● Early Gaming Roots
While Teatime played a bit of games on earlier platforms his first encounter with PC games was DOOM back in 1994, which founded his preference for FPS. So yes, he is old.
Games which followed included: Duke3D, Quake 1+2, Dark Forces, Jedi Knight, Wing Commander, TIE-Fighter, System Shock 1+2, Heretic, Hexen, Unreal, Medal of Honor, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Half-Life 1+2, CS, BF1942, BF2, Stalker, L4D.
Multiplayer experiences were limited primarily to occasional private LAN parties. Online gaming entered his life rather late. Teatime played some Quake online, but it was Half-Life’s multiplayer mode, HLDM, which motivated him to play online more regularly.
● The Road to TFC
Playing deathmatch failed to grant a lasting interest. But HLDM featured an interesting variation by playing DM with teams. That kind of gameplay proved to be far more appealing, even in its limited form. So it was pretty much inevitable that the announcement of TFC caught Teatime’s attention.
He downloaded the pre-release version which was available a few days prior to the official release (April 1999) and started playing this strange, yet exciting new game with teams, classes and flags.
● PlanetFortress
Back from his days playing Quake Teatime knew PlanetQuake, which - at that time - was a very good site for all kind of information and customization related to Quake (he even had downloaded an early version of TF but didn’t quite knew what to make of it at that time).
So it was quite natural that during his ventures into HL and HLDM he consulted PlanetHalf-Life for HL-gameplay-info. And there he discovered that there was another Planet-site exclusively devoted to covering TF and the newly released TFC, called PlanetFortress (previously TF Newswire). He started visiting PF and its forums. Since PF reached back to the days of TF it had a community comprised of new players as well as a lot of experienced TF players which either were sticking with TF or were making the transition to TFC. The mature, good natured and helpful environment led Teatime to become a part of that community.
● TPF
Very soon (mid 1999) people on the PF forums (Teatime being one of them) decided to form a group which by help of the group’s tag TPF (TeamPlayFirst) enabled people to find each other on the servers and play with each other (this was years before steam and friends lists). This group – much supported by the mature nature of the rest of the PF community - quickly developed a sense of game ethics, discussing and promoting topics like fairplay, sportsmanship and unethical tactics on pub games. Teatime was one of the more engaged and outspoken proponent of such values.
With TPF quickly growing from a community group into kind of a movement some aspects became more controversial, but the core of teamplay and fairness remained. Later TPF even spilled over into other games, and to the author’s knowledge some remnants are still around today.
● Beta-Testing TFC
Due to some fortunate events a group of people from the PF community was invited by Valve to participate on the beta-tests for the upcoming 1.5 Patch in 2000. Teatime was part of that group and though the patch itself turned out to be very controversial it was an exciting and interesting experience.
The Playtests started in late December 1999 and took place every few weeks up to the release of the patch in June 2000.
This patch not only applied a new netcode, but it also executed changes on the gameplay and it introduced three new maps (one of these maps was called Dustbowl 
)
● The Fort
The Fort, at that time still Fort Bundy, was inactive during the first months of TFC, so it hadn’t caught Teatime’s attention. But with Bundy’s return to the community and the reactivation of The Fort Teatime suddenly was confronted with another person who promoted the same values as Teatime did in TPF. What started with talks and discussions turned into mutual respect and friendship.
Teatime was invited to join The Fort mid 2000, just in time to witness Bundy leaving the community and the Fort in the wake of some nasty incidents with by-then PF-owner GSI. Bundy’s friend and co-writer Totentanz took over the site, which was renamed to The Fort in accordance to Bundy’s wishes.
Teatime continued writing for the Fort for 2 years, before he – eventually being the only remaining writer – also left the scene and the community.
More details on The Fort and its history can be found here
● TF2
With the release of TF2 Teatime has started playing TF again. During the first year playing was more casual and there were periods were he hardly played.
Having found a new community around Clan WDG, which is fun and interesting to spend time and to play with, has caused his TF2 gaming to intensify. It also prompted him to finally go through with his half-hearted attempts to revive The Fort. Well, you can see the result.
● Playing TF2
Teatime’s main classes are Soldier, Heavy and Engineer, with some
occasional Medic thrown in for good measure, and when times are getting
desperate you might even see him playing some Demo or Scout – both
rather pathetically.
It is unlikely that you will catch him playing Spy or Sniper, because he sucks on both 
So,
does Teatime have mad skillz? Well, the “mad”-part might be arguable.
However, skill-wise he’s a rather mediocre player who tries to
compensate his lack of skills with persistence and tactical knowledge.
Sometimes it even works …
● Clans
Teatime has never been a member of a clan.
This has various reasons.
For one Teatime is not an ambitious person and not overly competitive as a player. His prospect in gaming is to have an enjoyable and entertaining time, preferably without having to sacrifice a certain level of quality.
He also dislikes any kind of hierarchic structure, which isn’t helping.
But Teatime also thinks that at least two thirds of all clan members are pompous, self-centered, arrogant jerks who are trying to compensate their pathetic real-life with l33t gaming skillz. That pretty much lowers the general attraction.
If Teatime should ever lose his virginity and join a clan it will be a good-natured and laid back clan like WDG or 30+ (from his days of TFC).
● Future
Well, time will tell how long TF2 will keep him interested.
Teatime is actually quite enjoying the way Valve keeps tweaking the game and experimenting with new weapons and items (which makes him a minority). He figures it must have been a bit like that back in the days of TF, when the original game was evolving.
He also hopes that he is able to make the Fort a place worth visiting and reading. He knows that it will probably never be as popular as its previous incarnations were, but that won’t keep him from trying 
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