Left 4 Dead - Demo
The Left 4 Dead demo was released today, and wow, is it ever intense.
It only has two levels from one of the five-level 'movies'. They're shorter than I thought they'd be, but thanks to the AI director, they're *never* the same, as all the zombie hordes/special zombie attacks are mixed up. Sometimes you won't ever see the witch, sometimes she'll be right in your path - you'll hear her sobbing, you won't be able to see her, until you glimpse her white form in the glare of your flashlight beam, and then... well, then you're completely and utterly fucked.
The game has four difficulties, but the first three are nigh-pointless. Advanced - the third teir - is challenging, depending on the skill level of your group, say, if you've only got two humans and two AI. Or maybe it'll be better for the full game, when you play through five levels in a row, and you don't want to slave away for an hour on a level.
I played once through with AI, on normal (second teir of difficulty), had a couple of games of advanced with other human players (the matchmaking in this is a dream, though it may be somewhat standard for console players). And the game was doing okay, it was intense, and fun, but I didn't really need to rely on my teammates.
Then I finally got into a game where it all gelled. We blitzed through the two levels on advanced - mowing down waves of sprinting zombies, reacting quickly to the greater threats of hunters, smokers, or boomers. We even managed to take down a witch that was weeping in our path.
Emboldened by the glorious sight of the victory screen, we congratulated ourselves, made sexual innuendos about the female character, and notched the difficulty up to Expert. There would've been high-fives all around, if we were in physical reaching distance.
Now, you'd think a game with four heavily-armed human players would not be enable to inspire terror. You would think that, mowing down the first few waves of zombies with a laugh. You would continue to think that when you'd struggled to fight off another few waves, hauling your injured up to their feet after a brutal pounce from a gut-ripping hunter, or a near-lethal snatch by the long-tongued, strangling smoker. You would think that up until the point where you realise that you've run out of medkits, you're all near death, half of your buddies are living on borrowed time, thanks to the pills they popped to keep them alive.
The AI director doesn't just control the monsters, it controls the music.
Your team has paused, panting for breath on an underground subway platform, hoping to some higher power that there's not a tank up ahead, or a swarm of zombies, but some glorious, heavenly room overflowing with medkits and ammo. Then, ever so faintly, you hear the music kick in. It's soft, oftentimes overlooked, but it preceeds every zombie horde. Your skin prickles with fear - you're so open on this platform, a hunter might leap at you from the ruined train, or a smoker might snag you through one of the windows, or a boomer might haul its disgusting corpse up the escalators behind you, to explode, and cover you with noxious vomit which summons zombies from every nook and cranny for miles around.
For a moment, even if it's just a moment, for that moment, the game inspires terror.
Then, as the moaning cries of zombies close in around you, the terror changes to adrenaline, pumping through your veins, trying to keep your fragile body alive just a little while longer. You see a stream of the undead hurtling at you from along the train tracks. You level your shotgun at them, and fire. A grim smile of satisfaction crosses your face as the blast rends limbs from bodies and heads from necks, sending newly-killed bodies arcing backwards, even as their tremendous momentum makes them slide forwards.
But it's not enough - there's just so many, all hurling themselves at you. Straining with every muscle to propell their bodies towards you. Driven by the inexorable need to tear you apart and feast on your flesh.
You fire again, and again, and again, until the click of the trigger tells you that your gun is empty. No time to reload. The zombies are almost on you. You hear a cry of horror from beside you, as a hunter lands on one of your team, pinning them to the ground, and beginning to rip and tear at their undefended chest. Pulling your pistols from their holsters, you spin towards your friend, blasting the hunter away, and saving their life. You turn back to your own battle, but it's too late - the zombies are upon you.
You fall on your back, your vision full of snarling faces, thrashing arms, and stomping feet. You fire blindly into the swarm, but for every limb you sever, every head you blow off, another zombie moves in to take its place. Your teammates are busy fighting off the swarm coming from the other direction, and though they try to turn and help you up, it's too late.
You watch your friends get torn to pieces while the melancholy 'You are dead' spectator music plays.
Then you spawn back in the saferoom at the beginning of the level. Heal any risidual wounds from the level before, restock on ammo, be mocked for playing the black guy and dying first, and head out to try and get through it again.
It took over an hour for us to finish the second level (the first one is really quite easy), but it was worth it. Of course, it would be even more worth it if those buddies were something more than just random people on the internet, with whom you can share entertaining anecdotes about this and that...
...dammit. I need more friends. Or, more precisely, I need more friends who want to survive a zombie apocalypse with me.
