A Rancid Expansion
Finally – a reason to keep unliving! Blue’s News reports they woke up this morning and opened their curtains to a fresh layer of green ooze covering the desolate urban wastes. In short, our fleshy beings are to be spoiled rotten with the L4D Survival Pack – which is said to be transmitted via a series of tubes. Once infected, and after a brief patching period, the new content is said to have a transformative effect upon standard choc-chip L4D. Early symptoms include two new Versus Mode campaigns (assuredly Dead Air and Death Toll), a new game mode dubbed Survival (begin speculating now!) and a Software Development Kit for those most succulently-minded modders out there. Here’s the full text:
February 5, 2008 – Valve, creators of best-selling game franchises (such as Half-Life, Portal, Team Fortress, and Counter-Strike) and leading technologies (such as Steam and Source), today announced a series of content and development releases for its latest title, 2008’s best-selling new game property for the PC and Xbox 360, Left 4 Dead (L4D).
The first L4D DLC – dubbed the L4D Survival Pack — is due for release this spring and introduces a new multiplayer game mode entitled, Survival, plus two complete campaigns for Versus Mode . A Critic’s Choice Edition of the game is also heading to retail stores this spring, and will include access to all the content introduced in the L4D: Survival Pack.
In addition, for PC gamers and aspiring developers, the first Left 4 Dead release for the Source Software Development Kit (Source SDK) will allow the creation of custom Left 4 Dead campaigns that will be discoverable via L4D’s matchmaking system. The SDK update is also due for release this spring, and is free of charge to all owners of L4D on the PC.
“Since Half-Life launched in 1998, Valve has made continuous efforts to expand the offering of its products beyond what’s included on the day of launch,” said Gabe Newell, co-founder and president of Valve. “With Half-Life and Counter-Strike, and more recently Team Fortress 2, we’ve learned that we’re no longer making stand-alone games but creating entertainment services. With Left 4 Dead we’re extending that tradition by creating additional gameplay and releasing our internal tools to aspiring developers so they may also create and distribute new Left 4 Dead experiences.”
Left 4 Dead is a survival action game from Valve that blends the social entertainment experience of multiplayer games such as Counter-Strike and Team Fortress with the dramatic, narrative experience made popular in single player action game classics such as the Half-Life series of games. Released in November of 2008, L4D has earned over 25 industry awards from outlets around the world.
For more information, please visit www.l4d.com
5 thoughts on “A Rancid Expansion”
I’m certainly interested to see about any clarrification over pricing. It seemed to be uncharacteristically ambiguous in saying whether it is or isn’t charged for. I’m hoping they’re just testing to see how people react to any possibility that they will be charging, though I will in all honesty accept paying so long as it’s a reasonable price. At least compared with other recent DLC which will go unmentioned, they have a decent delivery service, and ultimately I don’t mind paying so long as the content is solid.
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But more importantly, if the content is charged for, I forsee a dramatic effect on the community. Organising games with people who may or may not have the DLC will become an absolute fucking nightmare.
They should not be charging for this, they never charged us for any of the TF2 things, why should they change their policy now?
DLC has some fundamental flaws right now, ranging from pricing to distribution methods to ‘exclusivity’ for certain consoles.
Pah! DLC has become twisted beyond all recognition of what it should really be, Valve have done good things with it so far, I don’t want them to go changing now.
Yup, DLC has certainly become a terribly loaded term with various implications now. The immediate reaction really has been “are they charging?” Within minutes of the announcement going up no less. The ambigious nature of the announcement doesn’t help matters. The implications of a “new retail release” coming with the additions is the most glaring part I think – I’m just hoping really that it’s just one of the usual GOTY style releases (think the Company of Heroes “DirectX 10 version” that entered retail – it was basically just a re-release with the 1.7 patch on the disk), rather than a compliation. I think Valve have every right to charge, but I think given the TF2 precendent, it will be hard to win people over to the idea.
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I think personally think a better business model would be paying more for the game initially in the knowledge that the developer would continue to improve on it.
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Thinking about, I suppose it’s important to consider that with that news post, they’re trying to talk about the DLC across all the platforms. It *will* cost on the Xbox/PS3 after all.Trying to tell one group they’re going to have to pay, and another that they wont isn’t terribly articulate. I’m sure we’ll have clariffication soon I suppose. Lets hope it’s positive
this is simply going to be so awesome, but im not going to get it if its not a regular patch. well, depends, if its pricy , over 10, then not but under 10, sure.
Let’s consider this: what if Valve slapping a price on the DLC means that they are not sure whether TF2’s long-term business model was a good idea?