Gimmie Dat Eight-Bit, Gimmie Dat Good Shit

Now this is entertaining: an 8-bit remake of Left 4 Dead!  Eric Ruth, an indie game developer, is the one behind the creative take on this 8-bit mayhem entitled Pixel Force: Left 4 Dead.  Eric has designed many games over the years of his life and is an aspiring developer.  All of his games are free and he is hoping one day to seek employment at a good studio.  In fact, you can download his games and get to know more about him at his website, http://www.ericruthgames.com/ .  This game allows single player and co-op modes.  And as you will see, the way it is designed makes it look like it actually came out in the late 80's or early 90's for the NES.  There are two difficulty modes and the weapons are thrown about the path in various places. 

I do not know how to add a video into the blog itself, so here is a link to some gameplay:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lFkXFqHc9E

Wretched Sales & Dangerous Devices

      As with all games, the company's goal is to create a great time for the player and generate as much money as they can through doing so.  Left 4 Dead 1 & 2 did quite a remarkable job with their sales and it still continues to be a great game that still sells well.  Left 4 Dead 1 was released in North America on November 18th, 2008 and Left 4 Dead 2 was released in North America on November 17th, 2009.  I am having trouble finding out how much the games made within their fist weekend / week of release, but I am sure it was enough to be a big deal (although it is no COD Black Ops, which made $350 million within its first 24 hours of release!).  What I have found, however, are statistics on its sales afterwards:  On February 20th, 2009, an article stated that when Valve cut the first Left 4 Dead's price by 50%, their game sales immediately jumped 3,000% in sales!  Apparently these sales were so strong that it dominated the game's opening weekend sales (http://www.mcvuk.com/news/33312/Left-4-Dead-sales-jump-3000).  The second Left 4 Dead ended up selling over two million units throughout the world within two weeks of release.  It had also been played over one million times by X-Box Live Gold members within that first two weeks.  Within these first two weeks, the second installment had already outsold its income from the first game!  Currently Left 4 Dead 1 goes for around $15 - $20, while the second installment goes for $25 - $30...well above the price of a one-year-outdated sports game.
     Left 4 Dead is not only displayed through the television screen, but also in physical forms through all of its merchandise throughout its time of release.  The game had quickly become a big name within the action and horror game fanbase and therefore had merch made after it.  Various t-shirts, action figures, stickers, and much more can be found either through the internet or various stores.  Valve even added a downloadable content comic book.  I actually found out about this game through my friend because he was wearing a shirt advertising the game.

Fear



Can I has your soul nao?




     Why do people like Left 4 Dead so much?  Is it because of the non-stop action?  Is it because of the dark and fearful atmospheres the game puts you in? Or is it because of the zombie society which has grown within our current culture?  For me, Left 4 Dead is an amazing game because of a mixture of all these things.  I am always satisfied with a good action-filled or horrific game, and this seems to cover both of those topics very well.  The game always keeps you on the edge of your seat and puts you in good, dark environments while you get to unload an army of bullets to save you and your partners from the wrath of the undead.  I have been a zombie and horror fan for a while now, but not until recently have I been a big fan of the genres.  Therefore, this game is a satisfactory means for escaping from the real world to kick some undead ass.

     Anyways, the point of this blog post is to discuss what fear is and how our society is fascinated with horror, violence, and the undead.  The topic of zombies has been around for a long time, especially within recent culture, particularly because of George A. Romero's 1968 release of Night of the Living Dead.  Ever since then zombies and the undead have been a part of our society.  Earlier on, during the 20th century, zombies were widely known to spawn through black magic of various sorts because that was what the society had feared at the time.  If you notice, currently all zombie storylines involve them coming through viruses and blood transfusion, which is what we as a society now have been currently fearing (ie. swine flu, anthrax, mad cow, to quickly name a few).  The original Resident Evil game was highly influenced by the 1990's gas attack/scare in Japan and it became a major element in the game because it was what the Japanese society was dealing with at the time and it made the game more relatable, and ultimately more terrifying.

