Left 4 Dead 2 review
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Left 4 Dead 2 review
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
The rain it falls on all alike
Upon the just and unjust fella'
But more upon the just one for
The Unjust hath the Just's Umbrella
Upon the just and unjust fella'
But more upon the just one for
The Unjust hath the Just's Umbrella
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I'm still feeling burned. I bought the single player just weeks before they released news of L4D2.
Let him land on any Lyran world to taste firsthand the wrath of peace loving people thwarted by the myopic greed of a few miserly old farts- Katrina Steiner
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
This is definitely my most wanted game of this year. The original remains my all time favourite shooter (if not game) in terms of emergent story, truly co-operative play and most importantly the feeling of being part of an actual zombie apocalypse where your survival is never guaranteed. I don't see a problem with the release of this a year after the original - for a game that provides true value for money in the amount of fun and entertainment that can be gleaned from it, I'll happily pay again.
The harder you fall, the higher you bounce.
- ArmorPierce
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I found that I got bored of the game at about the 200 hour mark for both the original and second. Anyone else got this?
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To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift. ~Steve Prefontaine
Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer are in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe.
To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift. ~Steve Prefontaine
Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer are in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe.
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
Many people I know got bored way sooner than 200 hours. Wando got bored as soon as the game got predictable, for example.
- Joviwan
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I still play L4D1 and have a good time with it (generally), but L4D2 is something I'm never touching again until I hear that they fixed the game. Chargers getting stuck on lunchboxes lying on the ground, smoker tongues breaking in the air for no reason, boomer bile hosing all four survivors only to have them all give him a funny look and shoot him, tanks spawning on fire or falling off cliffs, AI controlled bots running endless, useless circuits trying to get inside buildings whenever they aren't just standing on top of you while you're getting your nipples torn off by hunters... It's been a while since I played a game that was so fundamentally broken. Talk about disappointing.
Drooling Iguana: No, John. You are the liberals.
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
Wow talk about winning the horrible bug luck lottery.. the only glitch I've had come up was when I accidentally got a survivor stuck on one of those little pallete carts when I smashed into him as the charger.
Personally I had a blast with L4D2 and eagerly await the DLC they've announced for both it and the original.
Personally I had a blast with L4D2 and eagerly await the DLC they've announced for both it and the original.
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I picked up L4D on Steam for $7.50 on a lark because it was so cheap. I got bored with it once the novelty of the nudie mod and player-created levels wore off. So about 5 hours.Stark wrote:Many people I know got bored way sooner than 200 hours. Wando got bored as soon as the game got predictable, for example.
"It's you Americans. There's something about nipples you hate. If this were Germany, we'd be romping around naked on the stage here."
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
It was just fantastic, because the other 7 people I regularly play L4D with, at the time and now, all experienced the same bugs and more, basically every time we played the game.SylasGaunt wrote:Wow talk about winning the horrible bug luck lottery.. the only glitch I've had come up was when I accidentally got a survivor stuck on one of those little pallete carts when I smashed into him as the charger.
Personally I had a blast with L4D2 and eagerly await the DLC they've announced for both it and the original.
And let's not even go into the fact that the game would crash to desktop for half of the PC market on release day, and that it took them two weeks to squash the bug.
Drooling Iguana: No, John. You are the liberals.
Phantasee: So extortion is cooler and it promotes job creation!
Ford Prefect: Maybe there can be a twist ending where Vlad shows up for the one on one duel, only to discover that Sun Tzu ignored it and burnt all his crops.
- MKSheppard
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I thought about making a new thread instead of necroing this one. But I didn't think I could come up with a review long enough to justify a new thread.
So I got it for $5 off Steam; this sale is good until 30 minutes from now.
Technically, it plays pretty good -- 1920x1080 with anti aliasing and smooth frame rates on my rig, which is not that new.
The gameplay is kind of cool at first (I've only played the campaign so far); with a lot of gamemechanics like specialized monsters that attack in a way that requires a team-member to save you; forcing the group to stay together, even with stupid idiots playing the game.
It's fun for a couple playthroughs in campaign mode; but then you realize that it's kind of like those old arcade shooters you used to have, where you put $0.50 or $0.75 in for one round of playthrough -- and the game would flood you with 55,000,000 mindless enemies, who would inflict damage if you didn't shoot them before they got to biting range.
Additionally; the so-called "emergent AI director" seems to be basically this:
"So the players have reached another checkpoint in the game. Hmm. Lets see, they're doing pretty good, with some ammunition and pretty good health. Lets fuck them over by doubling the amount of the zombie horde they get hit with at a checkpoint."
