valve
December 14th, 2009 at 04:00pm
Under Xbox 360
Not content with unleashing a full-blown zombie apocalypse, Valve has come up with the second most socially awkward event imaginable: inviting characters from the original Left 4 Dead to hang out in the sequel’s first DLC campaign. Bill, Louis, Zoey and Francis will meet with the stars of Left 4 Dead 2 in “The Passing,” which Valve VP of marketing Doug Lombardi calls “the most important campaign in the Left 4 Dead story, as all the Survivors are being called together in one campaign.” It’s targeted for release in early 2010 on Xbox 360 and PC.
In addition to a co-op campaign (set in rural Georgia) and a new “co-operative challenge mode of play,” The Passing will offer new content for Survival, Versus and Scavenge modes. Playing as the L4D2 cast, you can also expect to encounter a new melee weapon, firearm and “uncommon common” zombie.
We can’t wait to meet up with last year’s survivors again … oh, assuming they really are still survivors.
Left 4 Dead 2 DLC ‘The Passing’ to feature L4D1 cast originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: dlc, fps, ld42, left-4-dead, left-4-dead-2, left-4-dead-2-the-passing, release-date, the-passing, valve
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2 DLC ‘The Passing’ to feature L4D1 cast
December 10th, 2009 at 03:00pm
Under Xbox 360
In its ongoing support of Left 4 Dead 2 on the PC, Valve has issued another patch for the game, fixing a number of problems including physics crashes and hit boxes on the Charger, Jockey and Spitter. Some of the exploits PC gamers have stumbled upon have also been eradicated, including incapped survivors improving their weapon accuracy by holding the crouch button — though we wouldn’t call that an exploit so much as a natural evolution in the face of the zombie threat. Good, old-fashioned human ingenuity is what will win us this war, people!
You can head past the break for the full patch notes. An update for the Xbox 360 will be available “later this month.”
Continue reading Left 4 Dead 2 patch on PC now, Xbox 360 ‘later this month’
Left 4 Dead 2 patch on PC now, Xbox 360 ‘later this month’ originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 10 Dec 2009 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2 patch on PC now, Xbox 360 ‘later this month’
Tags: fps, left-4-dead, left-4-dead-2, patch, steam, update, valve, zombies
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2 patch on PC now, Xbox 360 ‘later this month’
December 1st, 2009 at 02:00pm
Under Xbox 360
Valve apparently threw Boomer bile all over Left 4 Dead 2, because hordes of consumers gobbled up two million retail copies globally since its release a couple weeks ago. Valve won’t release the Steam digital distribution sales data, so that’s not included in the retail count. According to the developer, sales are currently double that of the original, with “Black Friday” helping to push copies into the hands of players (who now have their hands full with two Tanks, a Spitter, a Hunter, and a Jockey coming in for the kill).
Valve also noted that information about L4D2’s first batch of downloadable content would be coming very soon.
Left 4 Dead 2 sold 2 million at retail in 2 weeks originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: ea, fps, l4d2, left-4-dead-2, shooter, valve
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2 sold 2 million at retail in 2 weeks
November 26th, 2009 at 12:00pm
Under Xbox 360
What’s the only thing worse than having two dead team members, an approaching wave of special infected, and a fresh sheen of Boomer puke on your person? Having to suffer all those things while also — fighting — server la — tency issues. Fortunately, that experience has become less common, as Valve recently did a bit dusting around their network infrastructure, reducing lag during bouts of Left 4 Dead 2 on Xbox 360.
Of course, even without the lag, you’re still going to die. But at least now you’ll be able to see where it’s coming from. (Hint: It’s probably from those three oncoming tanks.)
Valve addresses Left 4 Dead 2 server lag on Xbox 360 originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: fps, lag, left-4-dead-2, server, update, valve, xbox-live, zombies
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Valve addresses Left 4 Dead 2 server lag on Xbox 360
November 26th, 2009 at 08:07am
Under PC
The Left 4 Dead team has posted on their blog to inform fans that they’ve done some behind-the-scenes infrastructure work to facilitate a better online play experience for Xbox 360 players of Left 4 Dead 2. From the post:
“We have upgraded our network infrastructure to better accommodate the huge response to L4D2. 360 players will now have lag-free servers. We’ve also added more dedicated servers.
”We will continue to monitor the situation and add resources as needed.
”Thank you for your patience. Now quit reading this, get out there and kill some zombies!”
Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2 servers upgraded, 360 version now “lag-free”
Tags: left4dead2, News, valve, xbox360
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2 servers upgraded, 360 version now “lag-free”
November 20th, 2009 at 04:00pm
Under Xbox 360
Considering the devilishly heightened difficulty of Left 4 Dead 2, we’re surprised enough outlets managed to complete a single campaign in time to submit a review for the title. We have to imagine GameSharks were somehow involved. Regardless, here’s what other sites are saying about Valve’s follow-up to last year’s Zombocalypse survival sim.
- Eurogamer (9/10): “Whereas once we treated Left 4 Dead as a stopgap between Half-Lifes, this is no longer a weird little side project with modest expectations, and Valve is confident enough to play around with it, safe in the knowledge that you can trust your players. Left 4 Dead proved it. And whereas that game had a personality, this one is overflowing with it.”
