I'm not one of those guys who has 1000+ hours clocked on TF2 but it is safe to say that I love the game. I love it for its simplicity and I love it for its complexity. I love the characters, I love the sounds of the game, I love Valve for updating the damn thing without asking for a penny, hell I even love the community. But recently i've felt that the TF2 i'm playing isn't the TF2 I love anymore.  
 
I feel that playing it isn't just about winning a round and maybe finding an interesting item along the way, it is all about finding the items. I found myself playing and logging hours into the game just to find weapons that I could craft into scrap, and eventually trade that away for hats instead of playing because it was genuinely fun. Or worse yet I found myself spending money to unlock crates to find cool little unlockables that are completely unnecessary. I quickly realized that I wasn't playing for fun anymore, I wasn't playing because I loved setting up sentries as an engie or runnin' and gunnin' as a scout, I was playing it because I wanted items. And it seems to me that many other people are doing that now as well, I mean there are servers dedicated to trading or idling for god's sake. 
 
The item system didn't ruin the game for me, in a way it made it exciting and humorous. The class updates were always well thought out and each item had a background and a clever story and you earned them for the most part through the achievement system for each individual class, which made earning the weapon a source of a feeling of accomplishment. The Mann-Conomy update however did water down the game for me, it is safe to say I suppose that it 'ruined' the game for me. Now I want to make myself perfectly clear and say that I understand why they implemented the store and that the store itself is not required to play the game. The Mann-Co Store is a necessary evil. Without it people would be selling hats for hundreds of dollars and/or coming up with sleazy schemes to steal items (much like happened with WoW accounts). I stuck through it though, having understood the need for the store I brushed it off and continued to play. After the newest update though I can't bring myself to be excited about TF2 anymore, I found myself preparing to play a game like I was about to grind experience. I just didn't enjoy it anymore, I enjoyed getting a new item, but I didn't enjoy the ride before getting to the item anymore. The items seem so impersonal and strange now as well, they have little to do with the classes and it is beginning to feel like an actual hat simulator, as the community often jokes about. 
 
So after a lot of pondering I have decided to call it quits, and to bid farewell to my beloved TF2. I did the same thing when I realized I wasn't playing WoW for fun anymore, I was playing for the epic loot or the titles I 'needed' to have. It was a good ride, and I had a lot of fun. I'll never stop enjoying the TF2 characters or music, but the time has come for me to stop trying to enjoy the game. I love Valve and in no way blame them for updating their game, they will continue to make fun games and I will likely continue buying them. I fully understand that none of the updates to TF2 (Mann-Co. Store, new items, crates) are even necessary to play the game, but they have made it feel like they are to me. So as I put on my Vintage Texas Ten Gallon and ride off into the night, I wanted to thank Valve for giving me one of the most enjoyable gaming experiences I ever had for a time, and I wanted to thank every TF2 player for making the game a blast. 
 
It was fun.

TF2 was a great game, sadly my only experience playing the game was on the PS3 and not the PC. Maybe one day I can experience the real magic one day. Anyway, nice blog.

I see where you're coming from but I think the difference is that I can detach myself from all the extra stuff and enjoy the game for what it is, a great class-based shooter. I haven't even unlocked most of the new weapons but I've never felt like I couldn't compete with anyone else, which to me is the most important thing.

 @BibleDoctor said:

" I'm not one of those guys who has 1000+ hours clocked on TF2 but it is safe to say that I love the game. I love it for its simplicity and I love it for its complexity. I love the characters, I love the sounds of the game, I love Valve for updating the damn thing without asking for a penny, hell I even love the community. But recently i've felt that the TF2 i'm playing isn't the TF2 I love anymore.   I feel that playing it isn't just about winning a round and maybe finding an interesting item along the way, it is all about finding the items. I found myself playing and logging hours into the game just to find weapons that I could craft into scrap, and eventually trade that away for hats instead of playing because it was genuinely fun. Or worse yet I found myself spending money to unlock crates to find cool little unlockables that are completely unnecessary. I quickly realized that I wasn't playing for fun anymore, I wasn't playing because I loved setting up sentries as an engie or runnin' and gunnin' as a scout, I was playing it because I wanted items. And it seems to me that many other people are doing that now as well, I mean there are servers dedicated to trading or idling for god's sake.  The item system didn't ruin the game for me, in a way it made it exciting and humorous. The class updates were always well thought out and each item had a background and a clever story and you earned them for the most part through the achievement system for each individual class, which made earning the weapon a source of a feeling of accomplishment. The Mann-Conomy update however did water down the game for me, it is safe to say I suppose that it 'ruined' the game for me. Now I want to make myself perfectly clear and say that I understand why they implemented the store and that the store itself is not required to play the game. The Mann-Co Store is a necessary evil. Without it people would be selling hats for hundreds of dollars and/or coming up with sleazy schemes to steal items (much like happened with WoW accounts). I stuck through it though, having understood the need for the store I brushed it off and continued to play. After the newest update though I can't bring myself to be excited about TF2 anymore, I found myself preparing to play a game like I was about to grind experience. I just didn't enjoy it anymore, I enjoyed getting a new item, but I didn't enjoy the ride before getting to the item anymore. The items seem so impersonal and strange now as well, they have little to do with the classes and it is beginning to feel like an actual hat simulator, as the community often jokes about.  So after a lot of pondering I have decided to call it quits, and to bid farewell to my beloved TF2. I did the same thing when I realized I wasn't playing WoW for fun anymore, I was playing for the epic loot or the titles I 'needed' to have. It was a good ride, and I had a lot of fun. I'll never stop enjoying the TF2 characters or music, but the time has come for me to stop trying to enjoy the game. I love Valve and in no way blame them for updating their game, they will continue to make fun games and I will likely continue buying them. I fully understand that none of the updates to TF2 (Mann-Co. Store, new items, crates) are even necessary to play the game, but they have made it feel like they are to me. So as I put on my Vintage Texas Ten Gallon and ride off into the night, I wanted to thank Valve for giving me one of the most enjoyable gaming experiences I ever had for a time, and I wanted to thank every TF2 player for making the game a blast.  It was fun. "

