Contribution page

“

Think you're good at making TF2 items and avatars? Better even than the people who design the game? Here's the thing: you're probably right. And believe us, this knowledge haunts us every day. Gabe Newell's just an email away, after all. What if you ratted us out?

— TF2 Contribution Page.^[1]

”

The TF2 Official Contribution Site was designed to incorporate the creativity of the TF2 community into gameplay. This does not, however, mean that players can choose the effects of their content in gameplay. All item submissions are reviewed to maintain quality content and are only incorporated by the TF2 team, as not to cause any unbalance in the game. Avatars, however, have to be flagged if not related to Team Fortress 2 by the community. Accepted contributions are Steam avatars, weapon models, and hat models.

Submission guidelines

File:ColorPalette.gif

Color swatch to follow when creating hats.

To sustain the visual style of the game, the TF2 team has established a few guidelines for submissions. All of the following should be used when designing and submitting your items:

Theme
- 1950's style design
- Maintains character personality and bio
Modeling techniques
- Realistic but slightly skewed proportions to add visual draw
- Details may be over or underscaled
- Keep it simple and clean
Texturing techniques
- Maintain texture quality; nothing higher or lower res than what is next to it.
- Hats are to use team specific or neutral colors
- Textures should be simple and not a distraction.
Technicals
- Hat models under 800 polygons
- Weapon models under 8000 polygons
- Textures no larger than 512x512, 256x256 being preferred
- Steam avatars must be 184x184 and saved in .JPG format
- Source files must be included for models and materials.
- Thumbnails and in-game images must be 256x256px.