Review: Left 4 Dead

Left 4 Dead has been one of the most intriguing titles to hit the 360 in the past few years. Mixing the genres of survival horror with true co-op/team gameplay has created an incredibly enjoyable and exciting undead beast, yet one that has countless simple flaws.

The Good: Teamwork
Hands down, L4D is the best cooperative shooter I have ever played. When compared to other games in the genre that are recognized and respected for their co-op aspects, such as Gears of War or Halo 3, it blows them out of the water. This is because in virtually all such games, you play it pretty much like you would a single player game, except you sometimes pick up an injured teammate or take turns driving / shooting a vehicle.

L4D completely abandons this style by forcing the team of 4 survivors to be exactly that: a team. This is accomplished primarily through the use of "special" zombies which can pounce on or strangle a survivor, incapacitating them. An incapacitated survivor CANNOT defend themself - a teammate must come to their aid and hit or shoot the attacking special zombie away. As a result, you end up playing like a team - watching each other's backs, rushing to each other's aid, and constantly saving each other from death. Another surprising benefit of this gameplay style is that is greatly enhances the game experience by creating a powerful bond and sense of kinship between the players, elevating the game's goal of survival to an almost-real state of believability. In this sense, L4D's co-op nature almost needs to be compared to other "team" games, like EA's NHL series.

Another unspoken benefit sure to be appreciated by anyone who has played public games on Xbox Live is that this game will likely be hated by the idiots who ruin online play with juvenile behavior and attitude. It takes a reasonable level of maturity/responsibility to succeed at Left 4 Dead - if a player is selfish, doesn''t care about their teammates, or has a "I can do everything by myself" superiority complex, they will lose. Going into a public game full of strangers and already knowing that the other players want to work with you as a team is an incredibly encouraging sensation.

The Good: Variety
One of the most publicized and anticipated elements of L4D was what Valve calls the A.I. Director, a system that ensures that every game is different. A basic example of this system at work in L4D is that one game a room will have a medkit, and in the next game it won't. Not being able to rely on pickups really makes you appreciate them more when you find them - sometimes you unexpectedly find an ammo cache or much-needed medkit and you genuinely feel lucky.

However the A.I. Director is capable of making more complex decisions that truly create unpredictable, uneasy scenarios. The most commonly experienced event is that if the team of survivors lingers too long in an area, suddenly a giant horde of infected will rush around the corner or start crawling through the windows. Not only does this prevent players from slowly and easily working their way through a level, but creates tension by forcing them to keep moving - just as if they were really in a zombie-infested city.

Another perfect example of how the Director really keeps things interesting is placement of special zombies. Last night while playing, a friend wanted to show me a useful shortcut he had found before, where we could bash down a door and skip a difficult scripted zombie attack. We gathered around the door and bashed it down and started celebrating (we weren't sure if Valve had removed this shortcut in a recent patch). However our celebrations were cut short when we realized just a few feet away lying in wait behind the door was a tank special infected (picture an undead incredible hulk that pulverizes anything nearby). We barely survived and walked away shaking our fists at the sadistic Director.

The Good: Versus Mode
Deserving of its own category, L4D's versus mode is where the game truly shines. Versus mode lets four players play as the infected against four players playing as the survivors. After playing through to the first checkpoint (or until all the survivors die), the teams switch roles and play through the area again. Both sides receive points depending on how many survivors perish and how far they make it. As good as the campaign mode is (and it is very good), versus mode is just awesome. First of all, being able to be an infected and take your revenge for the countless times you were murdered in campaign mode is extremely satisfying. But since you are against other real players, when you pounce or strangle someone or catch someone lagging just a bit too far behind, it is delicious because you know EXACTLY what they are thinking as you claw their face off.



