Left 4 Dead Gives Crash Course in Zombie Survival

Left 4 Dead gets brand-new DLC and it's just another map or lesser detail like most DLCs. Valve lives up to its promise to continue to take care of the L4D community and releases Crash Course as a downloadable content. With just over a month away from Left 4 Dead 2's launch, the first game still gets enough attention to receive a single player campaign. The DLC will feature new Achievements, dialogue and locations and will pick up the story were the last campaign, No Mercy, left it. Crash Course is also available in the Survival and Versus modes so it offers plenty for everyone.

The DLC is available for the PC and Xbox 360 but they’re not exactly the same thing. The difference comes with the price tag. If the PC version respects the tradition of all other downloadable content of L4D and is free, the Xbox 360 version isn't. It's priced at 560 Microsoft Points or $7. It may be true that this DLC is big enough to be ranked as an expansion pack, but it's still unfortunate that Valve wasn't allowed to release it for free.

Left 4 Dead is a survival zombie shooter that makes use of the Half Life 2 engine and focuses on team play. Four available characters are available for gamers to take control of. Francis, a tattoo-covered biker with a chip on his shoulder, Bill, a former Green Beret and a Vietnam veteran, Zoey, a college student and horror movie fan, and Louis, cowardly junior system analyst. The weapon arsenal isn't vast, with just six different fire arms, two explosive-typed and healing items. The game's character as well as its setting are meant to instill a sense of realism.

Zombies aren't the lumbering jokes of the older movies, but seem to be inspired more from 28 Days Later or Dawn of the Dead. Founder of Turtle Rock Studios and creator of Left 4 Dead, Mike Booth, wanted to create that believable zombie outbreak scenario. “Even though we obviously pushed well beyond the realm of believability with many of our "boss" infected, the core idea of a mind-destroying, civilization-collapsing pathogen is more horrifying to me than magically animated corpses, precisely because it is plausible. Rabies is a good example of a pathogen that can turn a loyal, friendly, protective family pet into a slavering attack machine. It's a virus that reprograms the behaviors of a complex animal – a mammal, in fact. What if something similar happened to humans? Left 4 Dead is one possible answer.”