haxxiy

User Score
8.0

Presentation - 8.0
Gameplay - 9.0
Value - 7.0

First of all -- before we can proceed with this review -- I must confess I've never been a big fan of Valve. The half-life series were quite nice games, of course, but still they are... not so hot to me, so to speak. To me, mind you. With Left 4 Dead things are different though. Could the parents of the Half-life series, hailed by many as the ultimate first person shooters, succeed to deliver a fun casual, zombie-killing based kind of game? Well, after the many hours I've played, I can say with sure: hell the fuck yes, man.

The game recommends you to have mastered the single player mode before trying to play online with your friends. Take a look -- there's only four campaings to be played, and overall you will know evertyhing the game has to offer you on the single player mode in about 4 hours or so. Plus you have only four characters to choose -- a hot brunette, Zoey, a cool-looking old man, Bill, a dude who seems hate everything, Francis, and a dark-skinned man with a funny voice, Louis. They are nice, yes, but still they are four. And there is no option to create a custom character, and no level editors, meaning you have to download some mods right here if you are tired of the same four campaigns and the small maps of the survival mode. Not that good, to be honest.

Left 4 Dead is based on the Source engine, originally created for use on Half-Life 2 back on 2004. Graphically, Left 4 Dead lacks many of the visual effects considered standard nowadays, like HDR lighting for example. Thus, the game lags behind other titles released on the same timeframe like Far Cry 2 and Fallout 3. There is some motion blur effects and depth of field at higher shader settings, but that's on. The bright side is that you don't need a beefy system to play the game. I've seen the game playing on the max settings at a 7600 GT PC, at 960x600... not the best resolution, but you get the deal.

Overall Valve managed to deliver a solid gaming experience, solid enough to please the large casual crowd and even the hardcore folks willing a fun but simple game to expend some time on.

Presentation - 8.0

Gameplay - 9.0

Value - 7.0

Overall - 8.0