Pesmerga
Newbie
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2004
- Messages
- 10,089
- Reaction score
- 8
L4D is fun. It's really fun to play with people you know, and especially so if it's a Versus game. Valve did a wonderful job with it. I've played it a lot, a LOT, with a lot of different people and have had a lot of different experiences.
But it needs a lot of fundamental work.
The AI Director is a joke
"Each time you play, it's a new experience". Sure- zombie hordes and tanks and witches spawn at greatly different times, but the average rate of them appearing on a map are pretty constant. I feel as if the Director is a largely useless part of L4D. The solution? To create actual dynamic experiences in L4D campaigns, let the director randomly choose from a range of "moods" that impact not only how the zombies spawn and attack, but how the actual environment looks and by cutting off / opening up new paths depending on the mood of the round.
For instance, a focus on hordes rather than tanks, witches, and bosses. Boomers will spawn more increasingly, hordes will be larger and more punishing. Tanks and witches should be nonexistent unless it is a crescendo moment. Hunters and smokers should be rare.
Alternatively, a focus on boss infected. Larger amounts of pre-populated zombies but very few horde moments. Cuts off the usual path of the campaign and opens up a longer, more precarious route that gives boss infected an extreme advantage (lots of cliffs, lots of heights, and lots of nooks and crannies for bosses to escape into), with usual tank and witch placements.
Moods could very well set the theme of the campaign itself- dawn, midnight, foggy, rainy, snow, lots of dramatic lights, very few lights, ambient sound changes, etc.
Finales suck
Finales suck. They're boring compared to the majority of the campaign. Setting up shop and holding the fort is just blegh, especially since the tanks are the only real way to win. It's too predictable- it switches from Horde to Tank to Horde to Tank and then to the getaway. Solution? Give the survivors objectives to accomplish when waiting for evac. For instance, on the rooftop finale of No Mercy, the survivors ought to have to turn on a set of landing lights or beacons or some arbitrary objective during the first horde (a horde that doesn't stop coming until those objectives are met). Giving the survivors something to do while waiting for evac ensures closet/corner camping isn't a problem, and the objectives ought to reinforce teamwork.
Infected bosses are lame
There's 3 of them which are played the most. Usually, the setup is 2 hunters, 1 smoker, 1 boomer. Hunters are useless. Smokers are effective, but boomers are really the golden star winners when it comes to stopping a survivor team in Versus. Boomers are wonderfully designed, but hunters and smokers are, by in large, useless without the accompaniment of a zombie horde or a tank. New boss infected characters should be introduced, and old ones should be balanced or reinvented.
That's all I have to say so far on L4D. What are you thoughts on my thoughts, or what are your thoughts on L4D and how it can be improved?
But it needs a lot of fundamental work.
The AI Director is a joke
"Each time you play, it's a new experience". Sure- zombie hordes and tanks and witches spawn at greatly different times, but the average rate of them appearing on a map are pretty constant. I feel as if the Director is a largely useless part of L4D. The solution? To create actual dynamic experiences in L4D campaigns, let the director randomly choose from a range of "moods" that impact not only how the zombies spawn and attack, but how the actual environment looks and by cutting off / opening up new paths depending on the mood of the round.
For instance, a focus on hordes rather than tanks, witches, and bosses. Boomers will spawn more increasingly, hordes will be larger and more punishing. Tanks and witches should be nonexistent unless it is a crescendo moment. Hunters and smokers should be rare.
Alternatively, a focus on boss infected. Larger amounts of pre-populated zombies but very few horde moments. Cuts off the usual path of the campaign and opens up a longer, more precarious route that gives boss infected an extreme advantage (lots of cliffs, lots of heights, and lots of nooks and crannies for bosses to escape into), with usual tank and witch placements.
Moods could very well set the theme of the campaign itself- dawn, midnight, foggy, rainy, snow, lots of dramatic lights, very few lights, ambient sound changes, etc.
Finales suck
Finales suck. They're boring compared to the majority of the campaign. Setting up shop and holding the fort is just blegh, especially since the tanks are the only real way to win. It's too predictable- it switches from Horde to Tank to Horde to Tank and then to the getaway. Solution? Give the survivors objectives to accomplish when waiting for evac. For instance, on the rooftop finale of No Mercy, the survivors ought to have to turn on a set of landing lights or beacons or some arbitrary objective during the first horde (a horde that doesn't stop coming until those objectives are met). Giving the survivors something to do while waiting for evac ensures closet/corner camping isn't a problem, and the objectives ought to reinforce teamwork.
Infected bosses are lame
There's 3 of them which are played the most. Usually, the setup is 2 hunters, 1 smoker, 1 boomer. Hunters are useless. Smokers are effective, but boomers are really the golden star winners when it comes to stopping a survivor team in Versus. Boomers are wonderfully designed, but hunters and smokers are, by in large, useless without the accompaniment of a zombie horde or a tank. New boss infected characters should be introduced, and old ones should be balanced or reinvented.
That's all I have to say so far on L4D. What are you thoughts on my thoughts, or what are your thoughts on L4D and how it can be improved?
