Xbox LIVE Addicts: Review: Left 4 Dead - Xbox LIVE Addicts

Here we have Left 4 Dead, Valve's attempt at the zombie-game genre. You may remember Valve, yeah they developed that erie blockbuster named Half-Life, as well as the multiplayer mayhem that is Team Fortress. They definately have the pedigree to take on this task so let's get to the meat and potatoes of this review so you can see for yourself.

The game begins right after you put the disc in. A cinematic kicks in straight-away that leads right into the first scenario of the game. You are given the option to skip it, but I would highly recommend watching this as you get a feel for the game, are introduced to one of the meanest infected in the game and what to do when nearby, and gives you a lil insight on the 4 survivors and their demeanor with some excellent voice acting director/storytelling. Definately puts you right into the mood of the game and gets you pumped for the first scenario. I've mentioned first scenario, so let me explain what I mean by that real fast so I don't lose you.

The game itself, both online and offline is split into 4 different scenarios. Each scenario plays out like a movie. There's a movie poster at the start, with a clever/funny catch-phrase line and a shot of the 4 survivors with a background related to that particular scenario. It also lists the cast on this poster under the picture of each survivor, ie. Bill as Himself, Bank of Dank as Zoey, Louis as Himself, Francis as Himself. At the end of each scenario are the movie credits, which Valve did a very innovative job here by using it as a stat tracker for that particular scenario. The cast is mentioned first of course, and then it goes into numerous stats, like number of each infected killed, accuracy, friendly fire incidents, headshots, number of pills used, first aid used etc. You think of it, and the stat is probably in the credits somewhere. The story/movie itself is completely played out by you, you won't see any cinematics explaining plot or characterization with the exception of the one you see when you first put the disc in. The opening cinematic is fantastic and leads directly into the start of the first scenario. Why they didn't put this at the begining of the first scenario, or make one similar for the begining of each other scenario I do not know as it would definately add to the movie feel I'd think. Without getting too far ahead of myself, let me get back to where I was.

We are at the main title screen so let me explain its menu real fast, sub-menu options will be in parantheses. Just to let you know, you can enable split-screen with a second controller connected by pressing the start button on the second controller from the main title screen. Your first option from the menu is Play Campagin, which is where you would want to go if you wanted to find some people online to play with (Quick Match & Xbox Live Custom Match), or if you wanted to play with friends online (Play With Friends). Quick match finds a match straight away that best fits your experience level. Xbox Live Custom Match will allow you to select difficulty and which Campaign you're looking for, as well whether you want to join a game in progress or one waiting in the lobby. Play With Friends will bring up a list of friends playing and what games they are in. If joinable you can join from this screen. You can also create your own lobby from the Play With Friends screen. You can make lobbies private, friends only or public, as well you can set the difficulty and campaign desired. Once in your own lobby you may also change the Chapter of the campaign chosen if you don't want to start from the begining. When online, character selection happens in the lobby, random is also a choice here. Next menu item is Play Versus, the sub-menu options here are all the same as Play Campaign so I won't explain them again. Then you have Play Single Player which allows you to start a campaign at which chapter and difficulty you'd like as well choose a character. Note: If a second controller is logged in for split-screen, it will apply to every option here, meaning you and a local buddy can go online and play coop or versus with others. The next menu item is Achievements, this is self-explainatory but I would like to note it does keep track of how many kills or whatever you have so you know how much further you have to go to reach your achievement, if applicable. The next menu is Options which I will explain in the next paragraph. Last you have the Extras (Developer Commentary & Credits). The Credits are exactly that but the Developer Commentary is something new and innovative brought to us by Valve. Selecting this will allow you to choose a character and go straight into the first campaign. During this campaign, the Infected will not take notice of you until the very end. You can travel and explore as you like through the whole thing, even kill all the infected if you wish. There are chat bubbles you can interact with throughout the first campaign that will start a voice commentary about certain things within the game and why they chose to go certain routes with their developement of Left 4 Dead. I highly recommend playing through this after you've completed the first campaign at least once. It doesn't ruin anything if you decide to do it right away either.

