Left 4 Dead 2 is exactly like the original Left 4 Dead and should have just been a patch! Oh wait, it's not. The five maps, four characters, new weapons, new director and new zombies look pretty substantial to me, and here's a few more extras, as found in GameSpy's Left 4 Dead 2 preview.
First up is a brand new special infected, known as The Spitter. As you might have guessed, The Spitter provides its infected brethren with a bit of firepower, able to spew up area-of-effect damage from its mouth. Speaking of infected, the hazmat suit guy we all saw at E3 was the first of what Valve are calling the "common uncommons." These are infected that have unique traits, but aren't special infected, and each chapter will have its own type.
The swamp level previewed had a brand new "uncommon," known as a "mud man." These are crawling zombies that skitter speedily along the swamp floor on all-fours. It is said that these uncommon infected really help to change the way each chapter is played, requiring extra vigilance from players. Mud men sound creepy, for sure.
Apparently, health packs and pills have been entirely replaced by adrenaline shots and ammo packs. The former provides a speed boost to players and allows them to indefinitely abuse melee attacks, at least until it wears off. If these items truly do replace health, this could be one difficult game. We'll have to see.
Destructoid itself shall be taking a closer look at Left 4 Dead 2 at the end of the month. Stay tuned for our own discoveries soon!
Contest:
10:20 AM on 07.21.2009
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Maybe from this build throughout they took it away? I hope not.
I'm assuming you can't carry all of these things at once, which would leave you to pick and choose. Do you want more ammo, or a health boost. Do you want adrenaline to boost your combat ability or a health pack to help keep you alive?
Of course, if they don't put the health packs and pills in, there goes that strategic element I just envisioned. It'll still be interesting to play through Left4Dead2 with a new style of gameplay.
Now that thats out of the way, I would hope they don't remove health packs and pills and make these alternatives, would create a huge strategic element as said above. The uncommons are a great addition as well, give the levels more of a unique feel other than "Same Zombies, New Background". Was gonna wait for a price drop on this game, but am more and more considering getting it on opening day.
I second your motion for more L4D.
I like the idea of the Spitter but I do not see it as a stand alone infected character. What I mean is it would be dangerous when complementing another infected character. Boomer+Spitter combo sounds deadly.
The spitter must be another one of those "Preventing the crouched-in-a-corner meleeing and shooting everything" scenarios. I'm liking what I'm seeing.
If I have this right:
1) Primary firearm/Melee Weapon (~10 guns, 5 melee weapons)
2) Sidearm (1 or 2 of 2? type of pistol)
3) Throwable (Molotov/Pipe bomb/unannounced stuff)
4) Survival (Medkit/Ammokit)
5) Consumable (Pills/Adrenaline)
e) Carriable (gas/propane/oxygen)
And you can only have one of each thing of the 5 options.
More variety in what you're carrying means more decisions of what to take and what to leave behind. You may even prepare perfectly for one situation and have the wrong stuff for another.
Also: Ammo Kits likely means in-level ammo piles are gone imo.
For example: In the more urban type levels you get the good ol' (Boomer, Smoker, Hunter) trio, whereas the swamp level has some variations, such as the Spitter (which I misread as Splitter 5 times) replacing the boomer.
I'm not claiming that this would be a better choice, in fact having around 5-7 Special Infected to choose from on any given level would add a lot of variation to gameplay and a bucket load of new tactics to master around the new levels, however, a Boomer-Spitter combo sounds devastatingly lethal and potentially game ending for the opposing team.
The game looks awesome and I cannot fucking wait for the release., hopefully some variable skins come out for the special infected, as much as I adored the original character designs, there's only a limited amount of black hoodies and duct tape available around in the zombie infested swamps New Orleans.
I think we're getting two more variants, one of the Hunter, and one of the Smoker.
any ideas for potential names? I could see a hunter variant being named The Stalker, for one, no ideas on a smoker one though.
thank you for sharingugg outlet.