obe_fahrenheitI'm honestly still really amazed at how many people still have the "TF2 is a dead game" prerogative even though it's literally always been as popular as it ever has been.
http://store.steampowered.com/stats/
The game hasn't lost anybody because of this sentiment (even gained people arguably), but it creates a more cynical community.
I agree that the "TF2 is dead" thing is generally stupid and an empty criticism but TF2's playerbase has dwindled pretty significantly over time. It's been on a very consistent downhill slope since late 2014 (there was a short increase during Gun Mettle), where it peaked at 100k+ concurrent players. That's down to about 75k now. I don't know why people consider a game that pulls 75k concurrent players dead, but it isn't "as popular as it's ever been".
Yeah "popular as it's ever been" were the wrong choice of words, I meant to say something to the effect of "as popular as it usually is"