Team Fortress 2 Relaunching As Free-to-Play Game

UPDATE: The Team Fortress 2website was updated just moments ago, confirming that the game is free-to-play effective right now. You can find the announcement trailer at the bottom of the post.

Just three days ago, Valve’s Doug Lombardi revealed in an interview that the company was working on some form of free-to-play game. I expected to hear news later this year, but I didn’t expect to hear something three days later.

In an exclusive interview with Develop Online, Valve developer Robin Walker revealed that the hugely popular team-based shooter Team Fortress 2 will be relaunching as a free-to-play game.

“We’ve been toying with the idea of making Team Fortress free-to-play ever since the Mann-conomy update [in September 2010],” said Walker. “The data we got back from that update leads us to believe that TF2 would be more successful as a completely free product.”

Walker went on to explain in the interview that Valve won’t be using any form of an advertising model, nor will there be any premium subscriptions that give players an edge over the standard user. Instead, the model will be entirely focused on micro-transactions for in-game items. Like hats, for example.

It’s not immediately clear whether or not this goes into effect immediately — after all, this week was already a scheduled “free week” for Team Fortress 2 — but we’ll keep you posted as soon as we hear more.