The concept probably works better if you can actually hear and can do voice chat with other people to have a more inclusive "oh god that tank is coming after me!" experience.
So I got it for $5 off Steam; this sale is good until 30 minutes from now.
Technically, it plays pretty good -- 1920x1080 with anti aliasing and smooth frame rates on my rig, which is not that new.
The gameplay is kind of cool at first (I've only played the campaign so far); with a lot of gamemechanics like specialized monsters that attack in a way that requires a team-member to save you; forcing the group to stay together, even with stupid idiots playing the game.
It's fun for a couple playthroughs in campaign mode; but then you realize that it's kind of like those old arcade shooters you used to have, where you put $0.50 or $0.75 in for one round of playthrough -- and the game would flood you with 55,000,000 mindless enemies, who would inflict damage if you didn't shoot them before they got to biting range.
Additionally; the so-called "emergent AI director" seems to be basically this:
"So the players have reached another checkpoint in the game. Hmm. Lets see, they're doing pretty good, with some ammunition and pretty good health. Lets fuck them over by doubling the amount of the zombie horde they get hit with at a checkpoint."
The concept probably works better if you can actually hear and can do voice chat with other people to have a more inclusive "oh god that tank is coming after me!" experience.
"If scientists and inventors who develop disease cures and useful technologies don't get lifetime royalties, I'd like to know what fucking rationale you have for some guy getting lifetime royalties for writing an episode of Full House." - Mike Wong
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
The AI director is smarter than that Shep. To be exact every single gun, item and mob in the game is spawned by it. As our the panic events and random rushes. In map editing you can create events to generate automatic panic events but otherwise the levels play out via the AI directors control.
That also includes other things when you set the AI to be able to control it, like weather and even car placement. The higher the difficulty the more and the more the director is a dick like throwing a tank and 2 smokers at you at the same time while your stuck with Tier 1 weapons. The editor lets you give the director as little control or as much control as you like. It even can include things like how alert the zombies are if you want to get in the nuts and bolts.
If your board of the five basic campaigns which last about an hour each there are excellent user made campaigns out there.
http://www.l4dmaps.com/files.php?cat=3
The following are great
One 4 Nine
Death Aboard 2
City 17
2 evil eyes l4d2
Diescraper Redux
25 to Life
No Space 4 Zombies
The following are good
Dead Before Dawn Too
Carried Off
Detour Ahead - L4D2
Night Terror L4D2 edition
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Zombies
Lost
The modified series (They are the L4D 1 maps ported and tweaked for L4D2)
Getting all of them adds 16 hours worth of content to your L4D experience plus some of them (Indiana Jones and the Temple of Zombies) are just great experiences to run through.
That also includes other things when you set the AI to be able to control it, like weather and even car placement. The higher the difficulty the more and the more the director is a dick like throwing a tank and 2 smokers at you at the same time while your stuck with Tier 1 weapons. The editor lets you give the director as little control or as much control as you like. It even can include things like how alert the zombies are if you want to get in the nuts and bolts.
If your board of the five basic campaigns which last about an hour each there are excellent user made campaigns out there.
http://www.l4dmaps.com/files.php?cat=3
The following are great
One 4 Nine
Death Aboard 2
City 17
2 evil eyes l4d2
Diescraper Redux
25 to Life
No Space 4 Zombies
The following are good
Dead Before Dawn Too
Carried Off
Detour Ahead - L4D2
Night Terror L4D2 edition
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Zombies
Lost
The modified series (They are the L4D 1 maps ported and tweaked for L4D2)
Getting all of them adds 16 hours worth of content to your L4D experience plus some of them (Indiana Jones and the Temple of Zombies) are just great experiences to run through.
"A cult is a religion with no political power." -Tom Wolfe
Pardon me for sounding like a dick, but I'm playing the tiniest violin in the world right now-Dalton
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
Yeah, it's really geared more towards multi. I've had a blast when you up the difficulty to just short of "hair pulling". And the hilarious moments when the team decide to leave someone behind or what have you is great.
Shrooms: It's interesting that the taste of blood is kind of irony.
- MKSheppard
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
....I'm not seeing it. All I'm seeing is checkpoints being reached and huge mobs being released; while the guns are in the same places. Perhaps they change in power according to how well the team is doing -- like you only get shotties if you do too good, and assault rifles if you're doing horribly.Mr Bean wrote:The AI director is smarter than that Shep. To be exact every single gun, item and mob in the game is spawned by it.
But that's a simple item swap.
The concept of the game is interesting yes, it's just that for me it kind of gets buried under the huge mobs of undead you have to gun down near-constantly - to the point where you sort of get numb from shooting fatigue.
