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Left 4 Dead patch goes live

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Left 4 Dead patch goes live
By David Hollingworth
Jan 16, 2009 | 7 Comments
Tags: Left | 4 | Dead | patch | goes | live

"Fixed Smoker tongue tolerance" may just be the greatest sentence ever constructed.

Acclaimed Zombie-killing game Left 4 Dead has just been patched, and the usual raft of bugs have been fixed - and there's been quite a few gameplay tweaks as well.

The biggest changes add up to a much tougher time for Survivors. Hunters will now find it much easier to pounce on meleeing survivors, Witches and Tanks will spawn more often, and closer to the main escape route (awesome - no more getting the Tank, getting all excited, and then wasting precious clobbering time getting to the fight), and the Smoker's tongue (I can't help but giggle every time I type that) has had a veritable raft of improvements.

Here's the full list:

General
* Fixed Survivors being able to climb surfaces marked for versus infected only
* Fixed a class of SurvivorBot bugs dealing with rescuing downed players
* Players can no longer grab ladders while flying through the air after a Tank punch
* Shooting near a car with an alarm that has already fired the alarm will no longer make chirping noises
* Improved loading time
* Fixed mini-gun physics exploit
* Fixed propane tanks (and other physics objects) causing players to fall through elevators
* Fixed rare achievement bug issues
* Fixed several map exploits
* Fixed various match making issues
* Fixed NAT traversal issues

Versus Changes
* Added HUD elements to show status of other infected players
* Changed color of infected player name in chat to red
* Fixed exploit where players could spawn infected bots
* Fixed instance where a Survivor changing to the infected team would be attacked by infected bots
* Normalised special infected melee damage
* Made the following client commands cheat protected: "Kill" and "explode"
* Fixed exploit where infected players could run away and teleport back to gain health
* Players can only change teams once per map
* Players can't change teams while other players are still loading
* Tank spawns at the same % through the map for both teams in versus mode
* Made the Tank and Witch spawn directly on the escape route
* Increased chance of getting the Tank or Witch
* Fixed team swap issue

Hunter
* Easier to pounce a Survivor who is meleeing
* Increased Minimum damage a Hunter pounce does

Smoker
* Fixed Smoker tongue tolerance
* Smoker now has to be killed or the tongue destroyed for the tongue to break
* Survivors cannot bash someone off the tongue until the Survivor being pulled is paralysed or hanging
* Tongue attacks that fail to paralyse or hang a Survivor will use the shorter ability delay timer
* Fixed cases where the ability timer was not using the correct time
* Fixed case where you could point at a Survivor but not register a tongue hit
* Fixed Smoker tongue not targeting and landing properly through PZ ghosts
* Smoker tongue does damage every second while dragging paralysed Survivors

Tank
* Bashable objects now appear with a red glow
* Tanks hitting a car with an alarm disables the alarm permanently
* Tank frustration timer is only reset by hitting Survivors with rocks or fists
* Reduced autoshotgun damage against Tanks

Witch
* Witch spawns at the same % through the map for both teams
* Avoids spawning within a certain percentage of the tank
* Fixed an exploit where the Witch could be woken up and tricked into attacking Survivors

The patch will be auto-applied when you next log onto Steam for PC players, and will be available to Xbox players shortly.

Tongue. Hee-hee!

 
 
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7 Comments
Thoughts on this article? Add a comment below.
CamSkene
Jan 16, 2009 11:33 AM
So far the Infected HUD is working really well, shows the spawn timers of all the other infected, allowing for group attacks to a greater extent. I'm also liking the changes to the Smoker's tongue, it doesn't seem to break as much, which is good.
Dysfunctional16
Jan 16, 2009 11:43 AM
"Tank spawns at the same % through the map for both teams in versus mode" - This is a big one for me - I was sick of the other team getting 2 tanks as infected and our team getting 0 :(.
I was in a sever in which the infected team already had a tank spawned and running around even before we had left the safe house!! Cheating SOB Director! :p

They still need a fair bit of work on the automatch. I don't understand why they couldn't keep the same server joining system with a CANCEL button on the loading screen (even if it only works some of the time). I am aware of the 'openserverbrowser' command but even the server browser fails.

All qualms aside, this is a really fun game and a few more patches like this will make it awesome!
Hawkeye
Jan 16, 2009 11:47 AM
Oh, I feel your pain there, Dys. That Tank imbalance could be a real killer.

Though, being on the other side, and getting two chances to POUND-SMASH-THROW the survivors was always a hoot!

- DH
Dysfunctional16
Jan 16, 2009 12:01 PM
:O So YOU'RE the one!?!?
Hawkeye
Jan 16, 2009 12:18 PM
RAWRRR *smash*
N3M3SiS
Jan 16, 2009 2:58 PM
Do you think my girlfriend will find it offensive if next time we're being intimate I shout "Boomer!" and blow everywhere?!
Hawkeye
Jan 16, 2009 5:15 PM
Thank you for RUINING SEX.

- DH
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