Left 4 Dead 2 Primer Guide

You're one of four left. Think about that for a second…one of four humans left after the viral outbreak turned the rest of the city into zombies. It's up to you and three others to work your way through the dangerous streets to a series of safe houses, and finally to a point of extraction…five times over. It's not easy.

Here's what you'll find in GameSpot's Left 4 Dead 2 Game Guide:

• General Tips: Check out our tips for venturing through the zombie-infested city.
• Infected Types: Find out more about the various zombie types you'll be encountering.
• Achievements: Check out the achievement list!

General Strategies

Objective

You: Human. The three others? Friends. Them? Zombies--shoot them.

That's Left 4 Dead in a nutshell. More specifically, your group of four will have to work your way through the zombie-infested streets broken up into 5 campaigns. Each campaign is sub-divided into areas with the goal generally being to make it to the safe house at the end of each one.

Upon reaching a safe house, close the door once everyone's safely inside to complete the level and move onto the next. It's important to note that everything carries over between areas, such as your health, weapons, and ammo. Thankfully, safe houses generally contains a variety of items, including health packs, weapons, and ammo caches allowing you to stock up before venturing back outside.

Surviving

You'll find your health bar conveniently located in the bottom-right corner of the screen, with your teammates' displayed just left. While the meter obviously correlates to how much health you have remaining, it also changes colors, from green, to yellow, to red, signifying how close to death you are, making it easy to spot who's in trouble at a glance. Even worse, as if being close to death wasn't bad enough, your running speed decreases as you take damage, making it increasingly difficult to avoid attacks and keep pace with your teammates.

If you run out of health, you'll wind up incapacitated. In this state, your only hope for survival is to have a teammate revive you before you bleed out and die. If revived, you'll temporarily regain 30 Health Points, but this too will slowly tick its way back down to one unless you can find a First Aid Kit--and fast. Assuming you're incapacitated again, you can be revived up to twice more, but you will die if you fail to be healed by the third incapacitation. Thankfully, the use of a First Aid Kit resets this counter, allowing you to be revived up to three times more.

If a survivor does wind up dying, they can come back in one of a few ways:

• Defibrillator Units: Defibrillator units enable you to revive a fallen teammate right then and there, but you can only use each one once.
• Rescue Closets: Dead teammates will respawn in "rescue closets" throughout the campaign--look for their glowing silhouette and free them, as they can't do it themselves.
• New Chapter: Any fallen survivors will rejoin you at the start of a new chapter.

Items

First Aid Kits

First aid kits are the primary means for healing yourself. Now here's the thing: First Aid Kits only restore 80% of the health you have lost and not 80% of your total health bar. In other words, the closer to death you are, the more health you'll regain by using it. Because of this, it's a constant balancing act of deciding when to use it. On the one hand, the closer to death you are, the more effective it is. On the other hand, you may die before being able to use it! In general, we found it's best to use it as soon as your health bar turns red--this enables you to regain a large percentage of your health, while giving you enough of a buffer to withstand a few more attacks while you heal yourself.

Pain Pills

Pain pills work a bit differently than the first aid kit. Instead of restoring a percentage of your health, they grant an immediate boost of 50 health points. Unfortunately, their effect is temporary, and your health will slowly begin to drop to its pre-boost level at a rate of one health point every three seconds or so (the total effect lasts for about 2.5 minutes). In effect, their only purpose is to keep you alive long enough until you can get healed properly, via a first aid kit. As such, save it until you're up against a significant threat, or are near death.

Adrenaline Shots

Adrenaline Shots have two benefits:

• You will run faster and perform actions significantly faster for 15 seconds, such as healing yourself or others, reviving teammates, and pouring gas when playing Scavenger.
• Adrenaline Shots also provide a temporary health boost of 25 health points, similar to the Pain Pills. And like the pain pills, their effect will slowly deplete at a rate of one health point every three seconds (or a minute and 15 seconds total).

Defibrillator Units

The Defibrillator Unit is a one-use item that allows you to fully revive any fallen comrades.