"Welp, we just killed 200 zombies. Lets go kill another 200 before the level's over!"
"If scientists and inventors who develop disease cures and useful technologies don't get lifetime royalties, I'd like to know what fucking rationale you have for some guy getting lifetime royalties for writing an episode of Full House." - Mike Wong
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
The areas where weapons spawn arent fixed, they've got various areas where they can be dropped, once you've played it a bit you notice the differences a little more each time. The game really does benefit from the sound, I've made use of the closed captioning system in it, but there really is no comparing to the frantic cry of a teammate as they get grabbed from behind and shout "Smoker on me!" "Got your back" "Hunter on the left"...it's really a big part of the game, I found playing without using voice coms made the game far less fun.MKSheppard wrote:....I'm not seeing it. All I'm seeing is checkpoints being reached and huge mobs being released; while the guns are in the same places. Perhaps they change in power according to how well the team is doing -- like you only get shotties if you do too good, and assault rifles if you're doing horribly.Mr Bean wrote:The AI director is smarter than that Shep. To be exact every single gun, item and mob in the game is spawned by it.
But that's a simple item swap.
The concept of the game is interesting yes, it's just that for me it kind of gets buried under the huge mobs of undead you have to gun down near-constantly - to the point where you sort of get numb from shooting fatigue.
"Welp, we just killed 200 zombies. Lets go kill another 200 before the level's over!"
"Prodesse Non Nocere."
"It's all about popularity really, if your invisible friend that tells you to invade places is called Napoleon, you're a loony, if he's called Jesus then you're the president."
"I'd drive more people insane, but I'd have to double back and pick them up first..."
"All it takes for bullshit to thrive is for rational men to do nothing." - Kevin Farrell, B.A. Journalism.
BOTM - EBC - Horseman - G&C - Vampire
"It's all about popularity really, if your invisible friend that tells you to invade places is called Napoleon, you're a loony, if he's called Jesus then you're the president."
"I'd drive more people insane, but I'd have to double back and pick them up first..."
"All it takes for bullshit to thrive is for rational men to do nothing." - Kevin Farrell, B.A. Journalism.
BOTM - EBC - Horseman - G&C - Vampire
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
Thank you for eating up all my spare time for the next week or so, Mr. Bean.
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
You quote welcome, let me know if you'd rather have another human handy to walk through these maps.Molyneux wrote:Thank you for eating up all my spare time for the next week or so, Mr. Bean.
"A cult is a religion with no political power." -Tom Wolfe
Pardon me for sounding like a dick, but I'm playing the tiniest violin in the world right now-Dalton
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
To note from the editor everything in the game is either an item.MKSheppard wrote:....I'm not seeing it. All I'm seeing is checkpoints being reached and huge mobs being released; while the guns are in the same places. Perhaps they change in power according to how well the team is doing -- like you only get shotties if you do too good, and assault rifles if you're doing horribly.Mr Bean wrote:The AI director is smarter than that Shep. To be exact every single gun, item and mob in the game is spawned by it.
But that's a simple item swap.
It could be a weapon item, it could be a use item or it could be an environmental object.
There are also zombie items and special infected items
So on that table you can set it to spawn a gun of the directors choosing OR pills OR nothing at all. The director keeps track of how well your doing based on kills, your HP and your accuracy and ammo counts. Funny enough the custom campaigns show of the director more because the custom campaigns have more items per square foot than the Valve campaigns. The Valve campaigns have maybe five places the Tier 2 weapons can spawn in Mission2 of the campaign when something like One 4 Nine has twenty places the weapons can spawn, three or four "big pile O weapons" and sixteen places one weapon might spawn. The custom campaigns are also better about having more places for zombies to come from. It's easier to deal with twenty zombies from direction A but harder to deal with 5 zombies form direction A, Ten from overhead in location B and Two breaking through doors from C & D.
So Valve maps contain perhaps three layouts per map in the campaign. Three ways it could be played out and that sounds like some serious combinations but the terrain changes are only in highly specific places. In some of the campaign maps (Like One 4 Nine and Detour Ahead) there are six paths through the same area you can take and more.
Which is also why some campaigns are 3x the size of the Valve campaigns because most Valve campaigns will play out in 5 or 6 different ways while the customers could be as high as thirty to forty.
"A cult is a religion with no political power." -Tom Wolfe
Pardon me for sounding like a dick, but I'm playing the tiniest violin in the world right now-Dalton
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
The variations are really only relevant in multi anyway; its an incredibly dreary and boring (and ugly) single player game. The director just serves to prevent MP becoming by-the-numbers samey every run, but it only partly succeeds.
