Team Fortress 2: Free Hats and Promotional Items Guide

A lot of people who play Team Fortress 2 eventually end up wanting some of those hats they see so many other players wearing about the game, even if they usually just play the game competitively, but they don’t want to pay for virtual items.  Fortunately, there are quite a few hats in Team Fortress 2 which can be obtained for completely free, usually by spending a bit of time playing another game.  Thankfully, these other games happen to be free to play games on Steam.  This guide will specifically focus on items you can get without paying a dime, which include hats and miscellaneous items.

The following is a guide to obtaining all the free promotional items within Team Fortress 2, of which there are many.  I have personally obtained most of these items in TF2, and know that none of them are exceptionally difficult to get, but some do take time.  However, they can all be obtained without spending any money.

 

Hat: Alien Swarm Parasite

Class: All

Game Required: Alien Swarm (Free on Steam)

Achievement Required: Hat Trick

To get the hat trick achievement in Alien Swarm, you have to hop online and complete 2 co-op missions in the top-down shooter.  This, like many of the achievements in this guide, is easily obtained by just playing the game for a while.

 

Hat: Bolt Action Blitzer

Class: All

Game Required: CrimeCraft GangWars (Free on Steam)

Achievement Required: Key to the City

CrimeCraft GangWars is a free to play shooter that features a lot of customization and both player versus player and player versus environment matches, based on gang warfare.  To get the Key to the City achievement, you simply have to create a character and play a few online matches until your character reaches level six.  Getting the achievement is really just a matter of kicking back and playing the game for a few matches.

Hat: Ghastly Gibus (Ghastlier Gibus Pictured Above)

Class: All

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievement Required: Ghastly Gibus Grab

To get the Ghastly Gibus in Team Fortress 2, you need to dominate another player while they are wearing the hat.  To dominate a player, you must kill them three times without them killing you.  Fortunately, this hat is so commonly worn within the game that most players get this achievement by simply playing, but you can try to aim for any players you see wearing the hat if you want to speed up the process, or find someone with the hat who will let you kill them.

 

Hat: Frontline Field Recorder

Class: All

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievement Required: Local Cinema Star

To get the Local Cinema Star achievement, a replay video you upload to Youtube from within Team Fortress 2 must reach 1000 views.  When playing on a replay-enabled server you can hit F6 to save a replay video, which can be edited and uploaded to Youtube from within the game.  Once the video is uploaded it needs to get 1000 views before the achievement unlocks.  Make sure not to edit the tags that are automatically attached to the video by Team Fortress 2, as they are how it tracks the views.  In order to get the views, uploaders should try to use interesting but simple and descriptive titles, and should also keep the video short.  This can be difficult to obtain, and it may take a significant amount of time for some videos to reach the view count. 

 

Taunt: Director’s Vision

Class: All

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievement Required: Star of My Own Show

In order to get the Director’s Vision taunt, the player must save a replay video from within a replay-enabled server in Team Fortress 2 and then go into the replay editor within the game.  Simply spending some time playing around with the features within the replay editor should cause the achievement to unlock.  This does not usually take more than a few minutes.

 

Hat: The Full Head of Steam

Class: All

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievement Required: Foundry Milestone

To get the Foundry Milestone achievement, you have to complete 7 achievements in the Foundry Pack, which is a list of 11 achievements that are all tied to the cp_foundry map in Team Fortress 2.  The best method to getting the achievements is to simply play a whole bunch of rounds on the Foundry map and let them come naturally, instead of actively seeking them out.  That being said, if you have a friend or two also trying to get the achievements, then actively seeking out the achievements while playing on the map with them may be the quickest route.

Misc: Professor Speks

Class: All

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievement Required: None

The Professor Speks are a pair of glasses you get if someone recommends you from their friends list when they decide to go premium in Team Fortress 2 (by spending any amount of cash in the Team Fortress 2 Mann Co. Store).  You might get these by convincing someone to go premium, or you can ask someone who is planning to go premium to recommend you.  Generally being nice to newer players and giving friendly advice and help is the best route to obtaining a pair.  Remember, what goes around comes around.

Hat: The Flamingo Kid

Class: Sniper

Game Required: Super Monday Night Combat (Free on Steam)

Achievement Required: Rookie Agent

This Super Monday Night Combat achievement is gained by your agent level reaching five.  There is really no good way to get this other than to play the game until that happens.  The game can be quite fun and even has a touch of Team Fortress style humor.  It’s sort of a hybrid of a third-person shooter and a class-based multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game, which makes it surprisingly unique.

Hat: The Triclops

Class: Pyro

Game Required: Super Monday Night Combat (Free on Steam)

Achievement Required: All-Star Agent

To get the All-Star Agent achievement in Super Monday Night Combat, your agent level must reach 20.  This is an achievement that can only be gained by playing the game for as many matches as it takes for that level to be reached.  This can however take several hours of playing the game, so players should really try to enjoy the game and not dwell on the destination during the path to this hat.

 

Hat: Spiral Sallet

Class: All

Game Required: Spiral Knights (Free on Steam)

Achievement Required: Mission Accomplished

The Mission Accomplished achievement is obtained by playing through Spiral Knights until you get to the first Clockworks Terminal, which is a sort of dungeon you go through with other players.  Spiral Knights is a top down action rpg, which is fairly simple to understand and easy to play.  Just play through this first area, which will most likely be with a group of other players, and avoid dying.  Once you complete the area, the achievement will be yours.

