Rules of Thumb

June 15, 2009 - L4D Team

When it came time to photograph the box art of L4D1, our art staff had three goals. One, there should be a hand in it somehow. Two, the hand should have a thumb bitten off, so customers would look at the four fingers remaining on the hand and think, "Hey, four." Three, under no circumstances would we use Photoshop. L4D is a visceral experience, and its box art deserved the same approach. Valve artist and L4D1 hand model Andrea Wicklund was more than happy to help.



Sadly, the ESRB got wind of this, and cited some fake-sounding legal loophole about it being illegal to take pictures of people biting off parts of their hands. So for L4D2, Andrea used state-of-the-art eye-tricking techniques (tucking two of her fingers behind her hand) to create the illusion that her fingers were missing:



We're sure you'll agree: Pretty convincing. Granted, it took lopping the fingers off two staff members' hands to get the lighting reference perfect, but since those didn't appear on the box, we think we're legally in the clear.

Announcing Left 4 Dead 2!

June 1, 2009 - L4D Team

We've just announced that Left 4 Dead 2 is coming later this year! It's a much larger game than the original, and features new co-op and versus campaigns, all-new Survivors, boss zombies, weapons, and items, as well as melee combat. Check out the teaser trailer, and watch this space for more news in the coming days.

Now Hiring!

May 19, 2009 - Zoid

It's been an interesting week for us here on the Left 4 Dead team. This Monday, for instance, somebody accidentally told Robin Walker he had the power to fire people. In other interesting news, the Left 4 Dead team has all been fired.

Lucky for me, Robin's fired everyone at alphabetical order, and doesn't seem to realize there's a letter after "Y". (Don't tell him.) . Since then it's been pretty quiet. Every hour or so Robin gets on a horse and chases some Greek kid around.

So for now I'm safe, and trying to reassemble the team. Without anyone else to help, I just have this crossword puzzle created by the fine folks at tf2maps.net. So this will have to work as a job application. If you can get this done, that probably means you can spell, which is a good start.

A Subtle Hint

May 19, 2009 - L4D Team

The 27th Annual Golden Joystick Awards are now accepting votes for your favorite game of the year. Now, we'd of course never for a second want to sway your vote and suggest you follow this link and vote for Left 4 Dead. We're above that sort of thing.

Personalize your apocalypse

May 15, 2009 - Yasser Malaika

Today we are opening the beta of the Left 4 Dead Authoring Tools to the public. It is available as a free download for all owners of the PC version of Left 4 Dead, and can be found under the "Tools" tab in Steam.

The L4D Authoring Tools include modified versions of the same tools we used to produce Left 4 Dead.

Using the L4D Authoring Tools, you may create your own campaign maps, character skins, 3D models, sound effects, and music and load them into the game.

Here's what's included:

• Updated version of Hammer, the source level editor
• Updated suite of command line compiling utilities
• Updated Particle editor
• Updated Faceposer
• Example maps, common infected, props, and explosives

This release also introduces a pair of plug-ins for SketchUp, a 3D modeling program you may download for free. You may use these plug-ins to create building blocks and props that can be imported into Hammer for use in game levels.



So how can other people play the maps you create? Don't worry, we are updating matchmaking to fully support the new maps.

Our plan is to release a beta of the Authoring Tools now so the community can start working on maps in the full environment. In a few weeks we will then release the updated match making to allow users to play those new maps and campaigns.

If you want to get started on the beta, we suggest joining two mailing lists:
http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/l4dmapper

And the general Source mapper's list. http://list.valvesoftware.com/mailman/listinfo/hlmappers

This is beta software, so if you have any problems or issues, please send them to the l4dmapper email list.

We have also updated our developer Wiki http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Authoring_Tools/SDK_(Left_4_Dead)

And don't forget. The matchmaking system will be updated in a few weeks so everyone can play your hard work. We will be releasing additional information and tools next week to show how you can package up your maps and how they are delivered to players. We want to make sure everyone has a smooth experience as they download and new Versus maps, Survival mode maps, and single and multi-map campaigns.