PASS Fortress
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| PASS Fortress | |
|---|---|
 | |
| SDK Beta Branch | |
| Current Status | Active |
| Latest Version | Unknown |
| Project Lead(s) | llucy3 (Lucy Faria) |
| Socials | Discord Website YouTube Twitter/X |
| Download | |
PASS Fortress is a TF2 Sourcemod aimed at improving PASS Time for competitive play. It is a standalone version of the competitive 4v4 PASS Time gamemode, with various improvements that can only be achieved in an SDK mod.
Development History
TF2's PASS Time gamemode was conceived by Bad Robot and had development assisted by Escalation Studios. It is a football-type mode where teams must throw a "JACK" (ball) into enemy goals, which is most effectively done when passing the ball between teammates and being intelligent with class selection.
Despite being fun, it never caught on with TF2's more casual player-base, due to PASS Time's unintuitive nature and high teamwork requirements. Teamwork rarely manifests, leading to frustration whenever an inexperienced player refuses to pass, or gives the opponent ball possession for no reason. Additionally, many players fall into the trap of only playing Scout, and neglecting to pick Soldier and Demoman, resulting in Engineer feeling oppressive.
The competitive version of PASS Time was originally conceived by a competitive TF2 player named JaguarFiend. Jaguar created a large PASS Time map intended for 6v6 gameplay. This map, named Arena, was later scaled down significantly. This resulted in the creation of Arena2 and the 4v4 PASS Time ruleset, which bans the vast majority of TF2's weapons and classes.
When played with friends in a voice call, 4v4 PASS Time solves the teamwork requirement issues and discourages overly-defensive strategies, while encouraging fast-paced gameplay and advanced techniques.
A plugin was implemented to fix various bugs, such as Medic being unable to shoot the JACK with his crossbow, and the JACK colliding with ammo boxes. This plugin, developed by llucy3, also added some new features such as stat tracking.
For the longest time, 4v4 PASS Time was only ever played in American servers. New maps were then created, the gamemode was played in an ETF2L cup among others, word of mouth spread, and there are now servers for Europe, Australia, and Asia.
Following the release of the Team Fortress 2 SDK, efforts to port the gamemode to a standalone client began immediately, as this would allow for many quality of life changes that are impossible to implement through a server plugin alone. Additionally, features that were once specific to the server plugin can now be ported to game code, allowing for offline practice and LAN events with less setup required.
On April 28th 2025, the SDK mod was formally announced with the name PASS Fortress.
Gameplay
Classes and Weapons
The 4v4 PASS Time ruleset was created by starting from a blank slate, and adding things that were deemed interesting. In that respect, it is similar to TF2's Medieval Mode, where the vast majority of items (and in this case, classes) have been disabled.
All hitscan weapons were disabled to prevent easy ball-hits and make it harder to deny jumping players. Emphasis is instead placed on using explosive projectiles to hit airshots and travel with the ball quickly.
The current ban list for TF2's 4v4 PASS Time can be viewed on Whitelist.tf. Note that it does not show banned "stock" items, such as the Stickybomb Launcher, Shotgun, and Syringe Gun, all of which are disabled.
Whether classes or weapons will get reworked to be "unbanned" in the mod is unknown.
Gamemodes
PASS Time is the only gamemode that will be officially supported in the mod. Other TF2 modes (such as Payload) may suffer from regression issues (e.g. classlimits still being active) or may be disabled entirely if there is a means to do so.
There is potential for spinoffs of PASS Time in the future. For instance, there is a community-made 2v2 Soldier-only gamemode called "Pibble" that introduces a "combo meter", instant respawns, and disables the PASS lock-on feature. Whether Pibble gets implemented officially in the mod, or remains as a community-made Vscript map, is unknown as of currently. The mod's developers are also aware of a 7v7 PASS Time format that uses modified "vanilla" maps and all 9 classes, but this format is not planned to be added at this current time, as PASS Fortress is primarily a 4v4 mod.
Aesthetics
PASS Fortress retains the characters, visuals and settings of Team Fortress, but only Soldier, Demoman and Medic are present. The menus will receive an overhaul.
The HUD will receive updates to fix issues. For instance, vanilla TF2's HUD contains information that is used in 12v12 PASS Time but is useless in 4v4 PASS Time. PASS Fortress will reduce the notification text size and remove useless 12v12 HUD elements.
Maps
There are plans to include some or most of the competitively viable 4v4 PASS Time maps by default. Other maps can still be downloaded and tested on the pickup game servers.