     Left 4 Dead is a prime example of the current societal scare.  The game takes place because of the outbreak of the "Green Flu" virus, which is highly contageous and causes a lack of higher brain functions.  If the viewpoint for the game was made through the earlier 20th century's perspective, then it would be sort of like: A witch who was sentenced to die but escaped has a vengence upon the world so she takes her magic, potions, or whatever and summons the undead to attack all who live...or something like that.  Left 4 Dead is a great example of how current scares influence what we see on our television screens.  It also has fun with the violence factor, which society has always loved since the beginning of time.  All in all, this game did a great job with what the modern society would want within an action-packed zombie horror-survival game.

Death

     Death in video games has always been a factor, especially once the games started advancing with better storylines and graphics.  Even though in the early games they may not have focused on the deaths so much, they were still there and they were still violent depending on how it's looked upon.  Super Mario stomps his enemies to death, Pacman turns himself inside out until he is nothing, in Burger Time the chef basically has a seizure, and so on.  In the mid 90s, when graphics were progressing and so were games, we had more visual deaths evolving.  And now through time with the advancement of video game genres/styles and better graphics with consols such as the X-Box 360 & Playstation 3, we have come to a whole new gaming experience than we had years ago.

     In Left 4 Dead 1 & 2, we experience these newest styles of death in video games.  The violence and deaths in this game are everywhere and occur almost every second it feels like.  When the rush of zombies come at you, you and your three teammates are littering ammo everywhere trying to kill everything around you.  When this happens you see limbs flying in the air, heads getting blown off, etc.  It is a much more realistic way of killing your enemies than in the older games, like Super Mario World or something. 

     Since Left 4 Dead is meant for replay value and the levels are fairly short, you don't really get to feel for the characters as much as you would with other video games, such as RPGs.  In lots of RPGs you get to build up your character over time and choose primarily what happens or what certain characters can do.  This then progresses the storyline and changes the game up due to what you have chosen to do.  Over time, you start to feel for the characters like you would in a movie, only this time you are in control of what they do so it can create an even further bonding experience.  In Left 4 Dead, there are several storylines to choose from with chapters within them.  On average each storyline can take an hour or so and then it is over with.  Due to the lack of backstory with the characters and the short length of gameplay per story, you cannot learn much about your characters, which in the end leaves you with less emotion and sorrow towards a character if they end up dying.

A Hellish Development

Left 4 Dead was an improvement upon Valve's Source engine (a 3D game engine which they developed) and allowed them to work on many different things, such as the physics-based animation.  This allowed them to use a more realistic portrayal on characters' hair and clothing and let them improve upon the physics interaction with enemies.  This also allowed the characters to move more realistically.  Because of these improvements, the game was able to run smooth as all of the zombies continued to keep coming.  Valve also used some sort of advanced shadow rendering as well for the lighting aspects of the game.  Horror films were a big inspiration for Left 4 Dead too, and a lot of the time you can see how they affected how it added to the cinematic parts of the game.


During the testing and development of Left 4 Dead, there were lots of features that were removed from the game, like various types of zombies.  Because the game is meant for its replayability and fast action, Valve decided to take away the long introduction and many of the cut scenes and replaced them with some narratives so that the players would have more time to focus on the gameplay itself. 

Back(breaking)-Story of Game Production

Turtle Rock Studios started to develop Left 4 Dead in mid-2005.  What they intended to make was a horror film-esq video game involved with good character narration structure and multiplayer interactions.  Ultimately Turtle Rock Studios aimed for a high game replay value, which they succeeded upon, in my opinion.  As time went by, the studio slowly released more information and demos on the game.  On November 20th, 2006, the studio publicly announced their game.  The first two places in which the game was first played were at the Showdown 2007 LAN in San Jose and at QuakeCon 2007.  Left 4 Dead was finally released through Valve Corporation (which had a long relationship with Turtle Rock)on October 15th, 2008.  Soon advertisements and contests for the game were showing up everywhere and the game took off from there.

First Blog - Left 4 Dread

For my video games & culture class at Hartwick College, I have chosen to research the action-packed, horror survival game series Left 4 Dead.  It takes place in Pennsylvania, where a virus has hit, called the "Green Flu," which causes a loss of brain functions and extreme aggression. This game is a fast paced zombie shooter that will never fail to keep you on the edge of your seat.  Throughout this class, I will be blogging much information about all aspects of this series.