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Left 4 Thumbs - The Homethumbing 2

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I find co-op so flat compared to vs, it's confusing to me how many people prefer it. It's fine once in a while, but the tension and dynamicism of versus is in a whole other league of experience. Co-op just feels like the tutorial for vs to me.

I think Joewintergreen hit most of the reasons I like the original better in his post, but the huge one that keeps me from going back is the scoring system. They replaced the flawed and frustrating scoring system of L4D1, where a squad wipe resulted in almost no points but that deficit could be made up by a solid health bonus in subsequent rounds, with a truly awful system where it was nearly impossible to recover from losing a team member partway through the campaign. It felt like a sequel made by ambitious people who had only a loose grasp on what the strengths and weaknesses of the first game were, and even the original campaigns imported in have weird traces of that, like the boomer bile which is basically just another pipe bomb they invented to have another throwable and the melee weapons which made hordes even less of an obstacle than they were before. And, of course, even if you play a L4D1 map in L4D2, it has the L4D2 scoring system.

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5 hours ago, Joewintergreen said:

Also, as a level designer, I basically think the level design and environment art in 2 are worse almost all the way 'round. A lot of it is the brighter, flatter lighting and textures and heavy fog - they cut themselves out of being able to use a lot of cool guidance tricks L4D1 had. Different teams though, I think?

Hard Rain is probably my favourite level throughout both games. Mostly  due to the amazing storm and cool gimmick of going back to where you started.

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Yeah, Hard Rain is an amazing campaign and the saving grace of L4D2 for me. When the game was new I played online with a few guys from a forum and we all had to yell into our mics to be heard over the rain when it would get heavy, which was just an absolutely amazing thing. 

 

I totally agree about the boomer bile! What the hell is the point of that? It's like a molotov, but only ever useful against the tank, and only sometimes, because sometimes the infected don't show up. Or, it's a pipe bomb, but it doesn't explode. Literally just a worse version of either of the original throwables.

 

3 hours ago, Problem Machine said:

It felt like a sequel made by ambitious people who had only a loose grasp on what the strengths and weaknesses of the first game were

 

I think you hit it on the head there - I'm not completely sure how true this is, but I suspect that, more or less, L4D1 is Turtle Rock's game and L4D2 is Valve's riff on it, and Turtle Rock's is better. There's presumably a reason the one company has never been perma-absorbed into the other.

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32 minutes ago, Joewintergreen said:

I suspect that, more or less, L4D1 is Turtle Rock's game and L4D2 is Valve's riff on it, and Turtle Rock's is better. There's presumably a reason the one company has never been perma-absorbed into the other.

The interesting thing to me is that when TR went off on their own again they also produced something that wasn't as good, in Evolution. Some real synergy went on in L4D1 development apparently.

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I had a great time last night, thanks everyone! I was a bit drunk so hopefully I wasn't being an arse.

 

Hopefully I'll be available to do some more soon :)

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I don't care about VS because it's competitive. I like coop because I enjoy cooperating with other people to overcome obstacles.

The reason Turtle Rock wasn't bought out by Valve is because the people at Turtle Rock didn't want to move. Valve tried.

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I don't care about VS because I could never be bothered to put in the time to learn how to play the different infected properly. And since I couldn't do that VS was never an interesting competitive experience for me.

 

I've played a bunch of L4D, but it has been awhile for me, so I'd be happy to play with newcomers.

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Boomer Bile is good because

 

1. unlike Molotovs, it doesn't enrage the Tank. Handy especially on community servers who like being idiots with Tank spawning, but really underrated regardless.

2. it drops liberally from hazmat zombies, unlike explosives which are map-generated and / or in place of other useful items.

3. it doesn't damage you. Unlike molotovs and beepy grenade things.

 

 

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12 hours ago, Problem Machine said:

I find co-op so flat compared to vs, it's confusing to me how many people prefer it. It's fine once in a while, but the tension and dynamicism of versus is in a whole other league of experience. Co-op just feels like the tutorial for vs to me.

I think Joewintergreen hit most of the reasons I like the original better in his post, but the huge one that keeps me from going back is the scoring system. They replaced the flawed and frustrating scoring system of L4D1, where a squad wipe resulted in almost no points but that deficit could be made up by a solid health bonus in subsequent rounds, with a truly awful system where it was nearly impossible to recover from losing a team member partway through the campaign. It felt like a sequel made by ambitious people who had only a loose grasp on what the strengths and weaknesses of the first game were, and even the original campaigns imported in have weird traces of that, like the boomer bile which is basically just another pipe bomb they invented to have another throwable and the melee weapons which made hordes even less of an obstacle than they were before. And, of course, even if you play a L4D1 map in L4D2, it has the L4D2 scoring system.

 

I'm with Twig and sclpls.  While playing as the zombies is fun for a while, the emphasis on teamwork and cooperation is what really draws me to games like this.  The zombie side requires some teamwork too, but it's more of a single moment when planning a coordinated strike vs the constant ongoing teamwork required by the survivors.  And the scoring was always completely worthless to me.  L4D isn't about "winning" by the numbers, its about that experience you get when you're working together with your buds.  I never liked that scoring was even a thing.

 

That said, I do agree with the parts about the general design of 1 v 2.  I prefer the original campaigns over the new ones (while also agreeing that Heavy Rain is great).  I also like the original survivors more.

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You still play as the survivors in VS though.  I really like L4D as a cooperative game more than a competitive game, but I feel like I got that out of versus.  When you're the survivors it's the same as playing co-op (I think?) and when you're the infected you have to coordinate your attack.  FWIW I played L4D1/2 with the same 3 friends so this is definitely coming from a different place than someone who jumps into a VS game solo.

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But then I have to play as the infected which, when I'm out of practice, just means I get insta-killed the second anyone knows I'm there.

I played a lot of versus. A lot. It's cool when everyone's at the same level, as you tend to grow together, too, so eventually you're actually having solid balanced matches against each other. 

But when teams are even slightly off balance it's a complete stomp and it's utterly boring for the losing team.

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I think L4D2's levels are very good (except for the rollercoaster section in the Carnival level, that can fuck right off). L4D1's levels are also great. I dunno, I think Valve is great at level design.

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I also like L4D2's levels a lot; you're not alone!

But I do think they're not as good as the first game. That's all!

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On 9/29/2017 at 5:21 PM, TheLastBaron said:

You still play as the survivors in VS though.  I really like L4D as a cooperative game more than a competitive game, but I feel like I got that out of versus.  When you're the survivors it's the same as playing co-op (I think?) and when you're the infected you have to coordinate your attack.  FWIW I played L4D1/2 with the same 3 friends so this is definitely coming from a different place than someone who jumps into a VS game solo.

 

It's mechanically the same but the framing as a competitive game changes it a lot.  Playing against another team of humans I always feel like there's some driving force to "win", especially since they put a score in.  I think the score is meaningless but it's still a presentation of which team is better.  It's fine if people like that but I think it's a different experience than pure co-op which is the one I prefer.  Plus what Twig said.

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*raises fists in the air*

 

So when do we play!!!

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While I would love to be the one to kick off another season of L4D co-op goodness, I'm not going to be a reliable point of contact for the foreseeable future.  Hopefully someone else can step up.

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On 9/30/2017 at 3:04 AM, Joewintergreen said:

That's what I reckon. I think I would like L4D2 a lot more if it hadn't followed L4D1.

This is basically it in a nutshell, really.

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