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TF2 secret update: Valve put Sherlock Holmes on the case

sherlock

The mystery surrounding the recent Team Fortress 2 update, where Valve added a pile of random items to the game as drops, is deepening. Usually things become clearer as they go along, but Valve have cunningly connected the strange pile of items to Sherlock Holmes. What the hell does he have to do with Team Fortress 2?

The story so far: yesterday a secret update to TF2 went out, bringing with it Goldfish, a Barn Door Plank, Pocket Lint, a Banana Peel, the Cheese Wheel, and a Damaged Capacitor as item drops. They each had a description that heavily suggested something mysterious was going on. The Goldfish’s reads: “Does it strike you as mysterious that goldfish are neither MADE OF GOLD or EVEN FISH? Because it should. Also, goldfish ARE fish, we got that part wrong. TO GET YOU OFF THE SCENT!”

As it turns out there was a second part of the puzzle: a second secret update was released, that was exposed when players equipped the Eliminating The Impossible item set, a Sherlock Holmes themed set of bling.

When this set is equipped viewing the dropped junk in the your backpack reveals a second set of item descriptions. At first they appear to be gibberish, but together they reveal the phrase: “Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser.”

Which is a line from “The Adventure of the Copper Beeches”, a Sherlock Holmes story. That story is about doppelgänger.

I’m not even sure where to begin. At first the world of TF2 seemed to be moving towards a more modern twist, with the hint that they’ll be including Robots. But Sherlock is decidedly creaky.

There’s some suggestion that ‘Meet The Pyro’ is attached to this: the Secret Diary has a scorch mark on it’s cover, and he is the burniest of the character classes. Could the doppelgänger be robotic in nature? Robot clones of each class has been hinted at as well. Valve are currently at update number 298, so they’re probably aiming for the major update to be number 300.

But beyond that, I’m stumped. I still think we’ll find out before the weekend, though.