Valve has released a few new details about the new map – Goldrush – along with a preview of what the cart will look like.

TF2 update: you may’ve heard that new achievements, maps, and unlockable items are on the way. The first map, Goldrush, introduces a new game mode. The BLU team must escort a high-tech mining cart through a series of checkpoints to the RED base within a time limit. The more BLU players near the cart, the faster the cart moves. The cart stops if any RED team member is in the vicinity. We’re balancing the map now; look for it within the month.

Valve has released a bunch of stats they have collected from Team Fortress 2 this week, ranging from Average Assists per Hour for the classes to the round winning percentages on the different stock maps.

Some of the stats that I thought were interesting are:

Meet the Demoman, one of nine playable character classes in Team Fortress 2: A fierce temper, a fascination with all things explosive, and a terrible plan to kill the Loch Ness Monster cost the six year old Demoman his original set of adoptive parents. Later, back at the Crypt Grammar School for Orphans near Ullapool in the Scottish Highlands, the boy’s bomb-making skills improved dramatically. His disposition and total number of intact eyeballs, however, did not.

If you haven’t gotten TF2 yet, you should buy it. I said before it wasn’t worth it since I wasn’t going to play the other Orange Box games, but I was wrong. This is one of the best games I have ever played. The gameplay is great, everything is extremely balanced. It could use some tweaks, but right now no one class dominates, and no class is absolutely useless. Overall the game is very smooth, I have no idea what FPS I’m getting, haven’t checked yet, but I’ve heard people say they get around 30FPS and it is still smooth and playable.

Meet the Engineer, one of nine playable character classes in Team Fortress 2: This amiable, soft-spoken good ol’ boy from tiny Bee Cave, Texas loves barbeque, guns, and higher education. Natural curiosity, ten years as a roughneck in the west Texas oilfields, and eleven hard science PhDs have trained him to design, build and repair a variety of deadly contraptions.

Meet the Soldier, one of nine playable character classes in Team Fortress 2: Though he wanted desperately to fight in World War 2, the Soldier was rejected from every branch of the U.S. military. Undaunted, he bought his own ticket to Europe. After arriving and finally locating Poland, the Soldier taught himself how to load and fire a variety of weapons before embarking on a Nazi killing spree for which he was awarded several medals that he designed and made himself. His rampage ended immediately upon hearing about the end of the war in 1949.

Meet the Heavy Weapons Guy, one of nine playable character classes in Team Fortress 2: Like a hibernating bear, the Heavy appears to be a gentle giant. Also like a bear, confusing his deliberate, sleepy demeanor with gentleness will get you ripped limb from limb. Though he speaks simply and moves with an economy of energy that;s often confused with napping, the Heavy isn’t dumb, he;s not your big friend, and he generally wishes you’d just shut up before he has to make you shut up.