Left 4 Dead 2 review
Posted: 2010-01-12 06:33pm
I rented Left 4 Dead 2 and loved it more than the first so I went ahead and bought it, and thought I'd explain what I liked and didn't like. For the record I'm a Xbox 360 player.
I spend most of my time in multi-player (except for some brief forays to try and finish some of the single player achievements). So, most of what's important to me is related to the multi-player.
First, the minor improvements:
The autoshotgun has been depowered, if you played L4D 1 multi-player you'll remember that the autoshottie could snipe things four stories up. The new damage on it falls off a lot more realistically, now being shot from a four story height difference won't even phase the regular infected.
The autoshottie has less ammo, so on versus mode you have to husband your ammo a little more carefully for crescendo events, or tanks.
The auto shottie takes a little bit longer to reload than it used to, this has big gameplay effects.
There are more infected, and they're more effective. Some little change in the way they attack means they don't just hit you from a frontal arc any more, now they surround you, this makes a horde a lot more dangerous. Also they slow you down more (than they used to in L4D 1) when they hit you.
The Crescendo events are tougher, in L4D 1 they were just survive a certain number of infected, and then you were good, now they require you to go somewhere and turn something off, forcing the survivors out of whatever little bunker they chose, and giving the infected a chance to catch them as they make a mad dash for the alarm switch. The crescendo event and the zombie horde will last until the switch is turned off.
The Boomer works better than it used to, you may have had issues with trying to puke on someone from high up and even though they're in your arc they don't get hit. It's been improved so puking from high up works more often.
A few tweaks to the AI director, if you played L4D 1 multi a lot, you may have run into instances where there were four hunters pouncing you. That doesn't happen anymore in multi, there's never more than 1 of each critter at a time. Although one campaign play through I ran into two tanks while I was waiting for the evac vehicle, that was a little strange.
There are less items on the map for the tank to hit you with. That's a big improvement, there was this alley in L4D 1 loaded with dumpsters, and whenever a tank spawned there it was game over for the survivors.
In L4d 1 the hunter could jump from a high building and do a big (up to 25) initial damage. That's been lowered to 10, it makes the survivors job a little easier.
Those minor tweaks mostly make the survivors' job a lot tougher, in L4D 1 the strategy that worked for me was everyone get auto shotties and blaze away. Very annoying for the special infected, but effective enough to usually clear a level. It doesn't work anymore, all the little improvements on the regular infected and tweaks on the shotgun make a lone survivor less of a death machine with it. Surviving now requires a lot more coordination. And when you do make it through you won't be as easily KO'd by one tank in a bad place.
New Stuff in L4D 2:
For the infected there are 3 new zombie types, and as mentioned earlier the AI director won't double up on any type of infected in versus (it seems to me like it has in the non-versus campaign though). This has huge gameplay effect. with 6 special zombies There are potentially 15 different combos (6 choose 4) that means that how you choose to hit the survivors changes a lot from combination to combination. In L4D 1 the strategy was pretty much always the same Boomer tries to puke on as many survivors as possible and then the smoker or the hunters pin which ever survivors got missed, and then attack the others as best they could. The only change was where you'd ambush from. L4D 1 has much more variation.
The new zombies are a great addition
The Charger is like a mini-tank, he takes at least two close range shotgun blasts to kill, and he does 15% of a survivors health in damage when he claws. His special attack is to run at full speed and grab whatever's in front of him, people next to the chargers attack get bowled over or knocked back. The charger's fast enough to keep up with survivors , so you can have him dash in and out to hit an incapacitated survivor that someone else is trying to pull up, this lets you keep him on the ground longer, and since he's loaded with health he can take the odd pistol shot without going down.
The Spitter fires a wide gob of acidic goo, the longer someone stands in it the more damage they take. It's great for hurting survivors that have tried to hunker down somewhere. Or to keep the survivors from picking up an incapacitated teammate, while you wait for more of your own teammates to spawn. I love it because it's got a range advantage over a survivor with a shotgun.
The Jockey hops on a survivor and makes them stagger around in a direction it chooses, it's great for separating teams, and the jockey hops off the survivor goes down, so he can continue to cause mayhem without killing the downed teammate. It's short and fast enough that it's tough to shoot, which makes it great at dashing in and out to claw someone.
New stuff for the survivors,
Adrenaline shot, it makes you perform actions (and run) faster, so you pick people up faster, fill gas tanks faster, heal yourself or others faster, it's neat but the speed only lasts about 20 seconds and it only gives 25 health that fades like pain pills did.
Defib kit, bring a survivor back with 50 health and a pistol. Ok from a versus standpoint, but kind of silly actually.
Special bullets, you get one clip (or ten shotgun shells) of bullets that are either explosive or incendiary. Explosive bullets stagger the special infected (including the witch but not the tanks as far as I can tell). Incendiary are like lighting something up with a Molotov except the fires go out on special infected after a while. It's a lot of fun to hit a charging horde with an incendiary shotgun, and see them all go up like candles.
