Customer Reviews

Left 4 Dead

5 star:		(77)
4 star:		(33)
3 star:		(22)
2 star:		(13)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

Original L4D review of Nov 18, 2008

'Left 4 Dead' is a great new 4 man co-op or single player FPS game from VALVE.

The GAME:

This game is a 4 player journey of survival; it can be played as single player (with 3 computer comrades) or with 3 other people on-line. The trek begins in any of 4 different locations and ends in another part of town with an extraction to safety if you survive. (or a nice mention, in memoriam, if you don't)

The Pros:

1.)Great graphics and audio. The atmosphere is very dusky and eerie; lighting is sparse in buildings except for your flashlight (kind of reminds me of 'Doom 3'). Creeping into a pitch black room with only a flashlight to find it either empty, full of zombies or even worse, harbouring a super mutant is visceral to say the least.

2.)The action is fast paced and hectic; there is not a lot of down time between one attack and the next. Attacks either by a hoard of undead or a super mutant comes at a fairly regular clip. Half the fun here is trying to find out what weakness the monsters have and what works best against them.

3.)Weaponry come in the form of guns (shotgun, sniper rifle, automatic machine gun and pistols) explosives consist of pipe bombs and Molotov fire bombs.

4.)You can start the game from the beginning any one of four campaigns OR at the beginning of any chapter within a campaign. Each section of the game is reasonably short, so you don't have to redo the entire game if you have to shut down for a while [see Cons: 2.) below]. Also, if your team dies while playing, you restart from the last 'safe-house' you made it to.

5.)The game resets weapons, monsters, and health packs for every new game; so each game is slightly different than the last, although played over the same geographic area.

6.)Certain 'achievements' are awarded throughout the game for accomplishing certain things. I initially thought these were a perk or upgrade, but now I don't think so...they just recognize certain 'accomplishments' i.e. setting a 'tank' afire or pushing away a 'hunter', and many others.
They add absolutely nothing to the game play and they were not available in the demo.

7.)You have the ability to set up a game from the Undead point of view; haven't tried this yet.

8.)A couple of nice on-line game features:

a.] you can change the difficulty setting ANYTIME; great if it's too easy or if your taking a continual pounding

b.] if you have a player that is 'disruptive' to the team play, you can kick that player out of the game by simply taking a vote among the other three on-line players. (I was surprised that this actually happened a couple of times while I was playing)

c.)And finally, a truly great feature; You can 'Take a Break' from an on-line game by pressing ESC> Take a Break> anytime while playing; great for a call to the BR or to take a phone call. When you 'Take a Break' you go 'Idle' while your away and your computer player takes over until you get back into the game (by pressing the left mouse key).

The Cons: (all minor)

1.)A fairly linear game; only a little room to travel off the prescribed path. Yet, in retrospect, having played this game many times, it would be difficult for this game to function properly with a 'open world', given the fighting style required for on-line co-op; each segment is a fairly short 'meat' run from point 'A' to point 'B'.

2.)No game saves...none; and this is understandable from the 4 player on-line game. However with the single player game, the chapters aren't terribly long BUT they do require a degree of concentration and work to finish, especially on the higher difficulty levels. And somehow losing all your hard fought gains if you have to leave the game unexpectedly, seems a little unfair; you'll understand more clearly what I mean once you begin to play.

3.)The AI of your comrades in the single person game needs one small modification; your buddies will guard you, heal you and stay near you BUT, they won't pick up the extra pipe bombs or Molotov bombs that often sit there before them. And it would be really helpful in the single person game-play if they did, especially on advanced and expert.

Suggestions:

I can not stress how much headphones/microphone add to the enjoyment of playing this game on-line; especially with communicating with your on-line playing partners. If you can, try playing with a headset, you won't believe the difference.

Conclusion:

A new FPS that requires 4 player co-operation (in both single and on-line play) to be successful. You may get away with a little 'individuality' on 'Easy', but on 'Normal', 'Advanced' or 'Expert' forget about it; if you don't travel and fight as a pack, your toast.

