Valve can now breathe a sigh of relief, because the profit-rending, company-crushing behemoth that was the Left 4 Dead 2 boycott has officially been killed. That's right, Gabe Newell can have the first decent night's sleep since E3, no longer weeping because a handful of people don't like more of the game they enjoy.
"The recently released Crash Course was just the start. Future updates will continue to roll in, and 4v4 matchmaking is first in line," writes boycott leader Agent of Chaos. "Valve has confirmed to us that it’ll be available before the release of L4D2. Also don’t forget, we have another DLC pack confirmed for sometime in the near future and of course, there will be bug fixes. This is as good as it can get people."
I knew the boycotters would come crawling back in time for the game's release, and what do we have here? The boycotters save face by claiming that they've "accomplished everything they can," which basically means they got all the whining out of their systems and have probably been too excited by Left 4 Dead 2. It helped that Valve also flew the boycott leaders out to Seattle to have them play the game. I imagine it's hard to keep on hating after the royal treatment.
So there we go. Another victory for democracy. America is safe once more.
Jim Sterling serves as reviews editor for Destructoid.com, head of the Podtoid podcast, and produces a number of news stories, original features, one-of-a-kind videos. With his passionate argumentative style, controversial opinions, harsh delivery, and dedication to brutal honesty Sterling is a name that you can't help but recognize.
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Contest:
6:00 AM on 10.14.2009
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im against picketing... but i dont know how to show it - MH
Answer: Not if you give the boycott up before the product is released because you realize you really want the product.
*cough* Wow, still can do the Ultracon...
Jim, first you make fun of them for not wanting to buy the game, now you're shitting on them for wanting to play the game?
Oh, I'm not shitting on them. I am just being smug because I knew they'd do this. They tried to trash a game that they knew nothing about, and claim that content wasn't coming to L4D1, which it totally was.
Their boycott was fucking stupid, based around things they had decided was happening, not things that were *actually* happening. That's why this is so funny. They've also refused to admit they were wrong, instead trying to claim they've scored some sort of victory so are gracefully withdrawing, rather than admit, "Yeah, we jumped the gun, and we want to play the game."
That deserves fun-poking.
Still, the 'boycott' (can we seriously laugh at the boycotting a non-released product thing yet?) probably got those 'leaders' a nice 30 second blurb in video game history.
Therefore, haven't the boycotters done us all a favour? Of course they were always going to buy the game, but the point is they made their voices HEARD by the game developer and DIRECTLY INFLUENCED how they handled DLC for the game around which the boycott community was based.
Anyone who doesn't understand how that is a good thing for everyone is a dumbass, frankly. When gamers can communicate directly with the devs, you know this is a great industry to be involved in. Try boycotting a Hollywood remake and see what the fuck happens...
I don't think that's likely. This was a strike of lightening. I doubt something this absurd would fly with Valve again, nor would any other company have played along with this silliness in the first place. Not in the same way, at least. Valve's a good sport, and apparently staffed with genius marketers/PR.
Sorry but thats absolute tosh. All the boycotters did was throw their toys out of the pram about issues they knew nothing about, divided a community and made half of it look like children.
No way. Jim is always right even if it's his opinion.
Yea... didn't think so. Buy games on what they are and not what they are "going to be" and you won't find yourself hating the fact that an awesome developer is making a sequel to a great game.
Just wait everyone, if this is true, we're in store for 4 more sequals
You're right, I don't make DLC, at all in fact. So I have no idea what developer policy in on these things. But the fact that Valve were willing to fly people to their studio to show them the quality of the sequel, and the way in which the DLC was announced directly after the boycott, plus the continuing claims that the first game will be supported, SHOW CLEARLY that Valve took the boycott seriously.
What I think this whole episode has shown is that a) Valve are a great company for having responded to consumer criticism with such earnestness and willingness to placate theis fans, and b) that to some degree, videogames are a democratic marketplace.
