Left 4 Dead: Bring on the zombie apocalypse

By Joe Dwyer     1/8/09 6:00pm

Forget everything you know about co-op shooters; Valve has raised the first-person shooter bar yet again with the release of Left 4 Dead, one of 2008's best multiplayer titles.The game's story is somewhat skimpy on the details, but the main thing to know is that a zombie apocalypse is going on outside, and it's up to the four "Survivors" to blast their way through wave after wave of undead and make it from one safe room to the next. To keep things interesting, players also have to deal with five different "Special Infected" zombies, who have mutated abilities beyond that of a normal zombie grunt: There's the Hunter, who can pounce on Survivors from afar; the Smoker, who can pull Survivors away from the group with his long tongue; the Boomer, whose bile attracts the horde; the Tank, who can beat the living hell out of the Survivors and soaks up a ridiculous amount of damage before dying; and the Witch, who is harmless until players wake her up with flashlights or loud noises, in which case she can kill them in one swipe.

Players can tackle the four-player campaigns or call up four more friends and play the eight-player Versus mode, where teams take turns as Survivors and Special Infected (minus the Witch) and compete to see who can get farthest in each level. Left 4 Dead is an incredibly social experience made all the more enjoyable when playing Versus with seven other friends. The campaigns and Versus can also be played finding random public servers, but the chances of griefers and woefully inept, screaming six-year-olds using Dad's LIVE account increase dramatically.

Left 4 Dead is a rare game in which selfless teamwork is actually required for success, rewarding players for sticking together, watching each other's backs and not hitting teammates with friendly fire. Just like in any classic zombie film, the one who yells, "Okay, everyone, follow me!" and takes off, Rambo-style, is usually the first to die. Even in Versus mode, the Special Infected need to coordinate their attacks in order to maximize their effectiveness.

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The coolest thing that Left 4 Dead brings to the table is the revolutionary "AI Director," created specifically for the game, which guarantees a unique and infinitely replayable movie-like experience. It controls the placement and frequency of zombies and pickups, determines what musical cues to play at certain points and even monitors how well players move through the level and adjusts the difficulty accordingly to ratchet up the tension. Amazingly, all of this is done on the fly and behind the scenes. A level that was easy the first playthrough may hit players with a Tank or zombie horde straight out of the safe room on the second.

The developers took several cues from Hollywood to emulate the experience of actually being in a zombie flick, including the use of film grain, vignette and even credits at the end of each campaign listing everyone's stats and dedicating the "film" to the players who didn't make it.

The game feels a little short, with only four campaigns that can be beat in a matter of hours, map exploits notwithstanding, but Valve has promised that additional downloadable content and patches are on the way. The game also has a list of 50 achievements on both 360 and PC for completionists, although some like "Zombie Genocidest" (Kill 53,595 Infected) will take a while to get. So if you're looking for something fun to do with your roommates that's not Rock Band 2 or problem sets, definitely check out Left 4 Dead.

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