Melee weapons great for close in work, the physics on each weapon are a little different, so zombies come apart in different ways. Frying pans just leave an intact corpse, but the crow bar will sometimes split heads. I think they're fun, but it's not really game altering IMO. Mostly I think they're just kind of silly.
The chainsaw is hilarious zombies come apart.
The maps.
The good there are lots of places for special infected to hide, it's easier to set up ambushes than on most of the L4D 1 maps. Since I'm principally interested in multi I like this.
Further good: There are a couple of levels that look like they could have come straight out of World War Z. The abandoned highway at the start of Dark Carnival for instance. Also I think that Plank country (a swamp) may look the best of all the campaigns I've played (including L4D1).
There are zombies that are unique to each campaign, Dead center has guys in hazmat suits who are immune to incendiaries. Dark Carnival has clowns that attract other zombies (kind of silly and an SOD breaker for me). Hard Rain has witches that wander around. Plank country has zombies which scuttle so low to the ground that they can't be seen in the water (kind of neat actually). The Parish has police in body armor who are immune to bullets except in the back (this was another SOD breaker for me).
The bad. I just don't like the artwork on the maps or the way they feel (exception of course is plank country). In L4D1 there were a few places where you'd divert around chain link fences but they weren't a significant barrier. In L4D2 there are places where instead of climbing chain link (as a sane person would) you choose to run on a roller coaster (which is fun but not very serious). The net effect is that single player just isn't that interesting to me. The L4D 1 levels are all believable and spooky and serious (The No Mercy levels in the hospital are creepy, those bloody handed zombie nurses were disturbing). But the stuff in L4D2 just doesn't grab me the same way.
New overall, a new gametype, scavenge. You need to collect gas cans while the infected try to prevent you from doing that. You have an initial clock of 1:30, every time you pour a gas can in the generator you get :20. Best score wins the round, and it's best of 1,3, or 5 rounds depending on the lobby leader's preference. I love it it's a fast paced game that is usually about 4 minutes to a round. It rarely happens that the survivors are wiped out (though it can happen like in a regular L4D versus). Usually the survivors get a few gas cans, and then you stall them and hold them until time runs out (the Spitter can actually blow up dropped cans). Coordination is required for both the survivors and zombies.
Bottom line: If you're a single player on kind of a person, L4D2 isn't that big an improvement on the first one, and you may wanna hold off buying it until you can fin d it in a used store. But I liked the multi-player enough to not wait, if you enjoyed
the L4D1 multiplayer you'll probably like this version's more. Although if you're on the fence rent it and try it.
I
I spend most of my time in multi-player (except for some brief forays to try and finish some of the single player achievements). So, most of what's important to me is related to the multi-player.
First, the minor improvements:
The autoshotgun has been depowered, if you played L4D 1 multi-player you'll remember that the autoshottie could snipe things four stories up. The new damage on it falls off a lot more realistically, now being shot from a four story height difference won't even phase the regular infected.
The autoshottie has less ammo, so on versus mode you have to husband your ammo a little more carefully for crescendo events, or tanks.
The auto shottie takes a little bit longer to reload than it used to, this has big gameplay effects.
There are more infected, and they're more effective. Some little change in the way they attack means they don't just hit you from a frontal arc any more, now they surround you, this makes a horde a lot more dangerous. Also they slow you down more (than they used to in L4D 1) when they hit you.
The Crescendo events are tougher, in L4D 1 they were just survive a certain number of infected, and then you were good, now they require you to go somewhere and turn something off, forcing the survivors out of whatever little bunker they chose, and giving the infected a chance to catch them as they make a mad dash for the alarm switch. The crescendo event and the zombie horde will last until the switch is turned off.
The Boomer works better than it used to, you may have had issues with trying to puke on someone from high up and even though they're in your arc they don't get hit. It's been improved so puking from high up works more often.
A few tweaks to the AI director, if you played L4D 1 multi a lot, you may have run into instances where there were four hunters pouncing you. That doesn't happen anymore in multi, there's never more than 1 of each critter at a time. Although one campaign play through I ran into two tanks while I was waiting for the evac vehicle, that was a little strange.
There are less items on the map for the tank to hit you with. That's a big improvement, there was this alley in L4D 1 loaded with dumpsters, and whenever a tank spawned there it was game over for the survivors.
In L4d 1 the hunter could jump from a high building and do a big (up to 25) initial damage. That's been lowered to 10, it makes the survivors job a little easier.
Those minor tweaks mostly make the survivors' job a lot tougher, in L4D 1 the strategy that worked for me was everyone get auto shotties and blaze away. Very annoying for the special infected, but effective enough to usually clear a level. It doesn't work anymore, all the little improvements on the regular infected and tweaks on the shotgun make a lone survivor less of a death machine with it. Surviving now requires a lot more coordination. And when you do make it through you won't be as easily KO'd by one tank in a bad place.
