Left 4 Dead is an upcoming multiplayer co-operative survival horror first-person shooter game by Valve Corporation. The game pits four human playable or AI controlled survivors of an apocalyptic pandemic against hordes of aggressive “Infected”. The Survivors’ goal is to help each other make it through various scenarios to safety. The Infected are controlled by an AI that dynamically balances difficulty and mood depending on the players’ progress and situation.
There are four playable human characters in the game (hence the “4″ in the title). Each player is randomly assigned a character upon joining the server and each character has the same abilities and may use the same weapons.
Louis is a black business man in a shirt and tie. Francis is a tattoo-covered biker. Zoey is a young woman that comes from a rich family. Bill is an old Green Beret Vietnam veteran.
Survivors are armed with various firearms divided into two tiers. The first tier is available for everyone to select from when the scenario starts, in addition to the one or two Springfield Armory GI .45 pistols all Survivors always carry. Weapons in the second tier can be found throughout the maps and at the end of the scenario, just before the final fight. The second tier, in addition to having a wider variety of weapons, also provides weapons that fulfill the same role as first tier weapons but are inherently better, such as replacing the Uzi submachine gun with the M16A3 assault rifle. In addition to firearms, Survivors can also carry a Molotov cocktail or a pipe bomb. The pistols are the only weapon that Survivors can use when they are knocked down by the Infected. All weapons and any other item the Survivor holds can be used to make a close range melee attack. This attack can push targets back to make space, push fellow Survivors or to gain time to reload. A one hit kill can be performed by a bash if the Infected is unaware of the attacking Survivor. In addition to these weapons, machine guns can be found mounted in defensible positions in some areas of the game.
The Infected are Left 4 Dead’s foe of the Survivors, and they are partly inspired by the infected from the 2002 film 28 Days Later. The Infected, as opposed to the slow, shuffling zombies associated with Night of the Living Dead or Half-Life, are fast and agile, creating quite a formidable foe. They can be dealt with easily on their own, but in great numbers are difficult to defeat. In addition, there are five mutated Infected who have their own special mutant abilities and are more powerful than the regular Infected.
So even though Left 4 Dead has been touted as a Zombie Survival Horror, it really depends on how you view the term Zombie. I was expecting a game that focused on hordes of the slow moving type that would require team work, fast thinking and good planning to make sure you had an escape route. Left 4 Dead looks to be more like a frantic shoot and run Rambo style game.
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