FPS 2.0

Author's Rating:

Pros: Zombies, guns, teamwork oriented, more zombies

Cons: Left 4 Dead 2 isn't out yet.

The Bottom Line: 
Any gamer that wants to play a game that rewards real teamwork must own this game.

Author's Review
So let's say you love the First Person Shooter (FPS) genre. You play Halo for at least five hours a day and you basically carry your team through the game, running off on your own to wreak havoc on the enemy players. If you're that person, then this game is simply not for you. Left 4 Dead makes former "team-based" FPS titles look like the mentall challenged running around with guns. Gone are the days of Rambo. If you run off your own you're more likely to cost your teammates the game than to receive praise and admiration for how badass you are.

In Left 4 Dead Valve has created the definitive co-op experience. The premise is simple. You and three of your friends are the Survivors (Louis, a pencil pusher, Francis, a biker, Bill, a Vietnam veteran, and Zoey, a college student who spent more time watching zombie movies than doing homework) in the zombie apocalypse. Yes, that's right, the zombie apocalypse. There are four campaigns (and more to come in the future, due to Valve's awesome policy on free DLC) that you can play through in either single-player, co-op, or versus mode. Each campaign is made up of five "scenes". The first four scenes require your team to move from one safehouse to the other, all the while fighting off hordes of Common Infected, which resemble the infected from the film 28 Days Later, as well as the special Boss Infected, former humans who have mutated in ways above and beyond the Common Infected. The last scene of every campaign is a defense level, where you must wait for rescue while hordes of the undead assault your position rapidly, mercilessly, and relentlessly.

Playing as a survivor involves immense amounts of teamwork. The boss infected are designed to immediately disable players, and if you lose one of your team, it becomes that much easier for the rest of you to die as well. If too many players are moving too fast for a heavily wounded, slowly moving player to keep up, it won't be long before a Hunter pounces them, a Smoker nabs them with it's tongue, or a Boomer showers them in bile, causing all common infected to swarm that player. Players must stick together at all times, covering all angles, and communicating all useful information over the microphone ("Pipe bombs over here!", "Witch ahead!", "A HUNTER GOT ME! GET IT OFF!", etc.).

Playing versus mode is arguably even more fun. Instead of working with the other Survivors to make it through the level, you and three others must coordinate your attacks on the Survivors (played by another team of four) as the Boss Infected (two Hunters, a Smoker, and a Boomer). The Hunter is fast, and has the ability to leap great distances and pounce on Survivors, pinning them to the ground. While pinned the Survivors cannot fight back, and must wait for their team to assist them as you violently try and rip them apart. The Smoker is a covert class. It uses it's very long tongue to constrict Survivors from a distance and drag them back to it. Just like the Hunter, constricting a Survivor disables them, allowing you to damage them without restraint or caution. The Boomer is a special case. While every other infected (save the Witch) is an obvious "shoot on sight", the Boomer explodes when shot, showering bile on anyone in the blast radius. This bile blinds the Survivors and attracts massive amounts of Common Infected to them, surrounding them in seconds. Boomers can also simply vomit on survivors from a distance, which causes the same effects. In versus mode, when one scene is done, the teams switch sides and replay it. This continues until the campaign is done, and the points are tallied.

All in all, Left 4 Dead is a gorgeous rendition of the zombie apocalypse, and a remarkably full bodied co-op experience.