The options menu from the main title screen has three sub-menus (Audio/Video, Controller and Storage). The latter just selects the storage device for the current profile. Under Audio/Video you have settings for Brightness, Color Mode (Television or Monitor), Film Grain Amount, Splitscreen direction (Horizontal or Vertical), Master Volume, Music Volume, and turning Closed Captioning on or off. Under the Controller menu you have Button Layout between 4 different configurations. Stick Layout (Normal or Southpaw), vertical and horizontal sensitivity, look type inverted or normal and whether you want to toggle crouch or hold it down. I'd also like to mention that while playing online with friends in a co-operative campaign, the pause menu has these options as well as a Take a Break option which allows you to take a break from the game and let the computer take over for you. Also the vote option is available which allows you to vote to go back to the lobby, change the difficulty on the fly, or kick an offending player out of the room.

I described the way the scenarios are layed out earlier but now I'll go into the meat of the gameplay. The first thing I noticed about this game was its lack of cinematics. The opening intro did leave me at first to believe there would be many more like it, but there is not. There is a very small scene before each scenario and an escaping scene at the end, which is usually just the vehicle rescuing the remaining survivors, getting away. The final rescue scenes are more of just a visual from the vehicle itself, letting you see the hordes of zombies frenzy as they attempt to find a path to reach you. This can be quite humorous and a great way to end each scenario in my opinion as it its quick and a different view of the zombies every time. Some may be disappointed by the lack of cut-scenes found in the game however because of the immense replayability to be had here, I found having less of these to interrupt actual gameplay to be a blessing and common-sense as I hate to have to skip cut-scenes over and over if I play a game a lot, and this games scenarios are meant to be played a lot, over and over. I will mention that a slightly larger, but not by much, opening scene for each movie, shortly describing how the 4 of you got there, well this would have been nice but having played the scenarios many times now and explored its story through visual queues I can say its not necessary.

The hud is very well set up, the health/situation of each survivor can be seen at the bottom with a bar, which looks different when using pain pills for health. Accompanied with this bar you can see whether each survivor carries a health pack, pills, or explosives of any type. Below each bar is the survivors name or the gamertag of who is playing them. On the right side of the screen you see your D-pad button display, which allows you to turn your flashlight on and off, change to health, pills or your chosen explosive if carrying any. Above the d-pad display is the guns you're carrying and how much ammo you have for your main gun. Over each survivor is their name as well. The survivors themselves also look quite a bit different from any infected by color and shadow so I really didn't have a difficult time ever telling them apart from the masses of zombies. This really helped in frantic situations for friendly fire, which on the harder difficulty levels can really come into play as a shotgun blast to your commrade will send them to the floor incapacitated. As well when any survivors are not near you, you can see a highlighted sillouhette through walls and floors to help you find them. This highlight will also change colors depending on their situation, really helping to alert you to people snagged by a hunter or smoker, and helping you find them if for some reason you happen to be split up.

Each survivor can carry two pistols, a larger weapon, one health pack, one bottle of pills, and one explosive either molotov or pipe bomb. You can visibly see what a survivor is carrying just by looking at them, or as mentioned before above their health bar at the bottom of the screen. The importance of choosing the right weapon and explosive, because you can only take one, really pays off for the co-op side of things here. The mechanics of each weapon and explosive are vastly different so deciding on who takes what can be of the highest importance especially when preparing for a Crescendo Event or any of the campaigns' rescue finales.

The story of each scenario is played out by the 4 of the survivors entirely. What you choose to look at and read, as well as how quickly you try and advance from safe house to safe house, is all up to you. In fact, each story is kind of played out individually even though this is a co-op affair, let me briefly explain. There is a built-in director in the background telling everything how to play out, as you move through each scenario. The enemies spawn based on where you're going at that instant, making it impossible to figure out spawn points, giving you an endless supply of replays through each scenario without real repetitiveness. The music/sound of the game is also handled the same way and gives to an eerie suspenseful feeling, as well letting you know when a special infected may be nearby. Valve wanted to make sure this was a game you were definately not going to turn the sound or music off to do your own thing and I must say they did a wonderful job at that. The best part about this background director, is that it is for the individual. Everyone playing hears a different soundtrack based on their precise location within the scenario. This also holds true for the AI and its reactions/spawn locations, meaning someone wondering off alone could end up in a heap of trouble before long. Because of this individual AI director and the way the special infected are handled, co-operative gameplay becomes essential.