It's all fun and games until somebody pisses off the witch.
It only has two levels from one of the five-level 'movies'. They're shorter than I thought they'd be, but thanks to the AI director, they're *never* the same, as all the zombie hordes/special zombie attacks are mixed up. Sometimes you won't ever see the witch, sometimes she'll be right in your path - you'll hear her sobbing, you won't be able to see her, until you glimpse her white form in the glare of your flashlight beam, and then... well, then you're completely and utterly fucked.
The game has four difficulties, but the first three are nigh-pointless. Advanced - the third teir - is challenging, depending on the skill level of your group, say, if you've only got two humans and two AI. Or maybe it'll be better for the full game, when you play through five levels in a row, and you don't want to slave away for an hour on a level.
I played once through with AI, on normal (second teir of difficulty), had a couple of games of advanced with other human players (the matchmaking in this is a dream, though it may be somewhat standard for console players). And the game was doing okay, it was intense, and fun, but I didn't really need to rely on my teammates.
Then I finally got into a game where it all gelled. We blitzed through the two levels on advanced - mowing down waves of sprinting zombies, reacting quickly to the greater threats of hunters, smokers, or boomers. We even managed to take down a witch that was weeping in our path.
Emboldened by the glorious sight of the victory screen, we congratulated ourselves, made sexual innuendos about the female character, and notched the difficulty up to Expert. There would've been high-fives all around, if we were in physical reaching distance.
Now, you'd think a game with four heavily-armed human players would not be enable to inspire terror. You would think that, mowing down the first few waves of zombies with a laugh. You would continue to think that when you'd struggled to fight off another few waves, hauling your injured up to their feet after a brutal pounce from a gut-ripping hunter, or a near-lethal snatch by the long-tongued, strangling smoker. You would think that up until the point where you realise that you've run out of medkits, you're all near death, half of your buddies are living on borrowed time, thanks to the pills they popped to keep them alive.
The AI director doesn't just control the monsters, it controls the music.
Your team has paused, panting for breath on an underground subway platform, hoping to some higher power that there's not a tank up ahead, or a swarm of zombies, but some glorious, heavenly room overflowing with medkits and ammo. Then, ever so faintly, you hear the music kick in. It's soft, oftentimes overlooked, but it preceeds every zombie horde. Your skin prickles with fear - you're so open on this platform, a hunter might leap at you from the ruined train, or a smoker might snag you through one of the windows, or a boomer might haul its disgusting corpse up the escalators behind you, to explode, and cover you with noxious vomit which summons zombies from every nook and cranny for miles around.
For a moment, even if it's just a moment, for that moment, the game inspires terror.
Then, as the moaning cries of zombies close in around you, the terror changes to adrenaline, pumping through your veins, trying to keep your fragile body alive just a little while longer. You see a stream of the undead hurtling at you from along the train tracks. You level your shotgun at them, and fire. A grim smile of satisfaction crosses your face as the blast rends limbs from bodies and heads from necks, sending newly-killed bodies arcing backwards, even as their tremendous momentum makes them slide forwards.
But it's not enough - there's just so many, all hurling themselves at you. Straining with every muscle to propell their bodies towards you. Driven by the inexorable need to tear you apart and feast on your flesh.
You fire again, and again, and again, until the click of the trigger tells you that your gun is empty. No time to reload. The zombies are almost on you. You hear a cry of horror from beside you, as a hunter lands on one of your team, pinning them to the ground, and beginning to rip and tear at their undefended chest. Pulling your pistols from their holsters, you spin towards your friend, blasting the hunter away, and saving their life. You turn back to your own battle, but it's too late - the zombies are upon you.
You fall on your back, your vision full of snarling faces, thrashing arms, and stomping feet. You fire blindly into the swarm, but for every limb you sever, every head you blow off, another zombie moves in to take its place. Your teammates are busy fighting off the swarm coming from the other direction, and though they try to turn and help you up, it's too late.
You watch your friends get torn to pieces while the melancholy 'You are dead' spectator music plays.
Then you spawn back in the saferoom at the beginning of the level. Heal any risidual wounds from the level before, restock on ammo, be mocked for playing the black guy and dying first, and head out to try and get through it again.
It took over an hour for us to finish the second level (the first one is really quite easy), but it was worth it. Of course, it would be even more worth it if those buddies were something more than just random people on the internet, with whom you can share entertaining anecdotes about this and that...
...dammit. I need more friends. Or, more precisely, I need more friends who want to survive a zombie apocalypse with me.
It's all fun and games until somebody pisses off the witch.