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The Official Left 4 Dead Thread

okay i need to clear something up: i have NOT played the game on expert. But that's not really the point that's killing it for me. its not the amount of damage the enemies inflict; That's just a variable, easily adjusted with a higher difficulty setting. What i mean is the way getting attacked is translated onscreen. There's no chaos, no sense of impact. I truly miss that "shaky cam" feeling of complete chaos as you're swarmed. My solution: when you're surrounded by a certain set of zombies you get autokilled in a gruesome sequence. no reviving. You need to have the feeling that your 3 partners are ALL THAT'S KEEPING YOU ALIVE. You need to cherish them. As off now i don't give a crap about my team. Sure i respond to pleas for health and support, but i care for blowing off faces in style more. I really miss the sense of being completely dependable of your partners.
Secondly, the indicators for taking damage need to scream "OOH SHIT GET EM OFF MEEE!!!". Shaking cam, bloody decals, and a loss of sight and sound that progresses as the damage accumulates.

At ease boys, to be honest, the problem lies with my expectations of the game, not the execution. Its a solid shooter, and does alot of things right. Its just that to me VALVE should've put more emphasis on the emotional state of the player; It gets so close to being the perfect zombie game, but skimps the one thing that, in my opinion, is essential to a frightening zombie experience: you and your buddies are the only survivors. Its litterally you against the world. no second tries, no fuck ups. oh well, i still applaud valve for making an almost perfect zombie game ;)
 
le.phat said:
okay i need to clear something up: i have NOT played the game on expert. But that's not really the point that's killing it for me. its not the amount of damage the enemies inflict; That's just a variable, easily adjusted with a higher difficulty setting. What i mean is the way getting attacked is translated onscreen. There's no chaos, no sense of impact. I truly miss that "shaky cam" feeling of complete chaos as you're swarmed. My solution: when you're surrounded by a certain set of zombies you get autokilled in a gruesome sequence. no reviving. You need to have the feeling that your 3 partners are ALL THAT'S KEEPING YOU ALIVE. You need to cherish them. As off now i don't give a crap about my team. Sure i respond to pleas for health and support, but i care for blowing off faces in style more. I really miss the sense of being completely dependable of your partners.
Secondly, the indicators for taking damage need to scream "OOH SHIT GET EM OFF MEEE!!!". Shaking cam, bloody decals, and a loss of sight and sound that progresses as the damage accumulates.
Click to expand...

Err...you do realise that the screen darkens when the damage starts to add up, as well as the motion blur takes over the screen, and the film grain. Your accuracy decreases a ton as well.

Oh...there is a huge jump in difficulty from whatever low level you are playing on, to expert. A normal swarm with no bosses will down you in seconds. A smoker plus a swarm will kill you in seconds.
 
le.phat said:
okay i need to clear something up: i have NOT played the game on expert. But that's not really the point that's killing it for me. its not the amount of damage the enemies inflict; That's just a variable, easily adjusted with a higher difficulty setting. What i mean is the way getting attacked is translated onscreen. There's no chaos, no sense of impact. I truly miss that "shaky cam" feeling of complete chaos as you're swarmed. My solution: when you're surrounded by a certain set of zombies you get autokilled in a gruesome sequence. no reviving. You need to have the feeling that your 3 partners are ALL THAT'S KEEPING YOU ALIVE. You need to cherish them. As off now i don't give a crap about my team. Sure i respond to pleas for health and support, but i care for blowing off faces in style more. I really miss the sense of being completely dependable of your partners.
Secondly, the indicators for taking damage need to scream "OOH SHIT GET EM OFF MEEE!!!". Shaking cam, bloody decals, and a loss of sight and sound that progresses as the damage accumulates.
Click to expand...

How do zombies in real life kill in a gruesome manner?
 
le.phat said:
okay i need to clear something up: i have NOT played the game on expert. But that's not really the point that's killing it for me. its not the amount of damage the enemies inflict; That's just a variable, easily adjusted with a higher difficulty setting. What i mean is the way getting attacked is translated onscreen. There's no chaos, no sense of impact. I truly miss that "shaky cam" feeling of complete chaos as you're swarmed. My solution: when you're surrounded by a certain set of zombies you get autokilled in a gruesome sequence. no reviving. You need to have the feeling that your 3 partners are ALL THAT'S KEEPING YOU ALIVE. You need to cherish them. As off now i don't give a crap about my team. Sure i respond to pleas for health and support, but i care for blowing off faces in style more. I really miss the sense of being completely dependable of your partners.
Secondly, the indicators for taking damage need to scream "OOH SHIT GET EM OFF MEEE!!!". Shaking cam, bloody decals, and a loss of sight and sound that progresses as the damage accumulates.
Click to expand...