Whatever you think of the boycott, these are good things to know. In a generation where we're all too fucking apathetic to raise our voices, I think that, right or wrong, this boycott has at least shown that gamers have some spine. Even if we are whinging little bitches sometimes.
And for fucks sake, it doesn't take a genius to realise that one year is a very quick turnaround for a worthwhile sequel to a good game...
There's a certain consideration when it's a multiplayer only game. I mean if it was a single player focussed game you could crank out sequels bi-yearly and I don't think much of anyone would be upset.
On the multiplayer only side for example: Battlefield 2 came out a little over a year after Battlefield Vietnam and BF: Vietnam literally died (from hundreds of servers to about 3) when Battlefield 2 hit the shelves. Even now you can barely find 1 playable server on BF:V versus the hundreds on Battlefield 2. Additionally there's an inverted argument to be made how a year after BF2 came out BF2142 debuted and while it enjoyed some traffic it has now been reduced to only 10 active servers.
Additionally this echos Digital Extreme's little scuffle with the whole UT2003 & UT2004 thing in which one product a year after completely and totally invalidated the prior year's release and there was much gnashing of teeth until a coupon deal was spouted for adopters of 2003.
I'm not saying L4D2 will be bad because I'm confident it will be excellent nor am I boycotting L4D2 as I eventually anticipate purchasing it. However it does concern me when much of the features of L4D2 are touted as observed fixes to L4D1 such as corner camping, mecha-shiva'ing, backtracking to prevent tank spawns and level rushing but not going back to fix said things in the originally observed 'broken' product.
It also concerns me that as a PC gamer I am informed everything under the sun that made L4D1 unique and what it is, is importable to L4D2 which feels like an invalidation of my purchase and gives me buyer's remorse. Had I known sooner about a proposed sequel that had these abilities I would have held off my purchase of L4D1 for L4D2. Especially since the announcement of L4D2 came only a few months after my purchase of L4D1.
I am NOT saying that they can't do a sequel and I am NOT saying they can't do a sequel this soon. What I am saying is that it's rather underhanded to do the two aforementioned things with no consideration with owners of the first L4D.
I will not regret purchasing L4D2 but it has made me regret purchasing L4D1.
This just goes to show that you can preach and whine and moan, but in the end the addiction will always win out.
Noobs.
The boycott may have pushed valve's hand to ANNOUNCE the DLC, but this stuff doesn't have that quick of a development turnaround. There's little chance they saw a group of whining "boycotters" and decided "Oh crap, we better make some DLC for them!" More likely, they'd already been working on it, and they just made Valve rethink on when to announce this stuff.
Not trying to troll you, but if I continue to enjoy the any forth coming sequels of L4D as much as the first, I'll happily buy them.
I know its trendy to hate on sequels, but a good game is a good game. I'd rather play a good sequel than an original piece of shit.
If such tactics are good enough for the latest sports/music game or SFIV game, then why not Left 4 Dead 2? Its in the nature of 21 century gaming, with DLC or physical dvds as options if necessary. Don't like it, don't buy it.
Well, doesn't matter now, as it's all finally over.
Don't you think it's a little sad that we(excluding me, I think the boycott is idiotic) raised our voice because of A FREAKING SEQUEL TO A POPULAR GAME, when we could have raised it for more important issues like the continuing price of development cost that in turn raise the cost of the games, the attacks against the medium, censorship in australia and germany. No, you fucking raised you voice because you didn't want to pay for another game when NOTHING forces you to buy it. It just proved you can get together 40,000 people with screwed priorities on a group. *clap clap clap* How amazing.
That made me laugh, but it was also absolutely true. What a ridiculously horrible cause this boycott had, and it honestly doesn't prove that gamers are capable of a single thing beyond their own selfishness.
It would appear that they infact did the opposite to standing up for their beliefs, seeing as they folded after Valve threw them a carrot.
It would appear that they infact did the opposite to standing up for their beliefs, seeing as they folded after Valve threw them a carrot.