Circuit Jerk

A game that I continually pined for over the past year arrived, and taught me a lesson in disappointment.

The game is good, don’t get me wrong, but the game is Left 4 Dead with a harder difficulty.

Essentially, Left 4 Dead was the demo, and Left 4 Dead 2 was the game Valve wanted to release. The thing is, I happen to love the demo. It was cute, and fun, and charming. It was the oldest child that grandma loves blindly. The one that grandpa slides an extra $20 during Christmas and says, “Don’t tell your younger brother.”

All the stuff we thought we wanted like more guns, more objectives, and more special infected seem to take away from the magic. I enjoy that the sniper rifle is functional, and that the grenade launcher creates a new character class. I like that there is some sort of loosely strung together story, but where’s the magic that kept me coming back to the first Left 4 Dead weekend after weekend.

I feel like its consistently on the cusp of pulling me in, but I’ve been able to leave it for Dragon Age and Modern Warfare 2, whereas last year not even Fallout 3 kept me from Left 4 Dead. I know, I’m asking for lightning to strike twice.

Valve did some interesting things with their formula. There are multiple paths to get to any objective. Some of these areas do a great job at turning you around. Consistantly running through the images in your brain, “Have I passed that building before?” becomes a mantra distracting you from the jockey sneaking up behind you.

The game is hard. Even on normal (second easiest out of four) you are brutally punished for jumping into the muggy, zombie infested, New Orleans.  It becomes less about what weapon you picked and more about how well you can hide behind the three other survivors and click your trigger.

There are actual objectives other survive on this one. Saying that, most of the objectives are small tweeks to the “push the button and an event happens” from the first one. Instead of a crazy guy ringing a church bell from a safe room, you are breaking into a grocery store to steal some soda.

This might sound like an aimless rant and in a way it sort of is. I started writing this article a week ago and just haven’t been able to complete it. I’m not convinced I love Left 4 Dead 2, but I definitely don’t hate it. With all my other fall games wrapping up, maybe it’ll come into its own.

Ok, so I guess I can’t blame Valve for not capturing me the same way. I can sort of see why there were all of these online nerd protests. I would’ve been angry if Episode 2 was released as a full fledged game. Left4 Dead 2 feels sort of like that. It really probably shouldn’t have been a full fledged $60 title. I’m not sure that Left 4 Dead 2 will completely convince me of its greatness, but I think its a necessary step to get to Left 4 Dead 3 which will be insanely good. Just think about how great that game is going to be…