weird fantastical weapons. Team Fortress Classic took after Half-Life, its levels are a lot more concrete and industrial, and its characters are high-tech mercenaries fighting with more traditional-looking firearms. Then, after a decade in development hell, TF2 decided to throw both of those styles completely out of the window in favor of, well, putus guy in his dumb fucking sandwich. The point I'm making is that Team Fortress arguably has more of a history as a realistic or at least gritty series than it does as a lighthearted and cartoony one. Because of this, most of the Team Fortress community was expecting TF2 to be a more grounded game before its final style was revealed, and that misconception is what inspired most of what I'm about to talk about in this video. First of all, back when I was working on my Where's Team Fortress 1 video, I remember trying out a fan build of the cancelled Team Fortress invasion game from 2003. This build included yet another really strange realistic version of 2fort that I was quickly able to track down. Now, contrary to what some people online say, this is not an actual leaked TF2 map. It's just a test level that some mod team created way back in the day. That's why it looks so much like something out of the Half-Life 2 beta. There's actually a couple different versions of it I could find as well, including this snowy version. Isn't it kind of strange to think that for several years before TF2 came out, this is what people online anticipated it to look like? In fact, you can even find videos on YouTube from before TF2's release or official announcement of people messing around on this scuff 2fort. I don't know, I thought that was interesting. Anyway, the map itself is unfortunately mostly unremarkable. It's not really anything like the 2fort we all know and love apart from its layout, and even then it's bastardized and pretty unfinished. There's no sewer area, so if you fall off the bridge, you're just kinda stuck in water until someone kills you. In fact, I'm not even actually really sure what game mode this version was meant to be played in. It doesn't really have capture zones or anything like that. Regardless, it's still not only another interesting depiction of realistic 2fort, but also a very novel piece of Team Fortress history as well. Don't worry though, I've got something more interesting. F.F. No, not french fries, you hungry piece of shit. I'm talking about Fortress Forever, which was a game made by diehard Team Fortress fans who got fed up with how long Valve was taking to make Team Fortress 2. So in 2004, after five years of waiting, they elected to create their own new Source Engine version of Team Fortress. Now, very tragically, production on Fortress Forever wrapped up literally right as TF2 was finally announced and released, and unfortunately has never really been very popular since. Well, at least outside the bizarre Team Fortress classic cult who rejected TF2 the second they saw its first trailer because they thought the cartoon style was gay. Anyway, Fortress Forever includes a goldmine of these gritty realistic versions of TF2 maps I've been looking for. I don't know how many people watching will have played Fistful of Frags, that old Source Engine cowboy game, but I found myself being reminded of that as I explored Fortress Forever's version of Dust Bowl. It's so Western. I know TF2 is Western too, but this really looks like a place that insane cowboy people would be throwing dynamite at each other in. Here, I'll even add some in. The layout is definitely a little strange since it's based on the original TFC version, but the map is still recognizable enough to be trippy as hell to explore. It feels a lot more believable as a real location than TF2's rendition, probably due to the lack of crazy technology or giant missiles. In this, Dust Bowl isn't a secret military base with sci-fi tech. It's just a big wooden town with churches and houses and mine shafts. It's kinda neat because in all my years of playing TF2, I don't think I've ever thought of Dust Bowl in the context of being a real location with people living and operating in it before. And this rendition made me realize that. One thing that's interesting about Fortress Forever is that, a lot like the FY2 Fort map I showed earlier, its attempts to rationalize and ground the TF2 maps into real locations inadvertently ends up highlighting just how nonsensical they really are. It makes it very obvious why Valve went for the stylized, cartoony aesthetic they came up with in the end. Funnily enough, I was able to track down a picture of an earlier version of Dust Bowl from the TF2 beta that much more closely resembles the Fortress Forever version, at least in color. I wonder if the TF2 community will ever get their hands on this one. It's interesting looking. Fortress Forever also has its own rendition of 2-4-2, and it's weird. Once again, it's much closer to the TFC version than the TF2 one, what with these elevators and the lack of a roof on the bridge. But it also has stuff that's completely unique, like these areas on the side of the battlements with ladders and this strange version of the sewer area. Fortress Forever has a version of Well, too, but it's honestly completely unrecognizable since it's also based on the old TFC version. I feel like sometimes we take for granted just how much of an improvement TF2's maps are over TFC's. Not only in graphics, but also layout. Have you ever played the original version of Well? It fucking sucks. Okay, one last thing. Do you remember that big TF2 leak that happened a few months ago? Well, it included an unreleased TF2 map called Hunted, which is based off the TFC map of the same name. One thing I find interesting is that Fortress Forever includes its own rendition of Hunted. And surprisingly, I think it actually resembles the scrapped, unreleased TF2 version more than the TFC one it was originally based off of. It seems like both dev teams decided that the new version of the map needed to be greener and grassier, which is kind of a funny coincidence. Anyways, I think that's all I've got for realistic maps. If you clicked on this video wanting to see realistic TF2 characters, then, uh... Uh... Oh, I know. Killing Floor, which is this old zombie horde survival game I used to play all the time, had a DLC that added a realistic version of the pyro as a playable character. Here's what he looks like in-game, and here's what he looks like running around on FY2 Fort in GMOD. Cool, right? I put him in the thumbnail. I also found an art station page for a guy named Radovan's... Radovan Sztyastný. ...who made a couple remakes of TF2 weapons that turned him into something out of Fallout 3, which were pretty interesting to look at. These guns aren't really designed with any type of realistic function in mind, so seeing them all gritty and shiny like this is a bit surreal. Oh, and one last thing. Did you know that Duke Nukem Forever has a version of 2 Fort 2? I don't really know why or how this became a thing, but it's called 2 Fort 1 Bridge, and it was apparently part of a game mode called Capture the Babe. Unfortunately, or fortunately, I guess. I don't own Duke Nukem Forever, so this YouTube footage is all I can show you of this right now, but I still thought it was worth a mention. Alright, that's for real all I've got for now, though. I know this was a shorter video, and it was also kind of just a 2 Fort video, I'm not gonna lie, but hopefully you still found it interesting and learned something. Thanks for watching, and have a spectacular day. Oh, subscribe too!