Play it on expert with 3 other people fool. Make sure there server is expert when you get in too.
 
I wouldn't mind a hardcore mode where you only have a limited number of lives to get through the entire campaign, making saving your partners and healing them a lot more important.

One of the cheapest things in this game are people intentionally dying and then everyone waiting by a respawn closet so they can come back with 50 health. I wish the director could pick up on this behavior and send some swarms + boss infected more frequently while you wait... then again that might actually make this tactic acceptable. You're short on manpower and have to hold the area for a few minutes...
 
As stated, you get taken out very quick in expert if you don't have a good team.

And it sounds like you're wanting survival horror, where I would classify L4D as horror action. Oh well, if it ain't your cup o' tea, don't bother with it.
 
wayward, you do get only a limited number of lives. You get 3 downs/lives, if im not mistaken. So people that intentionally die are wasting a down/life. Im not sure if this carries over the whole campaign. If it does, it would make expert mode not so easy ;p.
 
le.phat said:
okay i need to clear something up: i have NOT played the game on expert. But that's not really the point that's killing it for me. its not the amount of damage the enemies inflict; That's just a variable, easily adjusted with a higher difficulty setting. What i mean is the way getting attacked is translated onscreen. There's no chaos, no sense of impact. I truly miss that "shaky cam" feeling of complete chaos as you're swarmed. My solution: when you're surrounded by a certain set of zombies you get autokilled in a gruesome sequence. no reviving. You need to have the feeling that your 3 partners are ALL THAT'S KEEPING YOU ALIVE. You need to cherish them. As off now i don't give a crap about my team. Sure i respond to pleas for health and support, but i care for blowing off faces in style more. I really miss the sense of being completely dependable of your partners.
Secondly, the indicators for taking damage need to scream "OOH SHIT GET EM OFF MEEE!!!". Shaking cam, bloody decals, and a loss of sight and sound that progresses as the damage accumulates.

At ease boys, to be honest, the problem lies with my expectations of the game, not the execution. Its a solid shooter, and does alot of things right. Its just that to me VALVE should've put more emphasis on the emotional state of the player; It gets so close to being the perfect zombie game, but skimps the one thing that, in my opinion, is essential to a frightening zombie experience: you and your buddies are the only survivors. Its litterally you against the world. no second tries, no fuck ups. oh well, i still applaud valve for making an almost perfect zombie game ;)
Click to expand...

I'm not gonna comment about playing the game on expert, but are you playing on PC? Do you have a capable rig? If so, turn the film filter to max. There's chaos out the wazoo with that. Granted, I played that way my first time (and turned it down afterward) and it may have colored things, but it's got a stylized chaos that will confuse the heck out of you.
 
McBacon said:
l4desktop.jpg
Click to expand...

zomg post!
 
le.phat said:
after playing through the demo 4 times i've decided not to pick this game up. Before i elaborate on why i'd like to point out that the AI director feature is very nice, and is a feature i'd love to see in much more games in the future, and i'm not talking just FPS's either. Give credit where credit's due.

THAT BEING SAID, the one thing that's totally KILLING the experience for me is the fact that your character is one tough ballbreaking, ironclad mofo, waving off zombies like a pack of flies. As the zombies run at you the first time you play there is a sense of panic, adrenalin rushing through my fingers as i frantically tried to blast a path through the hordes. But once you get swarmed, hardly anything happens. The zombies attack you from all directions, but all that gives this away are the red arrows swarming the HUD. The camera stays stable, giving me all the time to slowly reload my guns, patch up some teammembers, and make me a cup of hot choco, all while the zombies try to love nibble me to death. There's no sense of impact, no sense of damage, and really, no sense of danger. With all the energy these zombies come at you, you'd expect the minute you get swarmed you should get fucking torn to pieces by those zombies. Instead they nibble at your heels, waiting for a face full of hot lead. The experience is broken, and i'm left unfullfilled. I'm sorry valve, without my happy ending you won't see any of my greens.
Click to expand...

Well, then you're just gonna have to go back to getting all the ladies. You write like a guy that just swims in ass 24/7.
 