There are five chapters of each scenario to go through, this is travelling safe house to safe house until you finally reach the finale at the end. The final chapter consists of the four survivors going that last step to reach the rescue pickup point. They then have to call the rescurers on the radio there and fend off the hordes of infected for 10-15 minutes until their saviors arrive. Each safe house will have ammunition, as well as possible weapons, health or pills depending on the internal game director's choice. The final rescue point has all items to stock up on, as well exploring around can find you explosives of many types to help in your escape.

I've mentioned special infected already and their are five different types of special infected, each having their own types of attacks that wreak havoc in entirely different ways. The Boomer is a glutton, bolbous and ugly, he moves slow but has an attack that can regurgitate on its target or targets from a medium range. If covered by his slop, all of the horde will instantly be attracted to the ones affected, covering them with a huge swarm of zombies. As well the affected are essentially blind, making it difficult for them to see, in turn forcing the unaffected survivors to assist them with all this horde, and hoping they don't get shot by the blind survivors random gunfire. The hunter is a stealthy fellow, able to pounce on an unsuspecting survivor from quite a distance. Once pinned to the ground, that survivor is at the mercy of the hunter and the other survivors, fate in their hands. Next is the smoker, a long distance sniper type who stays away and will try and lash at a survivor with his long tongue, dragging them to him or hanging them from up high so the horde can have their way with them. Like the hunter, the effected survivor is at the mercy of the other survivors to get them out of this bind. Then there is the tank, a massive hulking beast that is slightly slower than a running survivor. This enraged monster will smash their way to killing all of the survivors. As well they can hurl cars and chunks of stone from the ground at the survivors, stunning or even incapacitating them in a single throw. Last is the witch, this sobbing wench can be heard from quite far away, alerting the survivors of her presence so they can take precautions. For if you alert a witch from her crying state, she will almost certainly kill the one who frightened her unless all of the survivors can very quickly react.

The ordinary zombie horde themselves will wander slowly around or even be sitting or just standing there, perhaps coughing, puking, weezing, evening fighting one another as you observe them. Once they take notice of a survivor they will find whichever path they can to get to them quickly. The zombies can reach you no matter where you are, they will always find a path. Watching them can be amazing. Entering a room or area with many zombies wandering about can be fun, they can either all react to you at once when alerted or not, it all varies. Having a massive horde of zombies surround you can be quite intense, especially when it takes a few reloads from the shotgun. Keep in mind one shot can decimate quite a few zombies at once if placed right, so we're talking a whole lot of freaking zombies man. Sometimes the music will heighten, and you will hear off in the background zombies in a frenzy reaching closer and closer toward you only to see them frantically climbing over a wall or around a corner or whatever the path need be. This can be a very intense moment for the four survivors as usually a special infected or two or three or even all of them will be involved as well.

Even with the impressive AI director and impossible to predict spawning of infected, to keep the game from being just the four survivors running from safe house to safe house killing the infected in their path, Valve decided to put in what they call Crescendo Events to spice things up every now and then. Each campaign usually has one or two of these events that must be done in order to progress past a certain point. This could be the opening of a door with an alarm on it, raising of lift, waiting on an elevator, there are many different events I can't list them all. Triggering these will cause a massive swarm of infected and special infected to frenzy towards the four survivors that must fend them off until the end of that particular event. These are much like the end of each movie but not nearly as long. Also littered through the game can be vehicles with still active car alarms, if they go off, hordes of infected will charge towards the survivors. The car alarms in particular can be quite a difficult task to overcome so making sure not to hit these vehicles that can be visibly noted before-hand, really important.

The scenarios themselves can be quite linear, though you still usually have two or three different routes to take at all times. These slightly different paths to take when paired with the previously mentioned AI director and music director, can make replaying each scenario as fun as the first time you tried it, even after playing them over, and over, and over. Every window can be broken, as well as numbers of different types of furniture. Doors can be clawed through by zombie hordes or blasted through by shotguns. Almost every door you see that isn't barricaded can be opened and closed, leaving many closet locations to explore that have zombies wandering about and can be possible locations for molotovs, pipebombs, first aid, pills and ammo. The better weapon stashes also have random locations to spawn in so searching around can be essential to survival at times.