New Stuff in L4D 2:
For the infected there are 3 new zombie types, and as mentioned earlier the AI director won't double up on any type of infected in versus (it seems to me like it has in the non-versus campaign though). This has huge gameplay effect. with 6 special zombies There are potentially 15 different combos (6 choose 4) that means that how you choose to hit the survivors changes a lot from combination to combination. In L4D 1 the strategy was pretty much always the same Boomer tries to puke on as many survivors as possible and then the smoker or the hunters pin which ever survivors got missed, and then attack the others as best they could. The only change was where you'd ambush from. L4D 1 has much more variation.
The new zombies are a great addition
The Charger is like a mini-tank, he takes at least two close range shotgun blasts to kill, and he does 15% of a survivors health in damage when he claws. His special attack is to run at full speed and grab whatever's in front of him, people next to the chargers attack get bowled over or knocked back. The charger's fast enough to keep up with survivors , so you can have him dash in and out to hit an incapacitated survivor that someone else is trying to pull up, this lets you keep him on the ground longer, and since he's loaded with health he can take the odd pistol shot without going down.
The Spitter fires a wide gob of acidic goo, the longer someone stands in it the more damage they take. It's great for hurting survivors that have tried to hunker down somewhere. Or to keep the survivors from picking up an incapacitated teammate, while you wait for more of your own teammates to spawn. I love it because it's got a range advantage over a survivor with a shotgun.
The Jockey hops on a survivor and makes them stagger around in a direction it chooses, it's great for separating teams, and the jockey hops off the survivor goes down, so he can continue to cause mayhem without killing the downed teammate. It's short and fast enough that it's tough to shoot, which makes it great at dashing in and out to claw someone.
New stuff for the survivors,
Adrenaline shot, it makes you perform actions (and run) faster, so you pick people up faster, fill gas tanks faster, heal yourself or others faster, it's neat but the speed only lasts about 20 seconds and it only gives 25 health that fades like pain pills did.
Defib kit, bring a survivor back with 50 health and a pistol. Ok from a versus standpoint, but kind of silly actually.
Special bullets, you get one clip (or ten shotgun shells) of bullets that are either explosive or incendiary. Explosive bullets stagger the special infected (including the witch but not the tanks as far as I can tell). Incendiary are like lighting something up with a Molotov except the fires go out on special infected after a while. It's a lot of fun to hit a charging horde with an incendiary shotgun, and see them all go up like candles.
Melee weapons great for close in work, the physics on each weapon are a little different, so zombies come apart in different ways. Frying pans just leave an intact corpse, but the crow bar will sometimes split heads. I think they're fun, but it's not really game altering IMO. Mostly I think they're just kind of silly.
The chainsaw is hilarious zombies come apart.
The maps.
The good there are lots of places for special infected to hide, it's easier to set up ambushes than on most of the L4D 1 maps. Since I'm principally interested in multi I like this.
Further good: There are a couple of levels that look like they could have come straight out of World War Z. The abandoned highway at the start of Dark Carnival for instance. Also I think that Plank country (a swamp) may look the best of all the campaigns I've played (including L4D1).
There are zombies that are unique to each campaign, Dead center has guys in hazmat suits who are immune to incendiaries. Dark Carnival has clowns that attract other zombies (kind of silly and an SOD breaker for me). Hard Rain has witches that wander around. Plank country has zombies which scuttle so low to the ground that they can't be seen in the water (kind of neat actually). The Parish has police in body armor who are immune to bullets except in the back (this was another SOD breaker for me).
The bad. I just don't like the artwork on the maps or the way they feel (exception of course is plank country). In L4D1 there were a few places where you'd divert around chain link fences but they weren't a significant barrier. In L4D2 there are places where instead of climbing chain link (as a sane person would) you choose to run on a roller coaster (which is fun but not very serious). The net effect is that single player just isn't that interesting to me. The L4D 1 levels are all believable and spooky and serious (The No Mercy levels in the hospital are creepy, those bloody handed zombie nurses were disturbing). But the stuff in L4D2 just doesn't grab me the same way.
New overall, a new gametype, scavenge. You need to collect gas cans while the infected try to prevent you from doing that. You have an initial clock of 1:30, every time you pour a gas can in the generator you get :20. Best score wins the round, and it's best of 1,3, or 5 rounds depending on the lobby leader's preference. I love it it's a fast paced game that is usually about 4 minutes to a round. It rarely happens that the survivors are wiped out (though it can happen like in a regular L4D versus). Usually the survivors get a few gas cans, and then you stall them and hold them until time runs out (the Spitter can actually blow up dropped cans). Coordination is required for both the survivors and zombies.
Bottom line: If you're a single player on kind of a person, L4D2 isn't that big an improvement on the first one, and you may wanna hold off buying it until you can fin d it in a used store. But I liked the multi-player enough to not wait, if you enjoyed
the L4D1 multiplayer you'll probably like this version's more. Although if you're on the fence rent it and try it.
I