- IGN (9/10): “It remains one of the most distinctive co-operative titles out there, and allows for some of the most nerve-searing team-based multiplayer gaming on the market.”
- GameTrailers (8.7/10): “Though not an astounding improvement over the original, Left 4 Dead 2 successfully rekindles that magical zombie-hunting feeling with great new content, and a cool competitive multiplayer mode to boot.”
- Giant Bomb (4/5 Stars): “The core of Left 4 Dead may have lost some of its newness in the last 12 months, but the wealth of additions in this sequel ought to keep you blasting zombies and munching on brains for a good long while.”
Metareview: Left 4 Dead 2 originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: left-4-dead-2, metareview, valve
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Metareview: Left 4 Dead 2
November 20th, 2009 at 09:43am
Under Xbox 360
When Valve announced Left 4 Dead 2 during Microsoft’s E3 2009 press conference — less than seven months after the release of the award-winning original — gamers were, perhaps rightfully, shocked. This was the same Valve that spent nearly ten years iterating on Team Fortress 2 and whose experiment in episodic gaming has forced us to reevaluate our expectations for future installments of Half-Life 2 using the “Star Wars-definition” of episodic.
So when Valve announced a direct sequel to the ground-breaking Left 4 Dead on what could only be considered an accelerated schedule for normal developers (and an impossibly accelerated schedule for Valve) we had every right to be shocked. Valve answered this concern with assurances that Left 4 Dead 2 was an entirely new game, with changes that could not be simply grafted onto the original. And the team was right! … But that’s the problem.
Continue reading Review: Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360)
Review: Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360) originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:43:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: ea, electronic-arts, l4d2, left-4-dead-2, valve
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Review: Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360)
November 19th, 2009 at 08:30pm
Under Xbox 360
Zombie obliterators who’ve managed to survive Left 4 Dead 2’s “Dark Carnival” campaign are probably familiar with the Southern rock outfit known as the Midnight Riders. While they’re not exactly an enormous focus in the game’s overarching story, a teaser page featuring the heavily bearded band (and a cryptic “Coming Soon”) is leading some folks to believe that the Riders will soon play a much larger role in the game’s proceedings.
Given the number of facial hair-sporting members of the band (see: four), we’re really hoping to get some form of DLC that turns them into playable characters. Perhaps even a new campaign, in which they cure the global zombie infection using nothing but the power of their rock music. How about it, Valve?
Left 4 Dead 2’s Midnight Riders get a gloriously bearded teaser page originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: left-4-dead, left-4-dead-2, midnight-riders, rock, teaser, valve
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2’s Midnight Riders get a gloriously bearded teaser page
November 17th, 2009 at 05:32pm
Under Xbox 360
We’d usually say it’s a
good thing when a zombie invasion gets postponed, but not when we’re talking about
Left 4 Dead 2 releasing in the UK a couple days after the rest of the world. According to Valve’s own
L4D2 blog, “copies of the game are still arriving” across the pond, with assurances from the developer that it will “have everyone in the UK playing
Left 4 Dead 2 by Friday morning.” Wait —
everyone in the UK? Whoa now guys!
While Xbox 360 owners and PC gamers who still buy physical copies of software are out of luck, Valve says that everyone in the region who pre-ordered L4D2 via Steam can play it right now. Of course, those left waiting can pretend they’re fighting to survive the scariest of all Left 4 Dead campaigns: “Delay of Game” (tagline: “Patience never killed anyone — until now!”).
Left 4 Dead 2 delayed in UK, due ‘by Friday morning’ originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: delays, ea, ea-partners, electronic-arts, l4d2, left-4-dead, left-4-dead-2, release-date, uk, valve
By Mister-X
Continue Reading Left 4 Dead 2 delayed in UK, due ‘by Friday morning’
November 16th, 2009 at 06:30pm
Under Xbox 360
Thanks to Eric Ruth and his PixelForce NES “de-make” of Left 4 Dead, we now have an idea of what the zombie apocalypse simulator would have been like had it released in the ’80s. Valve is apparently aware of the project and finds the concept “hilarious.” Ruth reveals that he plans to release the full game as a free download in early January 2010 for PC. It features all the campaigns from the original game, including 8-bit incarnations of the special infected, for two players to play through — it is a NES game after all, fancy four-player wasn’t standard.
Check out a video of the game after the break. The only thing we’d wish this “de-make” had was a sprite flickering zombie rush, so all the youngins could experience the glory of NES flicker when there were too many things on the screen at once for the system’s 2KB of RAM.
Update 2: Check out Eric Ruth’s interview with sister site Big Download
Update: Changed “didn’t exist” to “wasn’t standard.” Nintendo released the NES Four Score adapter in 1990. Remember the one for the original Game Boy?
Continue reading 8-bit Left 4 Dead leaves modernity behind
8-bit Left 4 Dead leaves modernity behind originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: left-4-dead, left-4-dead-2, valve
By Mister-X
Continue Reading 8-bit Left 4 Dead leaves modernity behind
