"Left Team 4 Modern War". Game Review.

"Is there a crack for it? Please give me the link" - a comment

from a user on a gaming site, written

after the publication of the news about the free Alien Swarm.

Valve simply astonishes with its actions. Just as people got over the free Portal, another game is already in line - Alien Swarm. Also free. Forever.

It all started a couple of years ago when a group of mod makers created a rather interesting mod for Unreal Tournament 2004. By the way, it can still be found on the Internet. Screenshots are attached below:


Then, Valve picked up the mod and suggested that the guys do a remake on the Source engine. After 2 years, a store page appears for this game, stating that the project will be completely free, and on July 19, this magnificent game was released. Yes, that's right; it's a game because installation of AS does not require any other game on the Source engine, unlike other mods. The quality of the work starts to manifest already in the main menu:

Additionally, what the mod makers created could easily be sold for about 10-15 dollars. What? It’s a clone of L4D, you say? You are mistaken. Very much so…

Left team 4 modern war.

Alien Swarm is a mixture of at least 4 games. Yes, it has a piece of Left 4 Dead. From it, AS took a powerful enough but somewhat clumsy matchmaking system and cooperative play for four, but there are changes here. Fallen teammates cannot be resurrected; they return to the team after the mission is completed. And when someone dies, an impressive slo-mo effect occurs, the cameras of all other players zoom in on your deceased comrade, and he falls to the floor with a Hollywood-like grace:

Another game from which AS took a substantial piece is… Team Fortress 2. Tactics from Left 4 Dead will not work if there is no medic in the team who reliably heals teammates:

An engineer who can hack doors is also as necessary as air:

After all, you want to survive, right?

The leveling system from Modern Warfare fits excellently into the game. There are a total of 27 levels of upgrades. Gaining experience unlocks new weapons and items:

When the difficulty level is lowered, the amount of experience received decreases. Besides standard machine guns and various types of ammunition, AS has a flamethrower:

an electric rifle:

several types of turrets and other treats. Some weapons are available exclusively to one class. For example, a medic's healing gun:

By the way, there are only 8 characters in the game, 2 for each class:

And Gears of War gifted AS a rather interesting reloading system. When changing the magazine at the bottom of the screen, above the information window about your character, a bar with a small mark appears at the beginning:

If you press the reload button in time, you'll get a time bonus; if you miss, the weapon will take several times longer to reload.

Moreover, the game has a simply brilliant feature. After completing a mission, a window with a map opens where you can draw with the mouse. This helps to plan your actions. Naturally, not everyone uses this function for its intended purpose:

And the snow falls…

The gameplay is simple and straightforward - just shoot the little creatures that are crawling out from every crack. Thankfully, there is plenty of weaponry in the game, each with its own peculiarities - for example, the electric rifle has a larger damage radius. There are also alternative firing modes – the rifles have an under-barrel grenade launcher, which is great for taking out large groups of enemies. There’s only one campaign consisting of 7 missions, which you can complete in about an hour if you desire. But the developers made sure the game wouldn’t become tedious. They added an editor to create anything your heart desires. And – oh, miracle! – less than a day after the network release, amateur maps began to appear. So there’s no need to worry. At particularly important moments, everyone's favorite slo-mo comes into play, when the number of enemy cockroaches becomes outrageously high. Cramped corridors often give way to open spaces – the snow outside looks stunning! By the way, before venturing online, you can try yourself in Offline Practice - completing the campaign with bots. Perhaps another downside, besides the overly short campaign, is the absence of the Director from Left 4 Dead. After several playthroughs of the same levels, you start to memorize the location of every monster that will pop out of any corner.

And what's inside?

The graphics are quite decent for 2010. Yes, the engine is over 5 years old, but it is constantly being enhanced with new effects, and that saves it from inevitable aging. The snow looks absolutely amazing:

Shaders and detail also please the eye – even when zoomed in, everything looks quite decent. There are quite a few slowdowns – while TF2 and L4D consistently yield around 30 frames for me, in particularly important moments, it drops to 10-15. All screenshots were taken at maximum settings with anti-aliasing and vertical synchronization off. But at such a resolution, this is hardly noticeable. In general, judge the graphics by the attached screenshots yourself.

The sounds in the game are excellently chosen. While something from HL 2 does flicker, the developers minimized all of it. The dialogues, soundtrack, and gunshots are magnificent.

There are also no issues with the interface. The controls are convenient, and you quickly get used to them.

The game deserves a solid five. The short playthrough is compensated for by excellent co-op and the map editor. And its free nature adds a few more points to the game. All in all, we await new gifts from Valve.