The on-line co-op version is one of the greatest games EVER...IF played with the 4 players who have an understanding of the game concepts and are willing to work together. And that being said, having a maximum of 4 players for on-line play is probably the perfect number; 3 would not be enough to fend off the hoards (except on easy maybe) and with 5 players you'd be getting in each others way.

The game chapters are fairly short and there are no game saves. However the game play is intense and visceral and you do tend to become wrapped up in the action that is taking place around you.

And finally, this is one of those rare games that I just don't ever get tired of playing, (at least, with the on-line game)...and a game with this quality has to be in the running for game of the year.
4 1/2 to 5 Stars

Ray Nicholson (cujo)

Addendum: Oct 07/09

"Crash Course"...some comments

First impressions from a co-op viewpoint...initially disappointing, but better since they've updated it (see comments below).

A very short game...maybe 30 minutes or so consisting of only two segments. The map is mostly made up of streets littered with abandoned cars and trucks, and the buildings are mostly warehouses. This added map, although playable as single player or co-op, was primarily intended I believe, for Versus players.

This map has improved since its original debut; updates have apparently removed a lot of the excess ammo and guns, making it a better challenge.

The finale...interesting and takes some planning (although the final run to the rescue vehicle is extremely easy). Which leads to the one drawback in this new map...if you all die in the finale, you must restart at the last safehouse...about 15 minutes of travel to the ending.

Conclusion:
Now that the game (with the removal of all the extra guns and ammo) has become more of a challenge, I'll probably play this map a bit more...too bad they didn't make it a full map like the others (probably didn't want to divert too much attention away from the upcoming L4D2).


Addendum: April 22/09

"Survival"... some comments,

Well the much anticipated update for Left 4 Dead has finally arrived. The new game is call 'Survival' and it IS aptly named. There are several new individual mods to this new game that use slight variations from some of the different sections of the 4 established games i.e. No Mercy, Death Toll, Dead Air and Blood Harvest. There is one brand new locale called 'Last Stand'; its setting is at a lighthouse and it's probably the most difficult game of the lot.

Rather than a prolonged campaign these games are very short; and make no mistake about it, you are going to die. The challenge here is to see how long you can last; 4 minutes gets you a bronze medal, 7 minutes a silver and you get a gold medal if you last for ten minutes. Unlike the regular game, there is NO option for easy, normal etc. difficulty; just the one standard for everyone; "brutal" might be a good name for this newness addition.

In the regular game you get attacked by hordes of zombies, with an occasional smoker, hunter or tank thrown in, but usually not all at once. However in this game, you get attacked by ALL types of infected, all at once. In addition, there is no long stretch to outrun a tank; not that that matters, as you are fighting the horde, smokers and hunters the same time as your trying to fight off the tank...yup, just about impossible.

Impression:

Intense...yes. Gut wrenching...yes. FUN...hmmm, I'm not sure. One of the great strengths of on-line Left 4 Dead was the co-op fighting style needed to get through the advanced and expert campaigns. Here in 'Survival', co-op is needed but somehow, after a battle that begins with about 1 minute of 'easy', all chaos breaks-out. And because your being attacked from all side by ALL types of infected, the co-op gaming style, that made the regular L4D sooo enjoyable, is gone; gone because at this point, it becomes a game of personal survival, rather than the group...and that's the real shortcoming of this update.

And finally, I could play the regular on-line L4D for hours and never (well almost never) get tired. But with this game, I found that not only did it take quite a lot of time/effort to strategically set up gas cans, propane tanks etc. in the area you want to TRY to defend, but also, that after 3 or 4 tries I was frustrated, weary and eager to return to the regular game.

I must admit, in fairness, that I've never been a great fan of time based/get the highest score, type games, so I'm probably a little prejudiced. I'll continue to 'give this a go' for a while; maybe it'll turn out to be a great game. But somehow, I think I'd have liked a new regular campaign map better.

