A Chat With Chet / L4D1 and L4D2 cross-play

[Mess]

Gaming and technology website Bit-Tech.net recently had a chance to sit down and talk with L4D icon Chat Faliszek about the controversial Left 4 Dead 2. The interview raises some interesting information about melee weapons, weather effects, day/night systems and backstory.

BT: One of the new features is that the game is all set in daylight too --

CF: No, no. There’s just one campaign that’s all in daylight and it's just that that’s the one we’ve shown off so far. The rest of the campaigns are a mix of dark and light and each level is set at a different time to help create changes in the gameplay. The infected are more active during the day and you see some things differently in daylight, like the Witch will get up and wander around. There’s some other AI stuff that we’re not actually showing yet that’ll only happen too.

Do check out the full interview, it's a great read.

EDIT - Bit-Tech.net has posted another article, detailing how valve are investigating the possibility of crossplay between L4D1 and L4D2 players!

[no00dylan]

Another good interview to help clear up the confusion, thanks.

[Woe Kitten]

lol Doug got owned

[ghost12332]

Even the journalists don't want him to get grenades hahaha....

Good read though. I liked it.

[YokaI]

So basically they realized they made a mistake not making this a payed-for-expansion, so instead they make "crossplay" available, in other words making it so that people who payed for L4D1 could have just waited for L4D2 to get all of the same content and more just a year later...

If I were valve I would change ships and just say "L4D2 will now be an expansion to L4D1" seeing as the more they reveal the more I realize that L4D1 and L4D2 are not radically different enough to be considered a real sequel. I know this will create posts such as "omg you hate valve" but whatever, it's still ridiculous.

[source-maps]

So basically they realized they made a mistake not making this a payed-for-expansion, so instead they make "crossplay" available, in other words making it so that people who payed for L4D1 could have just waited for L4D2 to get all of the same content and more just a year later...

If I were valve I would change ships and just say "L4D2 will now be an expansion to L4D1" seeing as the more they reveal the more I realize that L4D1 and L4D2 are not radically different enough to be considered a real sequel. I know this will create posts such as "omg you hate valve" but whatever, it's still ridiculous.

why do you always have to be so negative about everything that has to do with l4d2?
they are trying to keep to community together via cross-play because thats one of the concerns the "l4d2 boycot group" has...
again valve is showing its listening to its customers and trying to make a better experience for all.
Btw haven't you heard there is a new dlc comming for l4d1?...

[Au-heppa]

So basically they realized they made a mistake not making this a payed-for-expansion, so instead they make "crossplay" available, in other words making it so that people who payed for L4D1 could have just waited for L4D2 to get all of the same content and more just a year later...

If I were valve I would change ships and just say "L4D2 will now be an expansion to L4D1" seeing as the more they reveal the more I realize that L4D1 and L4D2 are not radically different enough to be considered a real sequel. I know this will create posts such as "omg you hate valve" but whatever, it's still ridiculous.

That doesn't make sense to me. You are saying that people who will buy L4D2 will somehow get the L4D1 for free, and you are against it? Then you go and suggest they should make L4D2 expansion which would force people to buy L4D1 if they want to play L4D2. How is that better?

[Blade Nd64]

Half-Life 2 was great. Why weren't the episodes expansions? Why did I have to pay for separate games? EP1 and EP2 were just more of the same, right? Why can't I play Half-Life 2 in Episode 2? It has a better engine. The release as separate games tore up the communities. Everyone abandoned Half-Life 2 for Episode 2.

I want to boycott EP3. I don't care how much fun or interesting it will be. It's going to cause all these problems with the communities. I don't want to pay for more of the same game. I demand free maps and chapters be added to Half-Life 2 instead.

This sucks. I hate my life.

Just kidding. L4D2 is going to be awesome. I won't mind paying full price. I've gotten more than my money's worth from L4D.

[YokaI]

Tell me one update to the engine that L4D2 provides... That's right, you can't. You are comparing the episodes (which is stupid, because it has been 1 year since the last left 4 dead and about 2 years since episode 2 was released) with a game that game that was originally sold for 3 times the price of episode 2 (if you count all of the other games you got with the orange box deal such as TF2 and Portal, both of which contains more content that l4d and have a larger re playability lifespan.) Half Life 2 was flawed because it had so many plot holes, missing pieces, and just dumbassary that they had to make the episodes, and all 3 combined are going to be the price of one 60 dollar game (or at least that is what we were promised, not sure if I can trust valve very much anymore.) Besides, the original idea for the episodes were better in the first place (rather than episodic content, releasing half life 2 : aftermath would have given us a whole package of material later but would have been better in the sense of story telling. Cliffhanger after cliffhanger gets old.) However, I wasn't angry with that because I got other games with each episode that made it worth the purchase.

L4D => L4D2 is hilarious, it looks like the same game. Oh great, new meele weapons, that took a few models, and a new tank / hunter hybrid that uses the same animations as the tank! Joyful. You're telling me that these couldn't have been added to l4d 1 with a 10 dollar purchase? You would rather want to play the likely 25 dollars for L4D2? The animations for the new weapons, especially the reloading animation, are choppy at best, and don't really look right compared to other valve quality games. Hell, I think I have seen better mod animations.

Whats even better is that L4D2 is going to be cheaper than L4D1 but will still have all of the content, so people who own l4d1 are going to have to pay 75 dollars for the full package while other get to pay a small 25 dollars. This is assuming that they publish L4D2 like they did L4D1 and don't avoid the hard copy. Maybe they will sell it for 10 dollars, but it's very unlikely. And if it is the same price as L4D1, then it even further fucks the old users into a situation where they don't get all of the content they were promised with the series.