4850 is 199.99 with 20% off at circuit city if its closing near you. i think i might jump on it. its only 512mb but im currently running an x800xt 256 from 4 years ago and its running almost everything on high at 1024 but i either play in 720p on my tv or 1280 x 1024 both o of which i had to turn down a little bit to keep it playable.
 
le.phat said:
What i mean is the way getting attacked is translated onscreen. There's no chaos, no sense of impact. I truly miss that "shaky cam" feeling of complete chaos as you're swarmed. My solution: when you're surrounded by a certain set of zombies you get autokilled in a gruesome sequence. no reviving. You need to have the feeling that your 3 partners are ALL THAT'S KEEPING YOU ALIVE.
Click to expand...
An attack from the 'boss' zombies is usually a death sentence without help from your partners. I also find that being swarmed by the grunt zombies is disorienting in and of itself. If the grunts were able to destroy your aim and vision any farther the game would quickly tip over from challenging to frustrating, because those kinds of attacks are very common. They can do a better job on the sound effects though. Attacking fast zombies need to be LOUD. 28 weeks got that part perfect (I was literally shaking from stress by the end of the film).

Of course, I'm sure there will be a hardcore mode added shortly after release for those that feel they mastered the game. No health packs, downed characters bleed out, motion blur after getting attacked, etc.
 
oneHeero said:
Local offline MP?

Thinking of grabbing that CC deal(black friday) And my interest grew with talk of the AI stuff. Should be fun although non of the videos have interested me. I always go to a friends and we smoke and chill and like to play co op games and I can see this being a blast so much. We just started R1 on easy co-op(so we can beat it quick) and had a intense time.

I'm thinking of just asking for the 360 deal for xmas lol.
Click to expand...
Dude do it, i'm on acid right now and I had a FUCKING AMAZING expereince with it on steam with some friends. Holy shit. Dunno if you'll get same experiences with weed. omgomgomg
 
Meh, looks like I was wrong. You practically get unlimited respawns if you die, and then resets on the next map. As long as there is a respawn point that particular character hasn't used yet, you can respawn in it.

So yeah, it might be a little design flaw. It makes people do cheap stuff like not caring if you die and then just wait around for someone to spawn with little threat. And yeah, less incentive to actually heal and revive other people knowing this.

I hope too that there is a harder mode with limited lives for the entire campaign so people don't do stuff like intentionally taking one for the team with a witch to just get it over with if she happens to be in the way.
 
Gart said:
Meh, looks like I was wrong. You practically get unlimited respawns if you die, and then resets on the next map. As long as there is a respawn point that particular character hasn't used yet, you can respawn in it.

So yeah, it might be a little design flaw. It makes people do cheap stuff like not caring if you die and then just wait around for someone to spawn with little threat. And yeah, less incentive to actually heal and revive other people knowing this.

I hope too that there is a harder mode with limited lives for the entire campaign so people don't do stuff like intentionally taking one for the team with a witch to just get it over with if she happens to be in the way.
Click to expand...

i would rather have a time limit. like a the helicopter announces a time that you have to be at the hospital. so if you fuck up you can only wait around for one survivor at most. Should be something you can turn on and off of course.
 
Gart said:
Meh, looks like I was wrong. You practically get unlimited respawns if you die, and then resets on the next map. As long as there is a respawn point that particular character hasn't used yet, you can respawn in it.

So yeah, it might be a little design flaw. It makes people do cheap stuff like not caring if you die and then just wait around for someone to spawn with little threat. And yeah, less incentive to actually heal and revive other people knowing this.
Click to expand...

You can do that, but the director doesn't take kindly to people standing around.
 
Gart said:
Meh, looks like I was wrong. You practically get unlimited respawns if you die, and then resets on the next map. As long as there is a respawn point that particular character hasn't used yet, you can respawn in it.

So yeah, it might be a little design flaw. It makes people do cheap stuff like not caring if you die and then just wait around for someone to spawn with little threat. And yeah, less incentive to actually heal and revive other people knowing this.

I hope too that there is a harder mode with limited lives for the entire campaign so people don't do stuff like intentionally taking one for the team with a witch to just get it over with if she happens to be in the way.
Click to expand...
later maps in each campaign are *significantly* longer. this means the only place you get respawns is rescuing survivors.

also director tends to murder you for sitting around vs. ai, and in versus the respawn timers will eventually force a tank or a nasty combo.
 
Gart said:
Meh, looks like I was wrong. You practically get unlimited respawns if you die, and then resets on the next map. As long as there is a respawn point that particular character hasn't used yet, you can respawn in it.