R.N. (cujo)

Left 4 Dead is an amazingly visceral, spooky, action-packed gaming experience! It is quite simply a survival horror masterpiece. It also stands now, as probably the greatest Co-op multiplayer game in gaming history. Yes, it's that good.

The Source engine has NEVER looked (or ran!) better. And the zombies... THE ZOMBIES are an incredible sight to behold! When you see a horde or these crazed monsters running straight at you 28 DAYS LATER style, you will know FEAR. And your jaw will hit the floor. And just wait till you shoot these things! The way the bullets hit and impact their bodies, the way they fly back from shotgun blasts... a thing of pure beauty for those who can stomach it. =)

I don't know, I could go on and on, but the bottom line is, we FINALLY have a full, honest-to-goodness (read: not a fan-made mod) AAA zombie horror game that we can jump into with three friends and fight through COOPERATIVELY!!! Been waiting for Left 4 Dead for a long time and I can't believe it's finally here and that it turned out THIS good!

It's the Zombie Apocalypse. Bring friends.

Co-op Zombie survival, that's what the game advertises and that's what it is. You and 3 friends (or bots) team up against a zombie apocalypse that has ravished possibly the world. There's no puzzles, get key to enter room or deep plot, it's grab a gun and try to make it to the next safe house for rescue. You murder tons and tons of zombies to get from point A to point B, while this may seem like it can get old really fast to some the game is different each time you play it with enemies in different spots, there are NO scripted events in this making replay easy. The game is only gets better with more players, making it more of an intense experience. To really throw a wrench into you surviving, there's 6 boss character zombies which are not as common as the horde but are a lot more deadly.

The PC version holds more hope to me because Valve always does updates for their games adding levels, gameplay modes and weapons. Though they will probably update the 360's content it's likely that it would cost money. The other big plus for the PC version to me is others can make levels and such for the game as well if they know about editing half life 2 content. A few Team Fortress 2 levels have already been added.

If you're looking to murder tons of zombies trying to make it to rescue this is a game for you, if you're looking for depth and puzzles you may want look elsewhere. But this game is a blast.

I think most of the people above me have done a great job at explaining all the positive things about this game. Graphics are top notch, sound is fantastic and eerie, controls spot on, online play is great, etc.

I really just want to take a moment and explain some of the biggest complaints that people who are considering a purchase of this game should be aware of.

First off the length of this game has to be some kind of a record, you can easily blow through this game first time through alone in 4-6 hours. If your playing with 3 friends I don't see any reason why you could not complete this game in 4 hours or less. A full priced game that can be completed in the first sitting is unacceptable. I especially feel bad for the PS3/360 owners who are getting shafted $60 for a 4 hour game.

Now some people might say it is that short but the game changes each time giving you a unique experience. Now that is technically true but please understand that the unique experience is basically moving around the spawn points of powerups and Zombies spawns. The level design doesn't change, the main objective doesn't change, essentially the entire game stays 99% the same and enemies/items are shuffled around a bit.

I should also point out that if you are doing well the game will increase the difficulty to make it harder for you. This mostly means you are going to get swarmed by a larger quantity of zombies when you run into them.

There are 4 levels in this game, when I mentioned the game is short above I really meant short. Each section can be completed in about a half an hour or so depending on how good the other people you are playing with are. Valve says they plan to release extra levels later on but I am not sure if this will be in some form of an $$ expansion pack or free downloadable content. For the 360/PS3 users due to Valve's track record on the consoles I would say you guys are either getting nothing extra as in what you get is what you get. Or you will be paying extra money per level to expand the time you get out of this game.

The 4 levels are designed very well, they look great and give you a great sense of helplessness. There is nothing more frightening then the first time you accidentially set off a car alarm. You hear a ton of zombies all around you and then suddenly they start pouring in from all directions. Climbing fences, jumping over cars, running out of alley's, everywhere. You and your group helplessly start shooting at everything that movies and more then likely you know your done for.

The question everyone needs to ask themselves though before they plot down their cash is how many times can you play the same 4 levels before you get tired of it?