Pipe Bomb

The pipe bomb's incessant beeping actually lures the nearby infected to it before exploding, clearing them out. Use it to distract large groups of enemies enabling you to skate by unharmed.

Boomer Bile

These glass containers house a small sample of the Boomer's Bile. Why would you want such a thing? Because you can use it to draw out the horde wherever you toss it, including at other infected (such as the Special Types), making for easy pickings.

Combat

You can hold two weapons at any given time. One's your primary, the other is your secondary, which can either be a pistol or melee weapon. Pistols have unlimited ammo, and thus it's best to use them when facing weak or small groups of enemies.

Melee Attacks

Regardless of what weapon you have equipped, using a melee attack is always an option. Though weak, they'll briefly push back and stun any normal infected, giving you a chance to either escape, reload, or follow-up with another melee attack. Keep it in mind for when you're surrounded, or if you run out of ammo. However, if you attempt to melee too quickly without resting, the game will force a delay between each attack, as indicated by the timer that appears around your reticule.

Infected Types

There are many types of zombies in Left 4 Dead 2. Most of them consist of the "horde" type, but you'll also frequently encounter one of the seven "special" infected types.

The Horde

The horde consists largely of your usual, run of the mill zombie. They're weak, they're dumb, but they make up for this with their numbers. If you encounter one by himself, it's a safe bet there's more--lots more--nearby. Tackling them doesn't take require any special skills, so long as the survivors stick together.

Special Infected

The Boomer

Boomers are the zombies that look like they've hit up the drive through a few too many times. These lumbering giants are slow, and can be identified by the belches they let loose. However, their bulging bellies house a dangerous bile that summon massive amounts of the horde if it gets on you. There are two ways the bile can get on you: by being vomited on, or standing anywhere close to the Boomer upon their destruction.

The Charger

Chargers are the big nasty guys with the single huge arm. As their name implies, they charge toward their victims to unleash the pain. These guys are quick, so it's important to keep your distance.

The Hunter

Hunters are pretty much the opposite of the Boomer: small and fast. You'll recognize them by the hoodie they wear over their head at all times. They'll attempt to pounce on you from a distance, making them tricky to keep tabs on.

The Smoker

Like many real-life smokers, you'll hear this guy coughing and hacking from a ways away. Their core attack is to grab the survivors from afar with their long tongue, then pull them towards him to inflict even more damage, rendering the victim helpless. If this happens to one of your teammates, either shoot the tongue, or follow it to the smoker itself and do him in before he can inflict further damage. As their final act, this enemy leaves behind a cloud of smoke upon defeat, making it difficult to see.

The Tank

You'll know this roided-up baddie's nearby if you notice the screen shaking. As you may have guessed from their appearance, these guys are very strong and very deadly. It's important to keep your distance, as their punch attack not only deals heavy damage, but will also knock you to kingdom come. However, their long-range rock-hurling attack is nothing to be sneezed at either, as it causes a damage to a wide-area near where it lands.

The Witch

If you hear a girl crying (and it's not you), you know a witch is nearby. These girls are actually harmless as long as they remain unaware of your presense. However, if you do catch their attention by making a loud noise, shining your flashlight at them, or shooting them, you'd better get ready to counter! If alerted, the witch will make a mad dash for whoever disturbed them and knock them down repeatedly, inflicting massive damage. While the victim isn't totally incapacitated, the three other survivors should try and take down the witch quickly to minimize damage.

The Spitter

The spitters are very similar to the boomer, except smaller, weaker, and full of poison instead of bile. The poison, which she spits, as well as releases upon death, harms anyone that comes into contact with it, so wait for is to dissipate first before proceeding.

The Jockey

This freaky-looking dude attacks by jumping onto your back and steering you into trouble, all the while pummeling you with his other fist. You do have some very loose control while he's riding you, but it's not much. The only way to get him off is for the other survivors to shoot him off.

Left 4 Dead 2 Achievements

Note that there are Spoilers on this list.