Team Fortress Classic – Quake mod. 10 mods that became standalone video games

Looking at Team Fortress 2, its gameplay structure, and the fact that this product was developed by Valve, logic would dictate that this is a title that also ties its origins to the Source engine, and by extension, the Half-Life series. And while that makes sense in part, the pedigree of the Team Fortress series is a little less obvious, but also tied to the mod scene.

The story began in the second half of the 1990s, when there was an important moment for the shooter genre associated with the release of Quake. First-person shooter fun on a 3D engine introduced players to the true potential of FPSs, and over time, multiplayer gameplay improved with a major update titled QuakeWorld.

Team Fortress Classic is a modification of this very version of the game, offering deathmatches in a slightly more humorous edition and with a division into specific classes. Valve, colloquially speaking, was quick to embrace the idea and moved TFC onto the GoldSrc engine used in the first Half-Life and improved the quality of many elements. The production eventually made its way to Steam in 2003 and went through a process over the years that culminated in a major upgrade in the form of the previously mentioned Team Fortress 2. This brought even more levity and gave the series a cartoonish, absurdist tone in places.

Enderal: Forgotten Stories – Skyrim mod

Total conversion. Does that tell you anything? SureAI group used this technique to present the world with their own, gigantic RPG, which suffices for dozens of hours of gameplay and cannot be denied anything – from story, through visuals, to combat and exploration systems. All because of the fact that this "conversion," more widely known as Enderal: Forgotten Stories, was based on The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.

Many people look at Enderal as a near perfect modification. It was originally part of Skyrim, only to debut as a full-fledged game (albeit one that requires ownership of the aforementioned base game) on Steam on February 14, 2019, and behind the scenes it's even said that the apprentice has surpassed the master. Forgotten Stories takes the best from The Elder Scrolls 5, but also fixes its shortcomings and adds entirely new mechanics. Improved skill system and the presence of survival elements are only a part of such innovations.

You don't believe that there is a Skyrim in Skyrim that is paradoxically better than the original? You can find out about this interesting phenomenon without much trouble, because Enderal is available on Steam for free (you have to pay for the soundtrack), and let me remind you that we're not talking about an adventure for one or two evenings. Does the fact that the game is free mean it's not a success? Nope. Its creators made a breakthrough with the design. E.g. Nicolas Lietzau, who co-created Enderal, is now cashing in on the Patreon portal, promising backers a book set in the game's universe.

Let's add that you don't have to worry about lack of voiceover resulting from the team's budget choices, because they actually managed to take care of two, fully voiced language versions – English and German. So I have no doubt whatsoever that this is a really serious product that, unfortunately, has not received its due recognition.

The Binding of Isaac: Antibirth – The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth mod

The Binding of Isaac has long been recognized as the embodiment of roguelike, or at least a trendsetter, and benchmark of a successful game set in this particular genre. The creator of the game, Edmund McMillen, translated his personal childhood experiences into a controversial, grotesque, and darkly humorous arcade game starring demons and fecal matter. The first version of the game left a lot of room for improvements from the technical perspective, Rebirth was created – a remake enriched with a lot of new content. After that, however, came a considerable drought lasting several years, through which the title came to a hiatus. That has changed, however, thanks to a talented group of modders.

In 2016 Antibirth, was release. It was a fan-made expansion pack of truly impressive proportions, offering two new playable characters, more than a hundred fresh items, and a similar number of new enemies to defeat. In fact, they even added a secret ending to the game, expanding the story a bit.

McMillen went out of his way to say that it would be a shame not to recognize such excellent work by this team. So he initially procrastinated a bit and released his own DLC, Afterbirth and Afterbirth+, only include Antibirth as part of the final Rebirth expansion titled Repentance in late March 2021 (I'll note up front that more proper names couldn't be shoved in). So the fan mod became a solid base for McMillen to finally finish his adventure with The Binding of Isaac brand, make money of course, and move on with his projects. And in the meantime, who knows, maybe there will be an Antibirth+ or at least an After-Re-Anti-Birth+ (yet there was room for more weird titles).

Killing Floor – an Unreal Tournament 2004 mod

There's been a bit of zombie shooting before, but certainly not like in Killing Floor. This time we have to deal with a lot of destruction in a bloody survival horror, where the only way to survive is to plow through hordes of furious mutants, and hiding in a corner is rather out of the question.

This type of gameplay couldn't happen without a solid foundation, so Killing Floor, as a modification, was built on Unreal Tournament 2004, a game that represents a famous series known for very satisfying gunplay and very dynamic matches. However, the Digital Extremes studio's shooter is all about competition, which makes it different from the mod based on it, which encourages mainly cooperative play.

And so from an inconspicuous fan initiative and creative work came a work that for the next few years fought in its sub-genre segment, right next to the Left 4 Dead series, for the audience and contributed to heated Internet wars in the name of selecting the best zombie FPS. It would be a sin not to mention that this title was a perfect fit for the golden age of stories about the living dead, which also included cinema and television, the best examples of which were Zombieland and The Walking Dead.