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
Does it really matter if you have to face 400 zombies or 300 in the single player campaign with 3 bot teammates or in the multiplayer campaign with 3 other humans? The zombie horde levels are so high that generally it goes like this:Stark wrote:The director just serves to prevent MP becoming by-the-numbers samey every run, but it only partly succeeds.
Move to new section of map in which you turn around a corner. You find some zombies hanging around. You shoot them. This causes a spawn wave of zombie hoards that simply come running and leaping from wherever. Cue 1,500 rounds expended by all four players till the area is clear again.
Move ahead some more; repeat, repeat repeat.
"If scientists and inventors who develop disease cures and useful technologies don't get lifetime royalties, I'd like to know what fucking rationale you have for some guy getting lifetime royalties for writing an episode of Full House." - Mike Wong
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
You're not paying attention. In MP, knowing where the guns are or which corner has the spawns or whatever is critical. If this never changed, MP wouldn't be as successful. Introducing a level of uncertainty increases replayability, especially in teamplay. That you think SP is the same as MP is absurd: the game is built on (and sold on) the team experience, which you will never have in SP.
If you want to be critical, just point out how its ugly, has boring combat and uninspired level design, and doesn't actually have much player interaction.
If you want to be critical, just point out how its ugly, has boring combat and uninspired level design, and doesn't actually have much player interaction.
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I'm not seeing a difference between the Single Player Campaign with three bot team-mates and the Multiplayer Campaign with three actual human beings for teammates; having played a few of the missions in SP-Campaign and MP-Campaign.Stark wrote:That you think SP is the same as MP is absurd: the game is built on (and sold on) the team experience, which you will never have in SP.
The big difference is that MP-Campaign is a bit more exciting because there's an uncertainity factor with actual human beings, people charge ahead of you; and you have to follow them to keep them alive, in order for you to survive special monster attacks later on. In the SP-Campaign, the Bots generally always cluster around you and follow your lead.
You once described a game's playstyle (FEAR) long ago as:
Walk, shoot. Walk walk walk, shoot walk. Nothing of significance happens except meeting Fatty McFat Fat the fucking moron
Left 4 Dead 2's campaign (multi and SP) is:
10 START GAME
20 Walk, shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot shoot fuck out of ammo melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee melee Phew.
30 GOTO 20
Give you a case in point:
If you play the mission in the campaign which starts with you in a train yard....there is ALWAYS ALWAYS a horde attack the moment you open the door on a derailed boxcar, complete with a tank charging out of the boxcar.
How do I know this? Because me and the other three guys (I was playing the Multi Campaign) kept dying, and thus had to keep repeating the level.
"If scientists and inventors who develop disease cures and useful technologies don't get lifetime royalties, I'd like to know what fucking rationale you have for some guy getting lifetime royalties for writing an episode of Full House." - Mike Wong
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
- MKSheppard
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
The graphics are actually pretty decent. They get the job across; nothing more nothing less. The big problem is that the designers went overboard on ALL DARK ALL THE TIME. You're either in darkened buildings or walking around at night mostly.Stark wrote:If you want to be critical, just point out how its ugly
Agreed on this. The first few times you try it, it to you appears awesome. But after you realize that the system always swarms you with hundreds of infected no matter what you do; and that they move like rabbits on crack...has boring combat
Agreed on this. It's actually a pretty linear design, with no real interaction other than to pick up reloads or health packs and GET TO THE CHOPPAH SAFEROOM. Where they do have some interactivity, it's pretty pathetic; like having to go into a grocery store full of zombies to get a case of COCA-COLA soda so that some paranoid gunstore owner will shoot a tanker truck with a rocket launcher to open up a path to the next part of the gameand uninspired level design and doesn't actually have much player interaction.
"If scientists and inventors who develop disease cures and useful technologies don't get lifetime royalties, I'd like to know what fucking rationale you have for some guy getting lifetime royalties for writing an episode of Full House." - Mike Wong
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I was blown away by how hideous and primitive the game looks (especially the character models, but right down to the primitive level geometry) when I played L4D2. It doesn't say '2010 retail game' to me at all.
But I got sick of it after your level of experience - I played SP, I played some MP, and was just bored out of my skull. It didn't help (for me) that the combat is typical Quake instead of 'survival horror' - you strafe super-fast, you can run backwards fast enough to shoot people chasing you, jumping is a UT98 pogo stick, etc.
What gets me after playing ACTUAL team games is that the game doesn't really reward teamplay or give much opportunity for interaction beyond 'I'll go this way and press the button'. The game could be set up much more for teamplay if they gave a shit.