So yeah, it might be a little design flaw. It makes people do cheap stuff like not caring if you die and then just wait around for someone to spawn with little threat. And yeah, less incentive to actually heal and revive other people knowing this.

I hope too that there is a harder mode with limited lives for the entire campaign so people don't do stuff like intentionally taking one for the team with a witch to just get it over with if she happens to be in the way.
Click to expand...

Well they didn't want others player to leave a game or go afk after they die. Many people hate to wait out a round in Counterstrike and some people even complain about 20 seconds of waiting in TF2. So yeah, handing out a game over to a single player was more or less a no go.
So it makes the experience a bit easier, but it was more or less a necessary design decision.
 
This game scared the shit out of me. We had just exited the safe room in the subway level, and right after we went down the first set of stairs, there was a tank waiting on us. I turned the corner and yelled HOLY SHIT loud as hell, as I walked right into it. It was just standing there, waiting... o.o
 
I must have gotten incredibly lucky with my very first game; expert mode, three other good players with mics. One dude was a tester or a developer or something, because he got us through the demo multiple times like a goddamn SWAT team, it was awesome.

After that, it's hilarious to play with other folks--people who I know are very good at other online FPS'--on lower difficulties and just watch a play through go to absolute hell because there's no team work or cooperation.

"oh god, witch off to the right, lights off, let's go this way."
...HAS STARTLED THE WITCH, DWEET DWEET DWEET
"or we could just shoot her, whatever."

"alright, save your nades for the mobs and keep an ear open for the sound cue."
HEY LOOK A GROUP OF MORE THAN FIVE ZOMBIES LET'S TOSS MULTIPLE PIPE BOMBS AT THEM
 
Guled said:
how do you do it?
Click to expand...
Enable your console in the options.
Open console (hit the ~ key)
command: thirdpersonshoulder

Originally Posted by LEETSEPEAK:
Also, the crosshair is a bit to the left of where you'll be hitting.
Fix:
cam_idealyaw 1 or -1, whatever you like
Click to expand...

oh, and one more thing, you can't hear the shotgun proper in thirdpersonshoulder
 
Okay I see the pros and cons of the choices made. I'll be interesting to see how this plays out in vs mode.

I hope there's interesting map scenarios too. Most the videos I've seen haven't really shown anything aside from crescendo style hold outs. Maybe something like objectives, where players are forced to split into pairs for a moment. Oh yeah, I think someone mentioned a hold out scene when everyone was in total darkness in that game. Things like that; interesting scenarios based on objectives and/or dynamic changes to the map and use of props. If not, then hopefully the mod community will do some cool stuff.
 
Servizio said:
I must have gotten incredibly lucky with my very first game; expert mode, three other good players with mics. One dude was a tester or a developer or something, because he got us through the demo multiple times like a goddamn SWAT team, it was awesome.

After that, it's hilarious to play with other folks--people who I know are very good at other online FPS'--on lower difficulties and just watch a play through go to absolute hell because there's no team work or cooperation.

"oh god, witch off to the right, lights off, let's go this way."
...HAS STARTLED THE WITCH, DWEET DWEET DWEET
"or we could just shoot her, whatever."

"alright, save your nades for the mobs and keep an ear open for the sound cue."
HEY LOOK A GROUP OF MORE THAN FIVE ZOMBIES LET'S TOSS MULTIPLE PIPE BOMBS AT THEM
Click to expand...
More like,
"Get ready! I'll pull the switch. Let me just get this gas can in front of the door fir--
Oh, god. Why? Why did you throw a cocktail at me? I hadn't even pulled the switch yet"

*another teammate runs into the flames in an attempt to save you*
*half the team dies*
*The remaining half is pounced by a hunter and snagged by a smoker*
*With his last chance, to kill the smoker and save himself, he throws a cocktail, killing both the smoker and himself*

YOU ARE DEAD.
 
Oldschoolgamer said:
This game scared the shit out of me. We had just exited the safe room in the subway level, and right after we went down the first set of stairs, there was a tank waiting on us. I turned the corner and yelled HOLY SHIT loud as hell, as I walked right into it. It was just standing there, waiting... o.o
Click to expand...
:lol That session was so much fun.
 
Wow! Demo is beefy for this game.. 1.2 Gigs. It'll be at least 2 hours on my 1.5M DSL connection. Curious to play it though. Sucks I can't play the SFII table while waiting... :(
 
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