I've played L4D very regularly since Christmas. The campaigns are nice to get you into the game and learn it. When I first played the campaigns they were very addictive. But I knew that their purpose was to be the long term content for the game. The
Versus mode is really what the game is made for and where you get your replay value from. It's 4 on 4 and the matches can be very fun.
The downsides of the game are the lobby system. It was clearly developed for the Xbox versions for it's simple, limited option interface. You cannot just pick a random public server to play (unless you use the openserverbrowser command, which gives mixed results finding a game).
What makes the game great is playing with friends that you know, or some that you get to know by playing a random game. So then u can start up lobbies (to create a game) with your friends and you can go from there. The comradery is really where its at, as you can be paired with some real idiots if u pick a random lobby. When the game first came out, if u played a random server (because your friends didn't have the game yet) you'd get in a habit of finding good players you've played with and adding them to your steam friends list. Or you get some friend's of friends and start up a game, and you increase your network of known ppl you play with.
I would say, if I didn't have any friends that had the game, it would have been shelved a while ago. But I've got a nice collection of buds from games of old that I play with and I've acquired quite a few new ones as well. Having a mic is really essential to the game IMO.
I'm always looking for buds to play with, so if you're interested, I have a good collection of friends that we play every other night (with our own server).
http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197960388475SteamID: Fulmar[ZeR]