I get what you're saying, but in a weird way, I love games that allow me to find insane amounts of junk.  Borderlands, Diablo 2, MMORPG's, and hell, even something as silly as Poker Night at the Inventory.  If it's got a bunch of unlockable items or loot I can find, odds are I'm probably going to have more fun collecting than with the actual gameplay.

I agree - I hate to be one of those "back in my days..." kind of guys, but I really enjoyed TF2 much more before all the items and upgrades came into play. In fact, if I remember right, I stopped playing TF2 around the time the Scout update came out.

I kind of feel the same way, but it has been my go-to game for so long it will take something slightly more severe to make me stop playing. I still do find the fun sometimes, screwing around as a gunslinger engie or eternal reward spy. The newest weapons hold little appeal to me too, and I can't quite put my finger on why. I enjoyed the class updates. I loved putting the longest achievement on the tracker and watching its progress fill up as I got closer to the new weapons. I guess that might be part of the reason I'm not really jazzed about this update. I have to wait for the random number generator to say I can have a new weapon, or at least give me enough junk so I can craft it. Or buy them, of course.

I don't give a shit about the items. It's cool when you randomly find one, but other than that, don't care. I love this game.

I feel the game has now turned into a "Oh what can I kill that natascha heavy with the fastest?" rather than "Crap they have a heavy, sniper get on that and I'll go demoman" as just about anything can kill anyone easily now if they have the right items.

I haven't even played TF2 since it first launched, so I don't know anything about all of these updates. The game seems like an MMO now though. Why in gods name is there crafting? I'm not surprised that it's beginning to take a toll.

Well if you don't want the items I'll take them and you can pretend they don't exist.

I never understood what idle servers were for. Are unlocks based on how much time you've played or something?

I like how its gotten to the point where people are complaining about updates and small tweaks to the game; over 3 years worth of it too. 
 
I pity the future.

" @Meteora: It's funny because all I was doing the entire post was ragging on Valve and TF2 for immediately going to the shitter amirite? There was little to no explanation for my souring, and I made that clear by whining about it the entire post and not trying to see the logic behind what I Valve was doing to their game.   I too pity a future where people quit games not because the game itself has become bad but because the user has made the game it is not something he/she wanted it to be, so they take a step back. "

I'm not a hardcore TF2 player, but I play it in spurts. I, personally, never got into all the item stuff. In all honesty, as someone who wasn't constantly intimate with the game, it all confused me. When I inevtiably load it up again, I guess I'll try to find a vanilla server, as people seem to have gone bonkers, ha. 

I'm okay with all the items and such, because most of the time it's weapons that are new to me, or ones that I can trade. However, I do not understand the obsession with the hats, and the crates drive me nuts. I hate finding something that requires a key that you have to buy. But now I'm just bitching.

I'm still playing TF2 and loving it.  I know there are people complaining because Valve is trying to make a little money off the thousands of players out there but I ignore all that stuff.  I play TF2 because it's fun to blow people up and stab people and burn people and the addition of a few things I don't like into the drop system hasn't really affected me at all.  I just trade gift them to some new player who doesn't have much (I gave away a hat before to a new guy who was loving the game).   I keep coming back for a chance to try a new gun, to interact with one of the nicest communities out there and ignore the people who take the game too seriously.
 
If you don't want to play TF2 anymore then that's fair enough, I recommend Bad Company 2 if you haven't tried it.  Your reasons for quiting both this and WoW seems like good ones.  I'll stay here and play with my new BRass Beast :)

I feel the same way as you. I don't begrudge valve any of what they did, and as far as I am concerned TF2 was money well spent. I think I may just be done with the game and this whole setup kind of came at the same time. Then again I may go back, TF2 has lured me with it's siren song before.