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Photo by: docjohnboy. Some Rights Reserved.

Before I delve into this article, there are a few things I would like to clear up. First of all, I don’t get scared easily. Now don’t mistake this for “you can’t startle me”. I startle very easily, but as for getting scared… not so much. Secondly, movies never really scare me. I get bored or disturbed but not scared.  Thirdly, apparently, video games with a creepy or frightening premises get to me.

Recently, I purchased Left 4 Dead. This is a first-person shooter in which you are 1 of 4 survivors in a zombie-like epidemic ridden city. And your goal is not only to escape but to fully kill as many zombie-esque beings as you can. This is more along the lines of a 28 Days Later story except your weapons are much better than a bat or a smoke bomb and yet not as much fun as the Army Of Darkness weapons.

Photo by: Miyaoka Hitchcock. Some Rights Reserved.

There are also 5 “special” zombie-ish types: hunters, smokers, boomers, tanks and wytches. I have learned fear is a wytch. They just want to be left alone but be careful if you decide to shoot one. Thankfully, in order to kill one of this zombie type, you do not need a head shot. They will die if you shoot their bodies… but so far only if it is a good torso shot. If you shoot limbs, they may fall off, but they don’t die.

Another interesting twist with this game, which has helped to eliminate some of the creepy factor brought about by keys of a piano plinked and plunked in discord while walking down a dark hallway or sewer, is that you don’t have to be a survivor. That’s right Zombie lovers, you can play as one of the mindless flesh eaters. Not as one of the many in the mobs of regulars though, but as one of the “special” types excluding the wythces because, again, they just want to be left alone. Each Zombie type has it’s own special attack and then its secondary attack of just hitting or clawing at the survivors. This, combined with the other features of the game, make for some very interesting and entertaining game play.

I firmly believe that first-person shooters are better in co-op mode and, thankfully, this game’s got it. This is good for me because if I were to play this game on my own at night, I would probably be a puddle of crying-25-year-old-man in the middle of the floor, clutching a pillow to me, begging for someone to come save me.

I give this game a good, positive, play-this-game-dammit review. Rent it, own it, play it, but enjoy it.

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