Weapon: Black Rose

Class: Spy

Game Required: Alliance of Valiant Arms (Free on Steam)

Achievement Required: 1st One Down

To get the 1st One Down achievement you must create a character in Alliance of Valiant Arms and complete their first game in the first person shooter.  This is a fairly quick achievement to obtain and is easily done.

 

Misc: Pyrovision Goggles
Class: All
Game Required: Team Fortess 2
Achievement Required: A Fresh Pair of Eyes

This achievement is gained the same way as the Ghastly Gibus achievement.  Simply dominate another player wearing a pair to unlock them for yourself.  Just make it a point to target players with the goggles, or find someone wearing them who will let you kill them three times.  Most likely, this will unlock naturally for someone who plays a decent amount of Team Fortress 2.  The goggles were also given out as Vintage versions to anyone who played TF2 during the Meet the Pyro event.

Hat: Gentle Munitionne of Leisure
Class: All
Game Required: Team Fortress 2
Achievement Required: Doomsday Milestone

This hat is unlocked by completing 7 of the achievements in the Doomsday achievement pack, which is a list of achievements that are unlocked on the Doomsday map.  This is one of the more difficult achievement hats to obtain, as the majority of the achievements can be difficult to unlock, or require a certain amount of luck to obtain quickly.  I would recommend trying to play on the map with several friends, having a specific goal to unlock achievements by working together to expedite the process.

HALLOWEEN UNLOCKS

Several of the Halloween achievements are only available around Halloween and unlock free items, but I'm going to list the ones which can be unlocked any time of the year on many servers.  Often server operators like to spawn the Halloween bosses for fun, and many servers (including trade servers) are set up so that they spawn from time to time.  

Hat: Horseless Headless Horsemann's Head

Class: All

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievement Required: Sleepy Hall0WNED

Limitations: This item will only be shown if it is around Halloween, it is a Full Moon, or if a server you are playing on has Halloween Mode enabled.

In order to unlock this achievement, you must be on a server where the Horseless Headless Horsemann spawns, and you must be one of the last three players to land an attack on him before he dies.  I am frequently able to run around the Horsemann and shoot using the Scout.  Just try to stay far enough away that the Horsemann cannot stun you, and try to land a lot of hits on the him. 

Item: Unusual Haunted Metal Scrap

Possible Weapon: Unusual Horseless Headless Horsemann's Headtaker (Pictured Above)

Possible Hats: Spine-Tingling Skull/Spine-Cooling Skull/Spine-Twisting Skull

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Class: All (Hat) Demoman (Wep)

Achievement Required: Gored!

To get the Gored! achievement, you have to attack the Horsemann, specifically with a melee weapon, right before he dies.  This can be difficult, since getting that close to him will give him an opportunity to one-hit kill you before you can smack him for the achievement.  I recommend using a melee weapon with a longer reach, such as the Demoman's Eyelander to try to make things a little easier.  Once you get the achievement, you will get Haunted Metal Scrap which can be used to get a Demoman's melee weapon (my personal choice) or one of three varieties of the Spine-Chilling Skull hat (randomly chosen).  Either way, crafting your desired item, will cost you a lot of crafting materials, so you may have to save up some items to craft into metal before you can get your true reward. NOTE: Currently, only "premium" players have access to the crafting recipes for these items.  That means you must have spent any amount of money in the Mann. Co. Store to unlock premium.

Hat: The Monoculus!

Misc: Bombinomicon (Badge Item - Not Pictured)

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievements Required: A Fresh Pair of Eyes (Hat) | Dive Into A Good Book (Misc)

Limits: The hat will only be shown if it is around Halloween, it is a Full Moon, or if a server you are playing on has Halloween Mode enabled.  The Bombinocomicon can be worn any time.

First of all, to get the achievement A Fresh Pair of Eyes, and subsequently the Monoculus! hat, you must be one of the final three players to land a blow on the floating eyeball boss Monoculus!  As with the Horsemann, I recommend using the Scout and keeping your distance to try to unlock this achievement.  The rockets can be very difficult to dodge at close range with slower classes.  As Monoculus dies, you can jump into the portal left beyond and run up to the skull island (being careful not to fall into the depths below and die).  Once there, you will find a book within a cage, which will open up, allowing you to touch the Bombinomicon to unlock the achievement and be teleported back to the main map.

Hat: The Skull Island Topper

Game Required: Team Fortress 2

Achievements Required: A Lovely Vacation Spot

To obtain The Skull Island Topper, you must defeat the boss of the 2012 Halloween event, Merasmus!, or be nearby when other players kill him.  When he dies, the Bombinocomicon book will be visible.  Jumping into the book will teleport players to an island where the hat can be found within a cage inside of a giant skull.  By walking up to the cage, it will open, allowing the player to walk into the hat, and subsequently obtain the head-wear.  Merasmus! is dealt significant damage by the Huntsman Sniper weapon when it is fully drawn and shot at his head.  A server full of players who work together and know this weakness can make short work of him.

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