The two level demo took place in the "Dark Carnival" campaign, the one that Totilo recently previewed during a visit to Valve. My play through of the third campaign so far revealed took a few tries to get right and a few to finally get the chainsaw to randomly spawn. But when it did, it was a force to be reckoned with.

Maybe a little too much of a force, as the chainsaw felt about as powerful—and as tangible—as a lightsaber from Star Wars. Slicing up zombies with the newest melee weapon seemed more disconnected than swinging an axe or frying pan, as the sound of chainsaw didn't pack much of a punch.

It was also the first melee weapon I'd used in Left 4 Dead 2 that ran out of "ammo." The chainsaw does appear to have a limited amount of fuel and, when exhausted, your Survivor will toss the weapon. That will ensure that the choice to pick up the chainsaw will carry with it consequences, even if it appears to be one of the more powerful melee weapons one can use in the game.

Beyond the ability to slice through infected humans like a knife through hot butter, we're not sure yet what special attributes the chainsaw might have. The fire axe, for example, is perfect for dispatching the Witch—there's even an Achievement for "crowning" the zombie with the axe—but Valve's Kim Swift didn't offer specific details on what the chainsaw would be best used for.

Outside of chainsaw usage, I got my first hands-on time with the laser sight add-on that makes firearms more precise and experienced my first battle with the Jockey. The former was a nice, if not immediately noticeable perk, but the latter was an impressive pain the ass. Battling the Jockey for steering rights—fortunately, no high ledges were nearby in the levels we played—should offer some interesting twists to multiplayer battles.

During our discussion with Swift, it sounds like there's still plenty to be revealed about the game, including the two remaining campaigns, their respective "uncommon common" infected, new environmental hazards and a few new projectile weapons. Keep an eye peeled for more to come.

Left 4 Dead 2 Box - Japan

It’s not the first time, but seems as if Valve’s Left 4 Dead 2 will be getting a little tweak. Instead of the iconic four-fingered hand with the thumb bitten off, Left 4 Dead 2 will sport a nice smooth hand as if the person is merely a deformity. We’ll see if the game changes any in the future though.

At PAX, new details about Left 4 Dead 2 have emerged in the latest reveal of the Dark Carnival chapter. The most important one is the announcement of a new special infected, the Jockey. The Jockey lives up to his name, hopping onto the back of a survivor and steering him whereever he wants. The player loses control during this moment, and yes, this could go horribly wrong for survivors. We’re unsure how to eject the jockey (shooting him off seems a bit dangerous) at this time.

For more details on the Dark Carnival campaign, the campaign is subtitled “You must be this tall… TO DIE!” and it has survivors starting on a highway, headed to the Ferris wheel. After working through a two-story motel, you get to the carnival and face off against a new common-uncommon: the zombie clown. This infected calls other infected over to him, so talk about annoying. If this one gets close, expect lots of mobs!

According to reports, some of the carnival parlor games are playable, and the final crescendo moment revolves around the merry-go-round. All in all, it’s sounding wonderfully delicious.

I do wonder though, if death squads will be a lot easier to spawn. Between the Charger, Hunter, Smoker and Jockey, sounds like there are a lot of ways survivors can be “held” against their will, effectively ending a game. We’ll see when Left 4 Dead 2 finally arrives.

Left 4 Dead 2 Pre-Order Bonus

New details on Left 4 Dead 2 pre-orders are coming to life, like this one from Game.co.uk, where early buyers will gain access to the demo AND a download code for what’s reported to be an “exclusive in-game weapon: a baseball bat.” I fully expect to see other retailers following suit with bonus items, but EXCLUSIVE? They’re really going to ration out items to those who buy from certain stores? Seems very un-Valvelike.

UPDATE: According to Valve, the way it works is that if one person has the exclusive items, all people in-game also can use them. No word yet on whether this is a timed exclusive or not.

Left 4 Dead: Crash Course

There’s a great interview with Valve writer, Chet Faliszek, at Offworld about Left 4 Dead and Valve culture in general. Very interesting conversation about the larger Left 4 Dead world, which has some surprises in store for us.

Interestingly, Faliszek mentions that the recently announced L4D1 DLC, Crash Course, was supposed to be released before E3 and the Left 4 Dead 2 announcement.

“I think in this case we just didn’t message correctly,” said Faliszek to Offworld. “We didn’t make it clear that Left 4 Dead was still going to be updated. We just didn’t think to mention it, we were focusing on other stuff.” “We, internally, always knew we were going to do cool new stuff, so we didn’t say anything about the original game,” he added. “Of course we also intended to get the Crash Course DLC for L4D out before E3, but some things held us up.” “I think if we had that out before the Left 4 Dead 2 announcement, then it would have been clearer for our intentions. Losing the opportunity to get that right hurt us, but I think we made the right choices otherwise.”

While I really enjoy what Valve is doing here, I’m not entirely convinced this is true. It all seems like damage control. From the outside looking in, Crash Course seems to be a short Left 4 Dead experience, one easily concocted between E3 and its September release. I’m hoping I’m wrong!

Left 4 Dead 2 - Dark Carnival

We’ve played “The Parish”, we’ve played “Swamp Fever” and soon we’ll get a chance at the new “Dark Carnival” campaign from Left 4 Dead 2. That is, if we hit the Penny Arcade Expo, where we can see different chapters in the Microsoft and Valve booth. Also we should see some more new items featured in the game. Worse, we can see that scary clown zombies will be out for blood!

Still leaves a new boss infected and an unrevealed gameplay mode unaccounted for! What will it be? Flying creatures? Free-for-all zombie/survivor deathmatches? What do you think?

GameTrailers revealed some video about Left 4 Dead 2′s “Fairgrounds” campaign and the pending DLC for Left 4 Dead, Crash Course. In Left 4 Dead 2, there’s a cool amusement park scene, and an eerie carousel, but I’m hopeful for a working rollercoaster. Crash Course opens with a helicopter crash, as it bridges the gap between No Mercy and Death Toll, and yes, confirms there are only two maps. Boo hoo, but still fun!

It seems Left 4 Dead has been, err… left for dead after the release of Left 4 Dead 2. Left 4 Dead 2 fans will be able to enjoy all the campaigns of Left 4 Dead and then some, but the old group will be alone in the cold.

Other highlights from the interview follow:

Is this DLC going to be playable by owners of L4D2 as well?
We’re still struggling with how interoperability is going to work, right now. When we talk about L4D, the story stuff – there’s actually a lot of character dialogue that’s based in each map.

So you can’t just play it with another set of characters?
No. We’d have to duplicate that, which we’re not against doing. But there’s this thing of the world – these characters wouldn’t be here – how much does that matter? We have a world sketched out and we have an understanding of where everything is and what’s going on, you know, so story-wise it wouldn’t make much sense. But equally there’s a whole group of the fans who don’t care. So we could put new characters in old places and old characters in new places.

Would you really need to use the characters from each game – wouldn’t just loading a map dictate the characters you were playing with?
That’s one of the routes we’ve talked about going, and maybe adding the new creatures, or whatever. There’s a lot of back-and-forth. We haven’t fixed on what we’re doing yet, so we don’t want to talk about it and make people think something is going to happen when we don’t know ourselves.