'Left 4 Dead 2' video game review

(Credit: Microsoft/Game Press)

Developer: Valve (“Half-Life 2”)
Publisher: Valve/EA Games
Available On: Xbox 360, PC
Reviewed On: Xbox 360

While many games these days have online multiplayer, be it competitive or co-operative, these modes often feel tacked on. But last year's first-person horror shooter “Left 4 Dead”—imagine a puzzle-free, trigger-happy “Resident Evil”—had the opposite problem: it had great multiplayer, but it was the single player options that seem tacked on.

Thankfully, that's not a problem in this, the sequel. Well, not as much of a problem, anyway.

For the most part, this version plays the same as last year's model. In the campaign mode, you're a survivor of a “48 Weeks Later”-esque zombie apocalypse, complete with fast-moving zombies, trying to get somewhere you can be rescued. This is made relatively easier by the fact that you're accompanied by three teammates—who can be computer controlled, though it works better with three friends—who work together to survive: sharing health, assisting allies who've been grabbed, etc.

Where this sequel differs, however, is not just that it has new characters and new scenarios. There are even new kinds of infected and guns. There are now missions set during the day, as well as side objectives within the scenarios other than survival, such as grabbing soda at the supermarket for a checkpoint guard.

But the biggest addition is that you can now use such melee weapons as axes, chainsaws and even frying pans. Though you'll still want to shoot things on occasion since there are also new types of ammo for the guns, such as incendiary or explosive rounds.

The game also features a couple competitive variations on the aforementioned campaign mode. Besides “Survival,” where you have to hold your ground while surviving a never-ending waves of infected, there's “Versus,” which plays like the campaign except with an opposing team playing as the infected trying to stop you. Well, until you switch sides and become the infected yourself.

Oh, and for those who thought the original was too easy, even on Expert, you can now employ the “Realism” option, available for any mode and any skill level, which removes such video game conventions as the highlights that indicate where your teammates and ammo supplies are, which makes them more difficult to find.

While “Left 4 Dead 2” is fun no matter how you play it—and yes, that includes on your own—it's not without its problems. If you're a first-person shooter veteran, especially one coming off marathons of “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2,” you might find it aggravating that you can't look down the barrel of your gun for more accurate aiming.

They also don't always make it apparent where you're supposed to go. Which makes sense—if you were running from a horde of zombies, you might not always know where to go either—but we still wish someone had brought a map.

The story could also still use some serious fleshing out, though this game does a much better job than the original courtesy of some narrative-driven dialog. Still, it would be nice to know what started this whole thing, especially since it seems like the characters in the game know, they're just not telling us.

Bottom Line: For zombie-hating first-person shooter fans who didn't play the original, or played it to (un)death, “Left 4 Dead 2” has more than enough new life to revive your interest.

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