I don’t want to repeat everything I said in my review of the Left 4 Dead 2 demo, but there’s a lot to talk about.

The weather effects in the Hard Rain campaign are quite well done, and the hotel fire at the beginning of the first campaign actually makes you feel like you’re in a hotel fire – you feel the urge to run through as fast as you can to escape the flames, though they don’t actually ever cut off your path (at least not that I could tell).

There are two types of ammo that you can deploy: explosive, which stumbles special infected, and incendiary, which sets things on fire.  That’s the fun one

There are also laser sight upgrades, which increase your weapon’s accuracy.  They only apply to your currently equipped primary weapon, so if you change weapons you lose the upgrade.

As for the Infected, there are obviously the new Specials that I mentioned before – the Spitter, the Jockey, and the Charger – but there’s also a female version of the Boomer.  I haven’t confirmed this, but the word on the street is that the female Boomer can move while she, uh, vomits at you.  (She’s also supposedly louder, making her easier to locate.)

I mentioned the armored CEDA agents when I talked about the demo; there are also clowns (who make noise and attract more common infected), there are mudders (who crouch low to the ground and like to hide in muddy water), and there are guys in fireproof suits.

The new Scavenge game mode is extremely fun, and Survival and Versus are still just as awesome; Realism mode is extremely involving.  I was so immersed that I actually ducked in my chair when a Tank threw a chunk of concrete at me.

My only gripe thus far is that today when I logged on, my achievements had been reset (I had 20-some already).  It’s not too big a deal, but I guess that’s what happens during launch week.  Maybe there were some cheaters and Valve couldn’t tell who had cheated and who couldn’t.  I have confirmed that the reset was widespread, but I don’t know if it was global.

I’m going to echo Ars Technica’s review – Left 4 Dead 2 is well worth the money.

The official release time of L4D2 is 2.5 hours from now, but Valve intended to release it 3 hours early; at least, that’s true if you go by Pacific time.

So technically it’s 30 minutes late but 2.5 hours early still.  I think someone’s having trouble configuring the release:

At least, I’m pretty sure there aren’t seven editions of Left 4 Dead 2…

Edit: A few minutes later, there are still seven copies, but the date has been changed to Nov 16, 2009.  And of course the duplicates were removed just as I typed this.

Edit 2: And of course, now the single listing has Nov 17, 2009 listed as the release date.  They really shouldn’t do this stuff on a production server…

Edit 3: It ended up coming out just one hour “late”.  The nerd rage literally crashed Steam’s forums.  It was definitely worth the wait, though; I’ll write a post later this week about it.

The Left 4 Dead 2 demo came out yesterday (for people who pre-ordered the game, anyway), and I played it for half an hour last night.   I noticed several things when compared to the first Left 4 Dead (if you want to find out for yourself, stop reading):

- The main menu is vastly improved
- The in-game HUD is improved
- The full version will have five campaigns and four five game modes at launch, better than L4D1′s four campaigns and two games modes (four and a half campaigns and three game modes, if you add in the post-launch DLC)
- New survivors (of course), and it’s actually a refreshing break from Bill, Louis, Francis, and Zoe
- There are new, improved models for the Tank, Boomer and Smoker (not just new textures)
- New textures for the Hunter and Witch
- New, improved sound effects for old special infected
- Three new special infected
- At least one new type of common infected (some are armored and therefore harder to kill), and I gather that there are more that aren’t in the demo (e.g. clowns)
- Melee weapons – TONS of melee weapons: batons, machetes, frying pans, axes, chainsaws, guitars… you have no idea how satisfying it is to bash a Smoker over the head with a guitar.
- New primary weapons: I must have used at least a dozen new primary weapons in my one play session
- New secondary weapons: Along with the default pistol, a higher-powered pistol was added
- New thrown weapons: Vials of boomer puke to attract infected somewhere (and I think one other I’m forgetting at the moment)
- New utilities: defibrillators to revive dead teammates, adrenaline shots to increase speed (there may have been one other I’m forgetting)

The last six items there should give you pause – there are whole new areas of strategy in L4D2 that simply don’t exist in L4D1.  You have to choose between carrying a health pack or carrying a defibrillator unit; adrenaline and pills; pistol or melee; pipe bomb or molotov or boomer vial… you get the idea… and you have to balance that against not just “hordes and a few special infected”, but groups of different types of common infected along with six types of special infected.

The graphics engine has been greatly improved, and anyone who tells you otherwise is playing at 640×480 with all the eye candy disabled.

The demo lets you play the first two levels of The Parish.  Daylight zombie-killing has a very different feel to it, and the two maps in the demo feel less cramped than (say) No Mercy while feeling less empty and less railroaded than Crash Course.

I didn’t spend time exploring the maps, or fiddling with every weapon I saw.  There are probably things I missed.

There can be no doubt about it.  L4D2 has more new content than L4D1 had at launch, and I for one welcome our new armored zombie overlords.

I preordered Left 4 Dead 2 the other day.  Just throwing that out there.

Also, Tim Buckley (author of the popular Ctrl+Alt+Del webcomic) has articulated quite perfectly my own opinion on the L4D2 boycott.  Two posts of interest, both found here.

A recent Bruce Schneier blog post got me thinking about boycotts.  Specifically, the user “AwesomeRobot” made the following comment in response to another user who said they plan to forever boycott Sony due to the rootkits they put on music CDs in 2005:

Boycotts don’t work unless you say you’ll buy from them again when they clean up their act. What’s their incentive to change if you just say you’ll “never” buy from them again?

I boycott Eidos because of their deliberately poor customer service.  The trouble is, how am I to know when they’ve cleaned up their act, if I never interact with them again?

I boycott 1&1 Internet (my former web host) because… well, because of lots of reasons.  But if I avoid them in perpetuity, how am I supposed to know whether my boycott has worked?

Another thought that occurred to me relates to the infamous Left 4 Dead 2 boycott.  Now, I disagree with them about almost everything, and I’ve always maintained that the only way Valve can meet all their demands is to give away Left 4 Dead 2 as free content.  So, AwesomeRobot’s comment applies here, too: if the only way to please the boycotters is to give them stuff for free, what incentive does Valve have to please them?

Boycotts only work when the target has a possibility of earning money from the boycotters by meeting the boycott’s demands.  In my case, I’ll be keeping tabs on Eidos; if they appear to have improved, I’ll end up buying Batman: Arkham Asylum, and everyone wins.

As for 1&1, personally I won’t be going back, because their service simply isn’t a good fit for me anymore; but if they fix the glaring problems that made me leave, I’ll start referring people to them again (and stop telling people to avoid them like the plague).