How to turn-off Team Fortress 2 Gore and Blood

The following instructions allow you to turn-off gore (gibs) and blood in Team Fortress 2 on a PC to make it less violent. I haven't tried this on any other OS like Mac so I'm not sure the same steps apply.

Turn-off TF2 Gore and Blood on a PC

Make sure Team Fortress 2 is not running until after you make the changes listed below.

1. Navigate to your autoexec.cfg file. On my machine it's located inside...

C:\Steam\steamapps\my account name\team fortress 2\tf\cfg

NOTE: If you do not have an autoexec file you can download this autoexec here (right click + save links as) and place it inside your C:\Steam\steamapps\my account name\team fortress 2\tf\cfg folder.

Before: Gore. After: Silly gibs replace gore.

2. Once you have located your autoexec file inside the cfg folder, make a backup copy and name it autoexec_saved or whatever you want. It's good to have this for a backup just in case.

3. Right click on the on the original autoexec file and choose open with from the menu and choose notepad.

4. Type the following lines:

violence_hblood 0
violence_hgibs 0
violence_ablood 0
violence_agibs 0

5. Make sure you save the file to apply the changes. You can close all folders.

6. Open Steam and run Team Fortress 2. The changes should now be applied removing gore and blood, replacing then with silly objects. Contact me if you need help.

Another way to enable Silly Gibs - may work for some people

This method never worked for me but I'll post it here anyway. Lots of people reported that this worked.

1. Open Steam Library.

2. Right click Team Fortress 2.

3. Click on Properties.

4. In the General tab click on the button labeled Set Launch Options.

5. Within the form field type the following -sillygibs. Somewhere I also found someone had typed -lv for "Low Violence" but that didn't work for me either.

Game violence you will still see in Team Fortress 2

The change to the autoexec file will still render dead bodies but it removes the blood during play and the gore previously shown.

The change to the autoexec file if applied correctly will hide blood during battles and the gore (bloody class gibs) that occurs after an explosive hit. However, it does not hide bodies or remove the effect of flames produced when the Pyro class shoots players with various incendiary weapons. It will also not hide Spy-cicle deaths or various energy weapon deaths. Overall I think these look abstract enough not to offend most people. If I find a way to remove flames I will post it here.

Related:

How to filter adult language, and adult content in Team Fortress 2