Meet the Sniper

Meet the Sniper
Video Info
Released:	June 7, 2008
Run time:	1:40

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"Meet the Sniper" Video Transcript

[A lone RV is driving down a desert road. Camera cuts to the dash, where a bobblehead of the former Civilian sits. A hand comes from offscreen and flicks the head.]

Sniper: "Boom, headshot."

["Meet the Sniper" text appears. Cuts to the Sniper driving his RV as Magnum Force plays in the background.]

Sniper: "Snipin's a good job, mate! It's challengin' work, outta doors. I guarantee you'll not go hungry-"

[Cuts to a shot of the Sniper brushing his teeth. There are three photographs on the right of his mirror of a BLU Engineer, Heavy, and Scout - the Engineer and the Scout are crossed off, but the Heavy is not.]

Sniper "-'cause at the end of the day, long as there's two people left on the planet, someone is gonna want someone dead."

[Scene cuts to view inside the Sniper's scope. The Sniper headshots the Heavy from the previous scene; the bullet shatters the bottle of the Demoman behind him, causing the top half of the bottle to embed itself in his remaining eye. The Demoman flails around, takes out his grenade launcher, fires grenades wildly in the air and falls over a ledge, with his stray grenades igniting a cluster of explosive barrels below and causing a chain explosion.]

Sniper: "Ooh."

[Cuts to the Sniper talking on a pay phone.]

Sniper: "Dad? Dad, I'm a- Ye- Not a "crazed gunman", dad, I'm an assassin! ...Well, the difference bein' one is a job and the other's mental sickness!"

[Back to Sniper in the RV.]

Sniper: "I'll be honest with ya: my parents do not care for it."

[Cuts to Sniper climbing the tall tower in Goldrush Stage 3, Cap 1. The Sniper now is waiting at the top of the tower for a shot.]

Sniper: [Glances away from his scope briefly to address the viewer] "I think his mate saw me."

[A bullet ricochets off the ledge under the Sniper.]

Sniper: "Yes, yes he did!"

[The Sniper takes cover as return fire ricochets off the tower.]

[Cuts to a time-lapse image of the Sniper waiting for a shot. Several jars of urine fill up to his side, as the Sniper drinks coffee and waits. As the sun starts to set, the Sniper smiles and finally takes his shot.]

[The Sniper backstabs a Spy through the chest with his Kukri on Goldrush Stage 3, then slides him off the knife with a satisfied expression.]

Sniper: "Feelins'? Look mate, you know who has a lot of feelings?"

[Cut back to the RV]

Sniper: "Blokes what bludgeon their wife to death with a golf trophy. Professionals have standards."

[Sniper takes off his hat and puts it on his chest, standing over the dead Spy.]

Sniper: "Be polite."

[Sniper head-shots a Medic, a Soldier, and a Pyro.]

Sniper: "Be efficient."

[Slow-motion shot of the Sniper reloading his rifle.]

Sniper: "Have a plan to kill everyone you meet."

[The Sniper fires directly at the camera. The screen blacks out.]

[Team Fortress 2 ending flourish music plays.]

[Cut back to the pay phone.]

Sniper: "Dad.... Dad p-, yeah - put Mum on the phone!"

Notes

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• The location in which this video takes place seems to be partly Gold Rush and Fastlane while the scenes with the Sniper talking take place in original locations.

• The Sniper is driving a 'Camper', a subtle hint to his game-style.

• Although the Spy and Scout mock the Sniper for living in a "van", the Sniper actually drives a 196-'s Land Rover Pickup, an English car favored in areas like Australia and Africa because of its toughness. In addition, the Snipers actual RV is a "Slide In" Camper, also very popular in Australia and among Hunters and Outdoorsmen for its ruggedness and ability to handle tough terrain.

• The bobble-head on the Sniper's dash is a caricature of the Civilian as he appears in the original Team Fortress Classic.

