Left 4 Dead 2 (PC, Xbox 360) Review
Posted by John De Large on 12.12.2009
Or...How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Melee Weapon.
Title: Left 4 Dead 2
Publisher: Valve
Developer: Valve
Genre: First Person Shooter, Survival Horror
Players: 1-8
Rated: M for Mature
GAMEPLAY
For the uninitiated, the original Left 4 Dead is a first-person shooter where you (and three other teammates) go through campaign mode running through urban and rural areas while dodging the undead and capping zombies. You run from point A to point B, C and D to the climatic shootout that stands between you and rescue/the end of the Campaign. Good communication skills and the ability to cooperate with other players is essential to survival, while being a lone wolf is a good way to get yourself killed in a hurry.
Left 4 Dead 2 places you smack dab in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, AGAIN (these seem to happen with alarming regularity in Left 4 Dead and Left 4 Dead 2) and the gameplay is.... well, it's more of the same. You run through, kill stuff, have a big shootout and kill even more stuff, then escape. However, despite what boycotters will tell you, there's more than enough content in here to warrant a whole new game and five more campaigns.
Unlike the previous game you can now use melee weapons, which everyone seems to be excited about. Finally, Zombie Survival guide enthusiasts can grab a machete and start making some zombie salad. Do the melee weapons live up to the hype? You better believe it. Melee weapons are fun, efficient and while various gamers treat them as a last resort weapon, you're actually quite safe behind a fry pan, a cricket bat, a katana or an axe.
Other new items include adrenaline boosters (which boosts speed to the max), de-fib units (which revives dead characters) and my new personal favorite, the bile vial (which attracts zombies when thrown at a target).
So now that you've conquered every campaign and killed a zombie with every weapon what's left to do? Left 4 Dead 2 has got you covered with new game modes. If you want a more difficult Co-Op game instead, you can try Realism mode where zombies do much more damage to you, friendly fire is fatal, ammo and switches will not be outlined and only headshots do any kind of significant damage. To say this ramps up the difficulty would be an understatement, but it definitely adds a lot to gameplay, making communication more necessary and making it that much more important (and satisfying) to just reach a safehouse.
If you're thirsting for multiplayer action, there's the classic versus mode which pits player controlled Infected vs. player controlled Survivors and the new Scavenge Mode. Scavenge Mode lets you play as the Infected or the Survivors; the Survivors run around and collect gas to power machines, while it's the Infected try to stop them. 8 players in teams of 4 alternate between the Infected and Survivors from round to round, with 3 rounds to a game. Whichever team gets the most gas twice, wins the game. If this sounds silly to you, don't knock it 'til you've tried as it's strangely addicting.
While Valve managed to get a lot of new things right they managed to forget to add in some other features that gamers would most likely enjoy. How come we don't have create-a-player yet? Even Def Jam Fight For New York has had that one figured out for some time, complete with different sounding voices and distinct looking create-a-players. Inventory customization would also be a nice feature. Some players can complete whole campaigns with just a melee weapon and would prefer to hold a second medkit or extra bombs instead of having to lug around an assault rifle or grenade launcher they won't use.
GRAPHICS
Character models have gone through a costume (and ethnicity) change, but there's no decline in quality here. The zombies from the first game look mostly the same (although there's a female Boomer variant this time around) and new zombies look marvelously malevolent. The Spitter's design sticks out in particular, this girl looks like the thing bad dreams and bad dates on e-Harmony.com are made of.
It also looks like Valve put a lot of work into the environments which are more detailed this time around. When it comes time for the big campaign mode finale, you get to fight in some unique environments such as the foyer of a mall, an arena and the longest most zombie packed bridge there ever was.
SOUND
While Left 4 Dead 2 recycles a lot of the same music and jingles from the first, it's also got a lot of new music as well. Despite the new songs like "Re: Your Brains," and the classic "Still Alive," from Portal, you're going to get hit with a million and one remixes of the games famous jingle.
The voice acting in Left 4 Dead 2 is really good. Each character is voiced beyond serviceably, but it's Eric Laden whose work outshines the rest of the cast. Laden voices Ellis, the games resident good ol' boy and motormouth who brings comedy to the vocal tracks with macabre stories about a friend who gets burns on top of burns and cuts all over 90% of his body (to name a few).
FUN FACTOR AND LASTING APPEAL
Campaigns are fun and come in two varieties: Epic and More Epic. Versus mode and scavenger mode are infinitely replayable and if you're playing the game with close friends (or new ones you meet on Steam), it could be almost impossible to have a bad time.
Everything about the game is addictive, in fact the hardest thing about writing this review was actually sitting down and typing everything out on my computer. Too many times did I start writing this review only to decide that I needed more "hands-on experience," before I could "properly," finish this review.
There's more than enough gameplay modes to keep any gamer busy, although some gamers might let Left 4 Dead 2 fall to the wayside after they've beaten every map and smashed every Survival record. However, if you liked the original Left 4 Dead, chances are you'll make Left 4 Dead 2 a regular part of your game night rotation.
THE 411
So you thought the original Left 4 Dead had gotten everything right? Get Left 4 Dead 2 and see how wrong you were. Left 4 Dead 2 takes the original game and turns everything up to eleven, while adding in great new options, gameplay, weapons and the most epic campaigns I've ever played. If you love FPSes, wild frenetic action, zombies or any combination of the three, you're going to want this game.
Graphics
9.0
Good graphics, great archetecture and lots of attention to detail.
Gameplay
9.0
The game is fun, with lots of varied game modes and easy to learn controls.
Sound
7.0
Points off here; the soundtrack is mostly jingles and remixes of jingles.
Lasting Appeal
10.0
You'll be campaigning and playing Versus Mode for a long while.
Fun Factor
10.0
Take about four points off if you're one of the two gamers out there who hates shooting zombies.
