I've been playing the relatively new video game, "Left 4 Dead." Oh boy is it a trip.

You are one of four survivors of a zombie apocalypse. And you are stuck in a city or countryside where you have to fight your way to the retrieval zones, where you will be picked up by the military.

The game is conducted like a movie, only there's no cameras, recording crew, audio booms, etc. There's an AI "Director," who intelligently controls the action and pace of the game.

The zombies in the game are very different than what you're used to. However, I feel that "zombie" is an inappropriate term. They are more likely diseased, or "sick" people (as Anya calls them), who have reverted to a worse-than-frenzied-animal-like-state. The zombies do gibber, screech, and babble nonsensically, but they run very, very quickly. Bloodied, crazed, and unable to say anything intelligibly, they flail at you with amazing speed.

But that's not it. There's never just ONE zombie. The Director places zombies all over the place at random. Sometimes there's a dozen or so loitering around. But, every now and again, a zombie rush comes out of nowhere, flooding the area with dozens upon dozens of zombies that will do anything possible to kill you. Sometimes, the Director goofs up, and hundreds of zombies will come out of a closet with no entrance or exit. It's quite challenging and amusing at the same time.

And then, there are the special zombies.

There's the Boomer. A grotesquely deformed zombie - bloated to morbidly obese proportions. He's primarily useless - his claws do very little if any damage, and he's prone to just standing around. But what he does the best, is throw up on you. If you're covered in Boomer bile, not only are you blinded by the goo, but you are also the biggest and best magnet around for every last zombie on the level. They will get up and go after you like you wouldn't believe. And don't think that it ends there - if you're too close to the Boomer when you kill him, he explodes, and covers you with more Boomer bile.

There's the Hunter. The hunter, amusingly enough, looks like some street punk wearing a grey hoodie. But that's where the similarity ends. This zombie is quite possibly the only zombie in the game that's more likely than the others to give you nightmares. The Hunter has a very loud, very unnatural, and very nerve-shattering scream. By the time you hear it - it's too late, and the Hunter has pinned you to the floor - helpless - while he shreds and tears you apart with his claws. The Hunter's jump enables him to scale buildings, and jump across streets in mere seconds.

There's the Smoker. A very tall, lanky, and smoke-infused zombie with a never-ending tongue. You can always tell where the smoker is, because of the poison-green smoke cloud wafting around him and the constant hacking and wheezing. It sounds like a person after 80 years of non-stop smoking. The danger of this zombie is his ability to hang you with his tongue. Smokers can appear anywhere, but they are more likely than not to be on top of buildings, bridges, and other tall structures. Because their tongues really have no maximum length, they can just lash out, wrap you up, and hang you up from wherever they please.

THE WITCH. Quite possibly the most terrifying monster in the game is the grey skinned, crying, possibly-age-13 girl who faintly glows red. This ultra zombie has not only has her own theme music like the other special zombies, she also has a haunting, creepy vocal that plays louder and louder the closer you get to her. Once you get close enough, you see that her eyes are burning red orbs of power, and her hands are nothing short of foot-long claws blackened by layers of blood caked thoroughly over her hands.

The moment you startle her, she runs at you, screaming at the top of her lungs. To make gameplay even more frightening, if you don't kill her instantly, there's a panicky, alarming piano tune that clamors over the speakers until you finally do kill her. One swipe from her claws could mean instant death.

THE TANK. Not nearly as frightening as The Witch, this monstrosity is the ultimate zombie. One look at this thing and you'd assume that it would be in the same league as The Hulk. Massive, muscle swollen arms as big around as most people's bodies enable this creature to literally throw cars at you. Every member of the team must concentrate ALL their fire on this guy, or he'll crush the whole party. The Tank literally has thousands and thousands of hit points.

Here's the movie trailer from the beginning of the game. And yes, not only does the game look like this on the servers, but the speech is pretty similar too. No part of this introduction movie is in any way exaggerated.

http://www.l4d.com/blog/post.php?id=1964


Anya just watched me play about ten minutes worth, and had one of the best faces of disgust she's ever had. “How can you play that? It's so horrid!”

Without missing a beat, I said, “Seriously, you think that this is any worse than working retail?”


mind.in.a.box - Lost Alone - Falling

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things i found in my food