• Body count: 6 (8 if you count the Engineer and the Scout crossed off the Sniper kill list)

• Amusing Sign: The Billboard in the opening shot and behind the Sniper in the pay phone scenes reads "FOAD: Camping Fun, All year round!" This is both a reference to the 'camping' style of gameplay Snipers employ and the internet initialism FOAD (Fuck Off And Die), often aimed at Snipers in various online games by disgruntled players.

• Amusing Sign: By the roadside in the opening shot is a sign warning people to beware of headshots. The Sniper was on the payphone with City Hall for weeks after they put these up. How's a man supposed to get his job done?[1]

• Foreshadowing: The aforementioned FOAD sign has the silhouette of a Demoman wielding an Eyelander in the F, beheading someone. Barring a coincidence, this means Valve was planning the Eyelander since November 2008, just over a year before the War! Update. The sign, however, was near impossible to see in fine detail until the video's assets were added to the SDK in October 2009 (2 months before the War! Update).

• The Pyro is seen wielding the Flare gun, an unlockable weapon which had not been publicly revealed at the time of the video's release.

• The jars of urine are also the very first glimpse of Jarate, and give a possible explanation on how he has so much available.

• The phrase "Boom, headshot." may well be a reference to the catchphrase of the character 'FPS Doug' in the online comedy series Pure Pwnage.

• The video seems to carry on the tradition of the poor BLU Heavy and Soldier being abused in every Meet the Team video. To date the Heavy has been blown to smithereens by the Demoman, was killed first by the Engineer's Sentry in Meet the Engineer, been bludgeoned to unconsciousness by the Scout and run over by the train in Meet the Scout, gibbed by the Soldier on two separate occasions, was stabbed to death by an enemy Spy in Meet the Spy, and was even seen killed in a battle during Meet the Heavy and Meet the Sandvich.

• The Sniper is able to produce 3 1/2 jars of urine in 4 hours on just 4 cups of coffee. This is exclusive to Meet the Sniper, as the recharging time for the (then unknown) Jarate is considerably shorter ingame (though it is undisclosed as to whether he makes the new jar during this charge period or he spends the time taking another pre-made one out).

• The Sniper begins waiting for his shot at 4pm and takes his shot at 8:10pm, 4 hours and 10 minutes later.

• The Sniper's coffee cup says '#1 Sniper'.

• The Sniper drinks decaf, as is evidenced by the orange rim of his coffee decanter. This is most likely in order to keep his nerves steady.

• The Sniper's "standards" are very similar to those of the United States Marine Corps: "Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everyone you meet."

• The Sniper can be seen with a bruise under his right thumbnail. He has probably pinched his thumb with the breech while loading a bullet into his bolt-action rifle, the same way as shown in the last scene of the video. It may also be a bruise from him using the SMG, as the firing mechanism hammers back just above where his thumb is usually positioned when firing.

• The Sniper kills the Spy with his kukri by stabbing him through the chest. Not only is this a much less effective method of using a kukri, as the blade was designed primarily to chop, but the Sniper also uses it upside down. This may however be an intentional comedic reversal with the Sniper backstabbing the Spy with a knife of his own. Coincidentally, the Tribalman's shiv, the other kukri for the Sniper, uses upside down viewmodels in this fashion.

• While the Sniper taunts the Spy, the bloodstain on the wall quickly changes shading.

• In the opening title, the Sniper has several jars of Jarate (then just simple jars of urine) sitting next to his Sniper rifle as well as several used cigarette butts.

• With the release of the Sniper video the number of team members known to smoke cigarettes comes to four, the others being the Spy, Soldier and Demoman. This may be another comedic reversal on the fact that the Sniper and Spy class are rivals, but it is ironic that the Sniper should smoke as Snipers are trained specifically to spot glowing "cherries" of cigarettes on the battlefield (though he does not do this ingame).

• The opening jingle when the 'Meet the Sniper' title appears differs from the other Meet the Team videos.

• The music that plays throughout the entire video would appear to be a homage to the Magnum Force theme, the second in the Dirty Harry movies. The video itself carries a strong early 70's theme.

• The bus that drives by at the end has 'BLUDOG' on the side, a reference to the real life Greyhound Lines bus service. This may indicate the setting being in the US, though there is also a Greyhound Australia service as well.