The graphics in the game are stunning to say the least, the lighting from the flashlights and surrounding areas is amazing. Film grain was used at certain times to give the game that horror/zombie movie feel which as I said before can be completely adjusted with a slider for your own personal liking. Gas-tanks, propane tanks, even nitrogen tanks can all be found, picked up and used for explosive purposes with proper placement and the strike of a bullet. Broken down vehicles, gas stations themselves, & flammable barrels litter the areas as well to be fired upon as help, or hindrance to your survival in the game. All of these explosions are quite stunning to say the least, especially to see the hordes reactions to them. Blood, guts and body parts flying all over the place flood the game. You can aim where you want with the infected and get the expected results and glorious bloody detail that puts anything else I've played in my video game lifespan to shame. The detail of the maps and areas is incredible, there are things to read and look at everywhere. Clear visible signs of a story can be told as you travel along your chosen path. Each zombie moves, looks and reacts in many different ways leading to a different experience with almost every zombie every time. They will also find whatever path necessary to reach their goal and the amount of animations used for their movement through such path is really quite incredible.

The difficulty levels make the game extremely accessible to anyone's ability. Easy is still a frenzied rush of intense excitement but something anyone has the ability to get through. As you increase the difficulty so does the amount of infected/special infected and how quickly they react to you. Expert is something 4 people will be trying to tackle for a very long time. Friendly fire damage is also increased as the difficulty rises. When incapacitated you will eventually bleed out, as well the horde of infected will continue to attack you. You do have the ability to shoot with your pistol in this position. You may be revived from being incapacitated three times. After that you'll die when your health reaches 0. Once dead however, you'll only be out of the action for a moment. The game puts you in a spectator mode for a few minutes letting you take a break from the excitement and view the other survivors. Then it will place you in a closet somewhere that the remaining survivors have to reach and open to help you escape. If everyone dies, the last safe house is where you may restart.

One thing I haven't spoke about is the online versus mode. Yet again Valve comes up with something extremely innovative and fun to play. When listening to the developer commentary you find out that originally the Versus mode was supposed to be the entirety of the game until they decided to split it up later on. So what this means is that its the exact same except the special infected within each scenario, with the exception of the witch, will all be controlled by human opponents. Confused? Well hopefully this clears it up, 8 people can get into a single versus match, meaning four survivors and four infected. You may choose any chapter from any of the campaigns to play on, including the finale. Survivors can choose their characters in the main lobby. When the game starts the four survivors play out what appears to be a co-op campaign. Still lots of infected wandering about, still an interanl AI/music director, still have to escape. The four infected start as a spectator ghost waiting to spawn, looking directly at the four survivors. You can move your ghost around to any location then pull the right trigger to spawn. As long you cannot see the survivors, you can spawn, meaning you can spawn righht around the corner. You don't get to choose an infected this is randomly chosen for you to keep the game fair, we don't want tank after tank coming out. You then take your usually short-lived life to do what your chosen special infected is supposed to do. After death you are immediately in ghost respawn view and can find another spawn location. This is extremely fun and can really be co-operative again but not just for the survivors but for the special infected as well as working together can really bring out the best result in their attacks. As well, Valve mentioned in the developer commentary that with this mode, escape was really not expected, its heightened intensity far outweighs what you experience in the campaign/co-op and a score is kept for each team till they likely fail, or perhaps they succeed. There are two rounds per chapter so each team of 4 gets a chance to play the survivors and the infected. Top scores at the end of course are deemed the winner.

Well I think I've covered everything and I do apologize if I left anything out. I'm now supposed to do a score or something so below I've listed some pros and cons as well as stuff you may not like but didn't bother me, tagged with my overall score for the game. Thanks for reading if you got this far.


Pros: Individual AI & music director. Graphics and sound are incredible, really give a sense to the game and it's zombie movie/escape/survival feel. Doors open and close. Every time I play a scenario it seems vastly new to me. Detail of the characters and infected is really incredible, you don't see the same zombie models over and over. Aiming and gunfire/explosives is really well done. Blood and gore expected of a zombie game trying to make it look like you're playing a zombie movie is spot on. Incredible co-op and versus gameplay. Very innovative and new game to a genre that already has so many titles.

Cons: None for me.

You may not like: Only 4 campaigns, while these can be replayed over and over and over with everlasting joy and appeal, having even just one more or any more may have been a blessing for the majority.

Score: 9.3/10