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Happy New Year everybody! This is our first episode of 2012, recorded on new years day. It may be 2012, but we still have to deal with the last events of 2011. There was a second update before christmas we didn’t get a chance to examine last time. So we take the time now to chat about Saxton’s Own Spirit of Giving and how special it is to us [edit: and KatieKillz too, apparently] . Not to mention all the festive gifts and treats valve has shared with us. If you’re thinking some of them look very familiar you may have seen Hideous’ Weekly Warehouse on our blog.

But not only have they thrust more festive treats into our hands, they have also added in a very special item, for a very special someone ….. we just have no ides who it is. But we have a good idea as to which gender she is.

On top of that, we have a very sneaky peeky or a possible new gaming heads statue of the medic. Where did you get this picture? you might ask. It was spotted by somebody while on a Valve tour .. hmmmmm. If that doesn’t keep you entertained, we have a twitter contest to win a Lo-Fi Longwave, Ruskeydoo’s UGC Medals being snuck into the game and an absolute Mass of emails from you guys.

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Smissmas comes but once a year. For that at least we are very grateful since there’s a hell of a lot to get through. Luckily we have Shibby2142 on hand to take us through the Engine Brainiac Pack, the Pyro Moonman Pack and the new map, cp_foundry. His expert guidance also comes in handy when we look at the three special weapons; the Wrap Assassin, the Spy-cicle and the Holiday Punch. Although credits for understanding exactly how awesome the last can be have got to go to our player of the week SirKemper1 and his punch/taunt kill combo. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSs5Wp46nR4?rel=0]

Finally we discover the true meaning of Australian Christmas and are invited to read the Smissmas Story, as published in The Badlands Holiday Reader.

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When you have Eric Ruth on the hosts lists you can be sure you’re not going to get one of the sneaky little Spies who hangs around inconspicuously back stabbing passers by. No, you’re going to get the gun toting, shoot um in the face, killing machine kinda guy or as he calls them Business Spy.

Didn’t he pick his days to come visit. Smismass is just round the corner and Valve is taking no shit from TF2 servers running fake bots. The Lithuanians have their Pub vs Pros match just as IDK/Ne announce their Christmas Cup for complete newbies and Communities vs Pros III look for players to sign up.

Mecha the Slag is making his own twisted version of Christmas using models by MaxOfS2D (send in your questions for Max a maybe win a Lo-Fi). Check out their messed up version of a snowman.

Lastly, big love to our player of the week, Volpin Props for making the coolest Gravity Gun then giving it up for Child’s Play to auction off.

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Update from valve are like buses. You wait for 1 and then 4 come along all at once. But its ok, you don’t need to mull through mountains of content to keep up to date, we do all that for you. We’ll tell you about the performance improvements, the fixes, the new crates and even the new voodoo doll.

We’ll even talk about the latest addition to the web api that lets you buy items for TF2, Directly from the blog….or the wiki…or any other website for that matter.

Plus this week something happened in the valve troll department that we simply couldn’t ignore. Somebody was spotted wearing a Half Life 3 T-shirt. “Nothing special” i hear you say. But what i were to tell you that it was a valve employee?

Fort Team Charlie also launched its donate appeal this week, Can you spare 52 cents? We’ll tell you why is you think you can. Right before we talk about the future of Highlander as a professional E-sport

Special thanks to joejoe347, our player of the week, for mentioning tf2wh.com and sparking off a huge debate about trust and trading.

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What do Assassins Creed, Dr Who and Notches head have in common? Until this week, nothing. But now, they are all items that reside in TF2. The next question is how do I get these items? That is a little bit more tricky. Maybe it might just drop into your lap, Maybe you have to preorder a game, or maybe you have to develop a world renound indie game and host your own convention…..or maybe all three.

But if Exclusive items aren’t you thing, how about a game of cards. TF2 magic cards to be exact. We’ve found a group of people converting all of valve’s games into Magic the Gathering cards. Starting with team Fortress 2.

Or how about a plushie toy of TF2 characters? We caught up with Threnodi, the creator of a series of TF2 Plushies. She even goes as far as letting people request plushies to be made. Check out some of her works here. While your at it, don’t forget to vote for your favorite announcer for best actress in the the Video Game Awards.

Yes there certainly seems to be something for everybody in this episode…even an anime video of the scount fighting a heavy….no seriously, check it out.

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Kritzkastblackfriday2011……after you listen to the episode, you will know why that is an awesome code.

After last week, you’d think we’d still be talking about valve being hacked. but strangely enough, the news this week features nothing about it. Instead people are more excited by the fact that 2 new items have made their way into TF2. Both of which are associated with trine 2. But what if you don’t want those items? then make some for valve….for Christmas. In fact valve are asking people to do that this year. So if your a model maker, you know what you must do.

Speaking of Christmas, do you know what you want this year? Could it be some of the new Merchandise that’s made its way into the valve store?Or maybe you are looking for an awesome mouse replacement. May we heartily recommend the Novint Falcon? We even brought in Renegade (programmer for Novint Falcon in TF2) to explain how it works. And to give you all a fantastic discount. Listen now for money saving deals.

Or maybe its the Lithuanian Pub vs Pros that takes your eye. See we even let you know about things we can’t be a part of….what with us not being Lithuanian and all. But what we do know is boobs. No please, don’t run away. Trust me, this image is worth us talking about