So before you criticize my hatred toward this scheme of a sequel (which everyone is going to pay for, just as valve planned to pull it's ass out of the recession rather than making a good sequel that would be worth the money) please tell me what exactly this engine updates are GOING to be. The game is planned only a few months from now, so don't give me that "Well, they may be announced later" because that would be very unlikely at this stage of the PR.

Btw haven't you heard there is a new dlc comming for l4d1?...

Yes, but honestly it is underwhelming at best compared to what was expected from the game. I can just say surely that L4D2 doesn't have my purchase. And trust me, I don't really care too much whether or not I get l4d2 content or not because it looks bland and un-polished thus far, so really either way I don't care. However, if this continues to be the trend with valve products they definitely lost my business and certainly a few others with a critical eye when it comes to spending. Shit, I am not even able to buy a new game at this time anyway and I am not sure how many people really ARE ready to buy a whole new game.

[Zipfinator]

Alright I'm going to break down your post piece by piece and tell you why you're wrong...

Tell me one update to the engine that L4D2 provides...

New weather effects, new Director features and a new gib system. Those are just simple descriptions of what each of those features adds and all 3 of those added up into one update would be a huge amount for a DLC.

You are comparing the episodes (which is stupid, because it has been 1 year since the last left 4 dead and about 2 years since episode 2 was released) with a game that game that was originally sold for 3 times the price of episode 2 (if you count all of the other games you got with the orange box deal such as TF2 and Portal, both of which contains more content that l4d and have a larger re playability lifespan.) Half Life 2 was flawed because it had so many plot holes, missing pieces, and just dumbassary that they had to make the episodes, and all 3 combined are going to be the price of one 60 dollar game (or at least that is what we were promised, not sure if I can trust valve very much anymore.) Besides, the original idea for the episodes were better in the first place (rather than episodic content, releasing half life 2 : aftermath would have given us a whole package of material later but would have been better in the sense of story telling. Cliffhanger after cliffhanger gets old.) However, I wasn't angry with that because I got other games with each episode that made it worth the purchase.

That just completely made the last paragraph you typed useless... And why are you saying HL2 was bad when you've spent the last 5 years as a member of one of the largest Half-Life 2 communities. At least Valve is filling in more of the plot holes with the episodes and engine features than with a game 8 years later.

L4D => L4D2 is hilarious, it looks like the same game. Oh great, new meele weapons, that took a few models, and a new tank / hunter hybrid that uses the same animations as the tank! Joyful. You're telling me that these couldn't have been added to l4d 1 with a 10 dollar purchase? You would rather want to play the likely 25 dollars for L4D2? The animations for the new weapons, especially the reloading animation, are choppy at best, and don't really look right compared to other valve quality games. Hell, I think I have seen better mod animations.

Okay there are a ton of things wrong in this section. First of all Valve hasn't release all of the information on the game, in face they haven't released most of the information yet. You also haven't even seen all of what's been revealed. Valve has said in an interview that there are going to be at least 3 or 4 new special infected, the Charger is only one that's been announced yet. It's not fair to judge the game when you' don't even know all the information that's been released and Valve hasn't even announced half of it. Secondly you're complaining about the animations which are almost certainly placeholders. It was the same way with L4D 1, player models, sounds, animations and maps over the 4 months between the trailer and game release. Also if the game will be priced the $25 you guessed, that's not bad at all for the content they are adding. Most other companies would make you pay another 60 dollars for it. Take a look at Call of Duty 2 and Call of Duty 3.

Whats even better is that L4D2 is going to be cheaper than L4D1 but will still have all of the content, so people who own l4d1 are going to have to pay 75 dollars for the full package while other get to pay a small 25 dollars. This is assuming that they publish L4D2 like they did L4D1 and don't avoid the hard copy. Maybe they will sell it for 10 dollars, but it's very unlikely. And if it is the same price as L4D1, then it even further fucks the old users into a situation where they don't get all of the content they were promised with the series.

I'm sure that the crossplay will not do that. Valve doesn't have a record of cheating their customers out of money. And there are a lot of differences between the two games, people who only own L4D2 will have missed out on a lot of stuff. An example of this is the final stages are now gauntlets instead of the waiting for the helicopter and the addition of all the new special infected and weapons. They will have missed the simple gameplay which made L4D so much fun compared to the increasing complexity of L4D2 which isn't a bad thing.

So before you criticize my hatred toward this scheme of a sequel (which everyone is going to pay for, just as valve planned to pull it's ass out of the recession rather than making a good sequel that would be worth the money) please tell me what exactly this engine updates are GOING to be. The game is planned only a few months from now, so don't give me that "Well, they may be announced later" because that would be very unlikely at this stage of the PR.

Already answered those.

Yes, but honestly it is underwhelming at best compared to what was expected from the game. I can just say surely that L4D2 doesn't have my purchase. And trust me, I don't really care too much whether or not I get l4d2 content or not because it looks bland and un-polished thus far, so really either way I don't care. However, if this continues to be the trend with valve products they definitely lost my business and certainly a few others with a critical eye when it comes to spending. Shit, I am not even able to buy a new game at this time anyway and I am not sure how many people really ARE ready to buy a whole new game.

Not a big deal if you don't buy it, you're going to be the one missing out.

[no00dylan]

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