Teamwork is also very important as infected. While you don't have to worry about defending or rescuing your teammates, if you don't coordinate your attacks you have a much smaller chance of winning. A survivor team working together can fend off any single threat - a zombie horde, a tank, etc. Which is why in order to win, the infected must throw the survivors into chaos. A well-coordinated infected team can blind the survivors with a boomer (special infected that vomits/explodes into bile, blinding players and attracting a swarm of regular infected), and then while the survivors are blinded and fighting the swarm, take out one survivor with a hunter infected pounce attack or a smoker infected strangle/drag away attack, both of which eventually kill the survivor if they aren't rescued (and of course, their teammates are blinded and dealing with their own problems). As the survivors, being the victim of a well-organized assault is thrilling, regardless of who wins the struggle.

The Good: Presentation
The sensory elements in L4D are interesting. The graphics, while good, are not groundbreaking. The music, while fitting, is also not exceptional. But they are combined superbly in the game, especially when combined with fantastic horror movie-styled lighting. Streets are dark and foreboding, lit only by a blinking storefront neon sign or a lone car whose headlights were left on as it was abandoned. Subway tunnels underground are cast in eerie red light, but then you end up in a brightly lit warehouse and you can see every snarl and grimace on the infected's faces. Even though you don't often get the chance to carefully examine the infected, the level of detail on them is impressive. (We had a good laugh one game when we noticed a recently killed infected was still wearing a pair of bright pink and green striped socks).

The sound and music are also secondary to the gameplay, and is used mostly as indicators of danger. The game tends to be either eerie silence or a chaotic symphony of screaming infected and shouting survivor. But when the audio does kick in, it's always noticeable and effective - you can hear a hunter infected growling before it comes into sight, and when a tank is nearby you hear a blood-pumping crescendo before it bursts into sight. All in all a very slick and polished presentation.

The Bad: It Sucks Alone
I'll be honest. Left 4 Dead is terrible by yourself. It's boring, it's hard (in a bad way), there's no storyline, and it just feels like an average kill-everything game. The excitement and danger created by saving your friends just doesn't carry over well when you are saving nameless computer bots who just run around getting strangled and stealing the medkits.

The Bad: It Sucks With Two or Three Players Too
It's not much better without a full team too, unfortunately. The behavior of the computer teammates is annoying beyond belief. They go from being ridiculously omniscient, shooting special infected a block away before you even see them, to being complete morons and standing in the middle of a three-hall intersection being ravaged by a horde of infected while the actual human players huddle in a defensive corner.

The Bad: Not Enough Variety
There are only four levels in the game, each consisting of 5 sub-stages. It doesn't take long before you have played through them all, and while the A.I. Director does accomplish great things in keeping the gameplay varied and fresh, four levels is still only four levels. To make matters worse, only TWO of the levels are playable in versus mode. While there is probably a good reason for this (maybe the unavailable levels have areas that aren't balanced for versus play), it's still very disappointing.

A lot of people would also point out the lack of weapons as a negative. (Your initial weapon choices are a shotgun or uzi, then you can upgrade to a scoped rifle, auto-shotgun or assault rifle.) As a result, it gets a little boring using the same 2 or 3 guns over and over again. However, I think adding too many options would devalue the game's core experience, as it is the simplicity and teamwork that are important and not the weaponry. Yeah, Halo 3 has some sweet energy swords and sticky grenades, but they're completely different games trying to satisfy completely different niches. A few more guns would be fine, but too many would ruin it.

Another common complaint is that the survivors don't have different strengths and weaknesses. I am neutral on this one. On one hand, it would be nice to be able to fill a specific role in the group, like if one survivor was good with explosives while another ran faster. On the other hand, this would cause problems when players didn't get to play as their favorite character. As it stands now I like to play as Bill, the grizzled war vet (he's grouchy and cranky which I find amusing). But if someone else takes Bill, I am fine being a different survivor because they're all the same. An interesting dilemma.

Final Score: 9/10
I give Left 4 Dead a 9/10 because for me, that is what it is. I play it online with friends. I know 7 people now with the game, and once we get another person we can do full versus matches and it will be incredible. However if you don't know others with the game or don't like playing with strangers, you will enjoy this game much, much less. If that were my situation I would give it a 4/10 for being a smooth playing game with no storyline, and very limited replay value and variety.