Explaining The TF2 Community Maps Iceberg

**FLASHING LIGHTS WARNING THROUGHOUT VIDEO!!**
Team Fortress 2 is home to a whole world of community-created content, with millions of maps ranging from well known classics to obscure gems of the past. Join me as I delve into the homemade, definitive community map iceberg chart, explaining every map as I go along.

Intro: 0:00
Tier 1: 1:38
Tier 2: 13:08
Tier 3: 35:45
Tier 4: 1:05:26
Tier 5: 1:34:07
Tier 6: 1:53:31
Outro: 2:05:26

This video is my biggest project of all time, taking approximately 3 months to plan, script, record and edit. I humbly appreciate your patience, and I hope you all enjoy this unit of a video!

Insta: tophonator
Steam: toph / tophonator
Twitter: @tophonator_
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[BComet]

I have a fond memory on the NeonHeights Trade map.

At the time (around 2015...?), the server admin was likely bored, then proposed a little game. He said that, the player that manages kill him, would get a random hat. Then he proceeded to give himself around hp and did nothing but throw spells at random intervals. While everyone in the server was going heavy and showering him with minigun bullets, I went with the Huntsman for some reason, but I got the kill! Earned an Level 100, appropriately named "The Lucky Shot" Soldier hat, which I started to use right away and since then.
A couple years later (one or two I think), I met with the server admin again, he recognized me by my nickname and was happy to see that I kept the hat with me after so long.

[itchylol]

What a based youtuber, creating and editing a 2 hour video for a small audience and close to no financial incentive at all. I hope you get lucky and the algorithm boosts this to a million views.

[Siger]

Excellent narration. No tautology, no unfunny jokes, and it's well-informed. Hard to come up with any quibbles. Only wish it had more maps I don't recognize.

[UEAKCrash]

Very late because I just now saw this video, but a *lot* of the weird maps that are hard to track down their sources originated from TF2Maps annual April Fools day events. I hosted a contest for them for a few years, but they've been a tradition where mappers make the craziest stuff they can to amuse each other, often only being released in a single zip file as a pre-download for everyone, and then we would join our servers and experience them all together.

I can also tell you that koth_yup originally replaced all noises with engineer lines, which likely broke since it was released and is why it's just silent now. I bet the console is spamming "file not found" errors for it.

I play trainsawlaser and wubwubwub often on my home server wrapping up our weekly map tests :)

Thanks for putting this together though. As someone who has played a LOT of these when they were new, and even made a few of them, it is a fun nostalgia trip.

[loztwalker]

I'm surprised at how many of these i know, but i gotta say, as the tiers kept getting higher and i started seeing more and more maps i had never seen previously, the video just kept getting more interesting, great work

[passivelySCREAMING]

I’m astounded that 9.6.12 map is that obscure, yet I remember playing on it once or twice when I was server hopping. The middle tan building with the conveyer belt at the time I played on the server, had people walking over and using it for their strange farming. While looking down the windowless corridor I oddly remembered walking through and peek out the window or a sniper nesting there.
I even remember that Zelda temple having the three items on the pedestal, sorry i don’t play Zelda but I know the relics are placed there.
It’s crazy, it reminded me when I a like a few months into tf2, before I got into trading, before I met so may of my TF2 friends I’ve added, I literally played this map on a laptop, before I got a computer.

It’s obscurity made me reminisce young teenager me just playing the game for fun, it’s quite unsettling but I’ll treat as a fond memory rather a saddening glimpse of my youth.

[ShaggyToad]

Fun fact about maker of TF2Ware, Mecha The Slag. He went out and founded Gears for Breakfast and made his debut game The Hat in Time. He even used to own bunch of servers called SLAG gaming, that would pick random game modes with every map, dodgeball, fort building, prophunt, bomberman etc.

[kenwu]

This is literally a dream of mine came ture, an insightful and detailed video covering all the maps we as TF2 players been loving for years, thank you for doing God's work here!

[vinesauceobscurities]

Unmentioned is the machine_attacks series of maps, basically a narrative-driven MVM campaign that used to be so much fun to play as you truly felt like you were in a journey with a team accross lands. I remembered spending my weekend hours in these maps at its height of popularity somewhere in the early-2010s.

I never understood why map makers never explored the concept again. It really had a lot of potential to boost the game's PvE component.

[robotratsrb]

I remember this old server that isn't around anymore for some reason (sadly) that I've barely been able to find any information about. It always had a map called cp_balloonrace, and the premise was that at the beginning of the match, two airships would slowly fill up with players and take off after a short intermission. The only way to win was to get your team's airship to the end. Every few minutes the airship would stop at a checkpoint where whichever team got the capture on that stop was able to leave, and then the other team had to get it once the other left. Eventually the race would end with one team getting to the finish line. It was the highlight of early 2010 TF2 for me, and brought me some amazing memories. It was one of very few community servers I regularly played on and I'll always fondly remember the loud music that always played at the start of each game. RIP to the GOAT of all community servers );

[TheNightmareAngelYT]

So many great maps that were left to rot. The ones suitable for the public eye and that can be found should be brought back for everyone to enjoy!
Thanks for all of this, you madlad.
Hope the video gets a ton of views in the future!

[KeithGDR]

I'm the guy that made the DYNF ports for the original Jailbreak maps. Back in 2013-ish I was hosting a community called Dynamic Fortress and I made ports of most of the popular maps to fix some of their optimization issues, bugs and to open up the playable space a bit since my community at the time was complaining. I asked for permission from the original mapper Theodore and he said It's okay since I was porting the maps to use the TF2Jail plugin I made at the time.

[CaptainZaimon]

idle_4chan feels like the most soulless attempt at recreating the unique charm of Xenon's 2000s style I've ever seen.

[sealsealin]

I am genuinely surprised by the quality of this video. The amount of work in it must have been great. Really takes me back to the old times when there was a general spark in the community's heart for niche maps. Very well done!

[Jai_]

very well thought out and executed video, glad to have experienced it early.

[Juan-jlud]

This has become one of my fav videos about TF2 of all time. The work and dedication that went into this is incredible, I really love the music choice throughout the whole video and being it about a deep dive into obscure community maps? love it!
Absolute king
may the algorithm bless this channel
cuz man, you deserve it

[LeafMaltieze]

I started playing in 2009, and I have personally played on about 90% of the maps you've shown. It was nostalgic to see into the past like this.

[Shyrou]

Dude I was wondering where were you and now you come with a 2 hour long video? Absolute king

[Suggo]

Criminally underrated video, thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing. Thanks for making it!

[zelgarath]

I remember I was one of the first few admins for Neonheight's servers. Seeing that title pop up again was a BLAST from the past! Neon's a good guy and it was awesome seeing the server really just come to life and being along for the entirety of the development of his maps. I still remember throwing a few ideas his way for what next to put into Trade_Minecraft and he would usually end up adding something even more creative than I'd have thought to the server (I remember when he added the breakaway floor to the obstacle course under the spawnroom blowing my mind.) but unfortunately I'd never get the spycrab room I asked for! There was one point that Neon was on a spree to get every single duel minigame he could on the server and because of that he's still ranked in the top 20 for most duel wins. Many a great memory was had on his servers and I even still have the "Permission for Obesity" Wedding ring he and I bought as a joke! It's amazing looking back now and seeing just how much those maps really stood the test of time and really shook up what other community devs were doing at the time and I'm happy to have been at least a small part of it! 😀