Still playing TF2. It is currently as popular as it has ever been, even though you could have concluded that it was dying around 2018 or so. It's a little different from other FPS since you can play several roles that aren't just twitch-n-click.
I tried dipping back into TF2 a couple months ago. The first two servers I tried had a cheater join and aimbot the bejeezus out of everyone. Gave up and uninstalled after that.
This has been an ongoing issue, essentially people unusually dedicated to ruining the game run multiple Linux VMs with bots. Valve has recently done a bit to improve things after a community "save tf2" campaign, but it's a bit of a whack a mole situation. Practically joining a custom server with a moderator of some kind is the most effective option.