Don't get me wrong the game is fantastic, but it is without a doubt not $30, $40, $50, or $60 fantastic. If the game was under $30 for the PC I would say scoop it up and you will have a blast for a couple of nights. If your getting it for the PS3 or 360 I would not purchase this game until it was down in the $20 price range.

This game is fun to play, not really a story but that's a good thing as we've all seen the movies and played the other games and know the story anyways, why waste our time rehashing it?

The graphics are pretty good as well, with Valves strengths for me being the environments and the movement of the characters, especially the zombies. It's really fun not knowing where the next rush of zombies is going to come from and just picking off the ones that are aimless. It's a blast to see them all running at you in huge numbers and just blasting away. The details in the environment are well done also like scrawlings on the wall from previous survivors and the details of a hospital or house interior. The sound is also pretty good, with the zombies making different sounds and the witches crying. The weapons sound pretty realistic as well. Your AI teammates have a variety of things to say that make sense based on the situation, they yell at you if you accidentally shoot them and call out where the zombies are coming from.

One of the things that was nice was there was no real directions given, no map, nothing other than if you wander the wrong way you'll eventually hit a dead end and then have to explore until you find your way. When you get close to an important point it does a good job of letting you know you are there and what you need to do.

The things I didn't like were the lack of more than 4-5 standard weapons, a flamethrower, bat or other option would be nice. Granted it does give you the major type of weapons but I'd like to see more powerful and different ones. Also the bots can get in the way at times and lag behind you too much. I didn't have a problem with the save system but if you were playing with others it could be a problem, essentially you can't save wherever you want it has to be at a safe house.

Another bad thing was that I don't play co-op online and this is what this game is for really. I want to stay a casual gamer and going online really is a time consuming thing as well as some of the people can be obnoxious. I've played through all of the 4 maps on single player and am interested in playing them again but it's just not enough to really pay full price for.

So make sure you are willing and able to play co-op if you get this game, otherwise it is not worth it. I think the plan is probably to come up with new maps and sell them online through Steam or have the modders generate them because even with multiplayer I could see this being too small an area to keep coming back to again and again.

The First Person Shooter (FPS) genre has been in dire need of a Player versus Environment game. While the game has some interesting aspects, it's an overall disappointment for me.

1) There is only about 4 hours of game play solo. If you feel like replaying the game on a higher difficulty, add 4-5 more hours.

2) Some of the special mobs will be in places your allies can't really reach, sometimes you get incapacitated in places your allies can't help you up.

3) There is no instruction book for the game.

4) Mobs all around are usually hard to see... though the computer allies have no problems picking them out.

5) 50 zombies will randomly spawn and rush you from a (tiny) room you've already verified as clear.

6) When I hopped online to play, I was surprised to run into what sounded like 10 year olds... where are the parents?! Parents, this is NOT a game you want your preteen kids playing. Blood, guts, gore, profanity, guns and ... yeah just say no.

7) About 30 minutes into the game, you've seen all the tricks all the special moves and all the weapons.

8) Almost no replay-ability. 4 scenarios, 5 maps each. Biggest variation is indoors/outdoors other than that it's all just tons of zombies running at you with their arms waving around.

9) If any special creature attacks you and your team isn't paying complete attention, you're completely & totally helpless to defend yourself.

10) There is no experience, character building, you don't have a full choice of weapons to start with, no character customization.

The good points:

Lots of blood and gore, head shots are worth working for. If you have the cash laying around and really want to kill 4-5 hours ... go for it.

Because there is no instruction book and because there is not much of a tutorial, you really get the feeling that you're just kind of dropped into the middle of the city to fend for yourself.

Wish they would have mixed this with a bit of Hellgate: London.

This is probably one of the finest FPS survival-horror games I have played, and I am playing this on an older P4 XP computer with a GT7600 card (a few settings at "medium").

It looks and plays great ... very smooth. It might be sensless crazy action ... but, hey, it is extremely fun and entertaining, especially co-op play. I give this game ... Five missing thumbs up! Recommended.

Usually speaking, if I play Counterstrike my wife sits back and says "this is so boring, I don't know how you enjoy it."