• The camper is being driven on the right hand side of the road. This would also indicate that the video is not filmed in Australia, as Australian vehicles use the left side of the road. In addition to this, the driver's seat is on the left side, in Australia the passenger seat is on the left and the driver's seat on the right.

• The Soldier being headshotted and the sound of the shot do not appear to be in sync, but this is fixed in alternate language versions of the video.

• In the scene where the Heavy is shot through the head and the bullet shatters a nearby Demoman's bottle into pieces, the Demoman falls into a pit of explosive barrels. These barrels are only seen as models during gameplay, and do not explode at all, only serving as cover.

• At one point, the Sniper climbs a ladder. While it's possible to create a makeshift ladder in Source SDK (although there is no direct way to do it), none of Valve's maps include ladders which can be climbed (there are only a few that are lowered, so players can walk on them).

• The Sniper smiles for 10 minutes before finally taking his shot at his unknown target.

• In the Spanish version of "Meet the Sniper," a part of the Sniper's dialogue is censor 'bleeped', while talking about his parents. This only other times this occurs is in the English versions of Meet the Scout & Meet the Spy, and all versions of Meet the Demoman.

• The Sniper likes to keep his Rifle on a gun rack behind his seat during driving, which is partly visible during some scenes.

• After the Sniper kills the Heavy, the Demoman's Grenade Launcher is visible on his belt before he equips it.

• In just a few seconds, The Sniper takes down a Medic, a Soldier, and a Pyro. If their health was at max, the Sniper would not be able to do this so quickly because of the charge-up time for a suitably powerful Sniper rifle shot. This would also be a difficult feat even if they were already damaged. The Meet the Team videos do not of course follow the game mechanics exactly, accounting for some strange feats.

• The Sniper reloads his Sniper rifle by taking a bullet from his vest, ejecting the spent shell, and loading the new bullet into the rifle, all in one fluid motion, as seen towards the end just after he shoots the Pyro. This method of reloading would explain how the rifle has so much ammo without having a cartridge, though the Sniper's vest only holds so many bullets.

• The Sniper rifle appears to lack the typical laser crosshair in this video.

• The Sniper rifle bolt pulling sound sounds as if the Sniper would have pushed the bolt back, but instead he forcefully drags the bolt back.

• No other RED team members appear in the video. This may be a reference to the 'loner' playstyle of the Sniper, and his bio of not having to rely on others when you never miss.

• An unofficial model replacement for the Kukri gives it the appearance of a golf trophy, inspired by the Sniper's comment within this video.[2]

• An SDK update on October 21, 2009 allows mapmakers to use props from this video, such as the Sniper's camper van or the #1 Sniper mug.

• One of the bumper stickers on the Camper reads "MY OTHER CAMPER IS A SWORD VAN!", a reference to one of KC Green's Custom Comics [3] another reads "I'd rather be camping!".

• A note taped to the windscreen of the camper reads "TAX IN POST", a reference to the popular British comedy 'Only Fools and Horses'.

• The Sniper's van bears the Team Fortress series logo on the roof and its vehicle registration plate is 'HS 101'.

• Originally, Valve toyed with the idea of the bobblehead being a mascot from one of the many product signs dotting the landscape of the TF2 universe. The "Old Geezer" mascot for the Old Geezer beer brand spotted dotted about in some maps was suggested, and a bobblehead model was born. The word "apricot" is Sniper terminology for the medulla oblongata, a "sweet spot" Snipers aim for where the brain and brain stem meet, explaining why the Old Geezer was holding apricot brandy. During playtests, the apricot reference was discovered to be just a too obscure; and more importantly, nobody had any idea who the old guy was with several mistaking him for Santa. Valve recast the model as the Civilian, an escort class from Team Fortress Classic and a far more recognizable figure to TF veterans. The model is now available in the SDK also, along with the other Meet the Sniper exclusive props.

• The apricot reference, meanwhile, was added as an air freshener in the camper's window.

Other versions

French	German
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Russian	Spanish
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