Keep in mind this isn’t a review, nor will the length be incredible, its just my first impressions, after all. The new downloadable content for Left 4 Dead just went up, and being the zombie geek that I am, I downloaded it as soon as I could get my grubby mitts on the controller. With the new DLC, the game pretty much feels, well, complete. You can now play Dead Air and Death Toll in Versus mode, which was missing from the initial release for no good reason. But the real draw of the update? Survival mode.

Left 4 Dead has kept me coming back to it every so often, keeping my attention for hours on end. This could be due to the fact that I have an unhealthy obsession with the undead (as opposed to the oh-so-common healthy obsession with the undead). Valve also makes incredibly decent games, but mostly the zombie-love thing. I thought I’d be waiting for the free (FREE) content until at least June, but here we are in April with this new stuff. It’s almost like living in the future, isn’t it?

I’ve spent about two hours with the Survival mode tonight, getting a feel for what its all about. It turns out that the mode has a lot to do with –surviving-(Clearly, Capcom could learn a thing or two from Valve about creating gametypes with titles that are what they say they are…). There are 16 maps to choose from, one of which is a completely new locale, called Last Stand, where you’re set up at a lighthouse. The other 15 maps are comprised of areas you’ve seen before in the campaigns. The areas are sectioned off, full of health packs, pills, and explosives galore. You’ll fight horde after horde of zombies and “Specials,” who’s spawn times get shorter and shorter as time goes on. From what I can gather, there are awards for the four and seven minute marks.



In my first round my team lasted 02:01. It took us about four or five more rounds to beat that time. This occurrence might be a result of being out of practice, or the fact that this mode is ridiculously fucking hard. The best time I was able to achieve tonight was 03:45, in which I was the last one to die (it was very heroic, I assure you, hiding is very heroic).

For some reason I remembered someone saying that the developers could only last around 15 minutes in this mode, so I decided to take a peek at the Leaderboard. I’m not entirely sure if I was surprised, but at the very top of that Leaderboard was a team of people with very Japanese styled gamertags. Their time? Around 26 minutes. This, if nothing else, proves there is a superior race, and evolution does exist.

If you haven’t already, go download the new content, if for nothing else than the fact that it’s free. That’s almost like paying nothing.

…I really can’t fathom the type of fucking X-Men mutants that exist who can survive 26 minutes in Survival mode.