When I first got Left 4 Dead (off of Steam, right through Valve the BEST way to do it!), she watched me play and before long, she was pointing out the smoker, to watch the corner for the hidden zombie, and was shrieking with delight when the 'horde' came after me and the 3 other players. I usually play with a headset, but having her there I turned on the speakers, and she was shouting "Get them, get them!", or "Watch out!", or "Nice hit!".

When my wife can appreciate the game I'm playing, it's a DAMN good game. And not because she appreciates it, but simply because I can play without getting too much flack about it. That said, the game is insanely fun, and it's different with every group you play with so just get in there and HAVE FUN! New levels seem to be cropping up by the players, so it should be replayable for some time, and given the setup, I can see long term single maps come up too, in the same realm as "use map settings" maps from Starcraft, that eventually spawned Tower Defense and others.

Get this one folks, it's a blast to play, make sure you have a microphone and KILL THE HORDE!

I was pretty excited about L4D because i generally like to play co-op games. After reading all the rave reviews, i happily plunked down $40 for the game. After several gaming sessions with friends both lan and over internet, i concur with others that the game is a blast to play (with friends, not so much solo), but i felt that there wasn't much variety after a while.

i like how the director changes things up every time you play the game, but after a while, it's basically the same thing over and over again, a bunch of zombie meat come running at you, peppered by encounters with boomers, smokers, hunters, tanks, and the witch. hopefully valve will generate new content or add some depth to the game mechanics.

Suprisingly enough, I wasn't very enthusiastic towards Left 4 Dead. I knew it was going to be a big hit, and it combined 2 of my most cherished/favored elements, Zombies and Co-op gameplay. Perhaps it was due to the massive amounts of Co-op Zombie Mods on Steam, but believe me, this is a game that is well worth your time and hard-earned money.

Left 4 Dead isn't so much a game, as it is an experience. Echoing screams rattle through corridors, you can see the terrified looks on your companion's faces, and hordes of carnivorous undead will strike your squad at any minute. What makes the game so good? Well in typical Valve tradition, you NEED to work with your team to survive and make your way to a "Safe Room" where you can equip weapons and refill ammo. Say you wander off from your party, well if your attacked by a Hunter (The only way to remove them is if a buddy comes to give him a bullet filled suprise) well then, your in trouble.

L4D is home to some truly good sound design. Every character seems to have the voice to fit that look, and the music always kicks up at just the right time to up the adrenaline. Not only is it there to keep the atmosphere horrific, it also ties into the gameplay. The audio gives subtle hints as to what is about to happen (Single Horn - The Horde is A'coming!)
The Graphics are also fairly good. This is running off the same engine that powered Half Life 2, so you know what to expect.

The Bad? Well the game is a bit on the short side. Its split up into 4 Campaigns, each with multiple chapters that take about 10-20 minutes to complete (Experience may differ with difficulty and teammates.) However, that is no big issue at all. Each Campaign/Chapter is highly replayable, and the AI Director makes sure things never get to hard or easy.

The AI director basically alters just about everything in the Chapter the second time you play through. If you breezed through it without any real challenge thats fine, just don't expect a cake-walk the second time.

The game sports a very "Tounge in Cheek" style to it. The stages are set up like movies sporting a "Grindhouse-esque" title. Each character is cliche'd (The biker, the teen, the War hardened Veteran, and the Working Man who is just trying to get by in Society) and when one of them fails to make it to the end, that movie becomes dedicated to them. It works very well, especially because the game never tries to make itself to dramatic or to horrific, this can be easily detected by the characters spouting sometimes hilarious One Liners.

Alot of games traditionally like to show you one thing (Via a TV commercial or an Internet ad.) and make you experience a whole different one while playing. What you see is what you get with Valve.
If you like Zombies, get it. If you like Co-op gameplay with a deeply terrifying atmosphere, get it. If you own a PC (Or 360), get it. This deserves every gamer's attention. Feel free to walk around the city or stroll through the Cafes.. just watch out for the Horde.