And shit do NOT remind me about FEAR. I tried playing it on 360 and its just as awful as it always was only now its fuck ugly too.
But I got sick of it after your level of experience - I played SP, I played some MP, and was just bored out of my skull. It didn't help (for me) that the combat is typical Quake instead of 'survival horror' - you strafe super-fast, you can run backwards fast enough to shoot people chasing you, jumping is a UT98 pogo stick, etc.
What gets me after playing ACTUAL team games is that the game doesn't really reward teamplay or give much opportunity for interaction beyond 'I'll go this way and press the button'. The game could be set up much more for teamplay if they gave a shit.
And shit do NOT remind me about FEAR. I tried playing it on 360 and its just as awful as it always was only now its fuck ugly too.
Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I was blown away by how hideous and primitive the game looks (especially the character models, but right down to the primitive level geometry) when I played L4D2. It doesn't say '2010 retail game' to me at all.
But I got sick of it after your level of experience - I played SP, I played some MP, and was just bored out of my skull. It didn't help (for me) that the combat is typical Quake instead of 'survival horror' - you strafe super-fast, you can run backwards fast enough to shoot people chasing you, jumping is a UT98 pogo stick, etc.
What gets me after playing ACTUAL team games is that the game doesn't really reward teamplay or give much opportunity for interaction beyond 'I'll go this way and press the button'. The game could be set up much more for teamplay if they gave a shit.
And shit do NOT remind me about FEAR. I tried playing it on 360 and its just as awful as it always was only now its fuck ugly too.
But I got sick of it after your level of experience - I played SP, I played some MP, and was just bored out of my skull. It didn't help (for me) that the combat is typical Quake instead of 'survival horror' - you strafe super-fast, you can run backwards fast enough to shoot people chasing you, jumping is a UT98 pogo stick, etc.
What gets me after playing ACTUAL team games is that the game doesn't really reward teamplay or give much opportunity for interaction beyond 'I'll go this way and press the button'. The game could be set up much more for teamplay if they gave a shit.
And shit do NOT remind me about FEAR. I tried playing it on 360 and its just as awful as it always was only now its fuck ugly too.
- MKSheppard
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Re: Left 4 Dead 2 review
I think the worst part was that the Campaign mode did not really feel like a 'campaign' to me. There was no exposition explaining who you were; how you found yourself in that opening hotel.....how you met the other three grotz....and for the later missions; how you got to that point from the previous missions.
Shit if it was that hard to get infected, then how'd the world fall in the first place?
The "send 200,000,000 zombies after the players in endless waves" also probably contributed to your malaise.
The levels actually do look pretty neat; as do the models of your fellow players and some of the zombies.
The problem is....you're too busy bunny hopping and running like a rabbit on crack to take in those details, they pass by in a blur of gunfire.
At first it seemed like a useful gameplay mechanic, but then it didn't make sense the more I thought about it. Why would you need help to get a Jockey off your back? Just put your gun to it's head and start shooting, instead of running around like an idiot trying to shake it off.
I love how in the campaigns, you could be surrounded by zombies biting and clawing you for like 20 seconds, and all you had to do was pop a health pack after you meleed your way out, and you'd be fine!Stark wrote: It didn't help (for me) that the combat is typical Quake instead of 'survival horror' - you strafe super-fast, you can run backwards fast enough to shoot people chasing you, jumping is a UT98 pogo stick, etc.
Shit if it was that hard to get infected, then how'd the world fall in the first place?
The "send 200,000,000 zombies after the players in endless waves" also probably contributed to your malaise.
The levels actually do look pretty neat; as do the models of your fellow players and some of the zombies.
The problem is....you're too busy bunny hopping and running like a rabbit on crack to take in those details, they pass by in a blur of gunfire.
You mean like trying to find some way of teamplay that didn't involve forcing the player to stick with other characters, so if they got their marbles tossed by any of the special zombies, they weren't fucked?What gets me after playing ACTUAL team games is that the game doesn't really reward teamplay or give much opportunity for interaction beyond 'I'll go this way and press the button'. The game could be set up much more for teamplay if they gave a shit.
At first it seemed like a useful gameplay mechanic, but then it didn't make sense the more I thought about it. Why would you need help to get a Jockey off your back? Just put your gun to it's head and start shooting, instead of running around like an idiot trying to shake it off.
"If scientists and inventors who develop disease cures and useful technologies don't get lifetime royalties, I'd like to know what fucking rationale you have for some guy getting lifetime royalties for writing an episode of Full House." - Mike Wong
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944
"The present air situation in the Pacific is entirely the result of fighting a fifth rate air power." - U.S. Navy Memo - 24 July 1944