Left 4 Dead (***1/2)
a review of
Left 4 Dead
a videogame developed by Valve
and published by Publisher
text by Samuel Kite
score: 
1/2 (out of four)
1/2The time when human beings began burying their dead is usually considered an important step in our evolution. Every time I’ve heard this suggested, it is meant to be an ‘aaaaaah’ moment, but there’s no exposition. The implication, I think, of this statement, is that we are *meant* to understand that this was the time when human beings truly began to recognize each other and to care about one another. If you care to take it to a superstitious place, this is a sign of understanding that there is a human soul, and the vain hope that when it disappears, it must be because it went somewhere nice.
The evidence of history shows us that human beings do not care enough about each other’s dead bodies to avoid making more, and that the human soul is corruptible, and destroyable inside a human being that is essentially alive. I don’t just mean a business school education, either. I’m talking about legitimate brain damage, Alzheimer’s, or retardation. However, one thing is certain. People do not want to die.
Seeing a dead body represents at least 2 things. That mortality is an utter certainty (cheers!), and that the people you like will be gone at some point (especially in cases where the body belonged to someone you liked). Most animals do not make exceptional effort around dealing with a dead body of one of their own. In some cases, they might eat it, but for the most part, mammals do recognize their own dead, and get upset about it. When they do, the depression, vital in as much as it comes from intense attachment to members of their own species, which serves survival when they are alive, can become a serious survival concern after the sucking void of their absence threatens to defeat the hope for the barest joy in a world seemingly filled with pointless pain punctuated by brief moments of panic and ennui.
From an evolutionary standpoint, when a behavior goes wrong and results in poor survival–that is no surprise. It would be surprising if a behavior never went haywire and presented in a way or at a point in time which made it a difficulty for the animal instead of a benefit. Nearly all life recognize death in some sense, whether by acknowledging cellular damage and repairing it, or through more elaborate survival behaviors. Generally, recognizing death is helpful in avoiding it, and a good first step in surviving as a going concern. To recognize death in a more preemptive way, by seeing a dead animal similar to yourself and realizing that it is not just a food source, but in fact, a symbol of potential danger is just a furtherance of what neurons do every second of every day; detect pain.
But, because pain is something to be avoided, behavior becomes about minimizing it, rather than minimizing its causes. Burying our dead, then, is really just a way to stop the feelings we have when we see a dead body (feelings which are usually an assistance in detecting danger). As a class of behavior, it’s an extension of jerking off. Do for yourself what the environment won’t do for you. In some ways, it’s like opiate addiction. However, in our highly survivable circumstances, ignoring danger by burying our dead is a better pay off than forcing ourselves to stay near one for a while while it decomposes, and being depressed about it. In essence, the flow chart for dealing with a human body is the same as that for dealing with excrement: bury to reduce risk of disease and maintain a better mood. In the nomadic context, the dead often weren’t buried at all, but left exposed in a particular place which was far from the normal routes of travel. Burying with distance.
Burying our dead, then, isn’t a huge advancement. It’s a natural progression in the capacity for self-manipulation. The only question really worth asking is what happened first; did the species which preceded us ingest fermented fruit and interesting plantlife to get high, or did they start jerking off, and figured out how to get high later? Was pleasure seeking a general behavior that predated escapism? How much overlap is there?
Another thing. When some animals, particularly predators, particularly cats, dogs, and us are confused (which is usually in the course of trying to determine if something is food) we tilt our heads to the side. The eye receives an image which is ‘upside down’, though what that I means, really, is subject to speculation when it’s all that you ever ‘see’. The brain evolved around interpreting input in that context. One can assume that there is no element of the construction that requires processing an image to flip it. We just think upside down to compensate. We have bifocal vision, and unlike chameleons (sadly), we use them to look at the same stuff all the time. Hooray depth perception, but you can usually notice when your eyes are doing the work to determine where their pictures line up. Presumably, when you tilt your head to the side, the brain must take the data from both eyes, determine how the image has rotated and then start feeding shapes into the rest of your brain to see if you recognize anything.
What seems weird is that we deliberately tilt our heads when confused, prompting that compensating processing to kick in. We are deliberately manipulating our own visual cortex. I’m going to assume it’s to gather data about the shape of something from a different perspective–possibly to better judge things like size, posture, and whether it has a nice ass.
While we have a nuanced ability to come to grips with some things in our environment, we’re still wired for a prehistoric panic that signals the presence of spiders, or snakes, or the talons of a bird, or for some people, rats. Sometimes it’s hard to know what is the terror that comes from something unexpected moving in the living room, and what is the terror that comes from a very specific shape that upsets us, but it seems like we have some very specific wiring that terrifies us in the presence of known predators.
On that subject, we haven’t had to deal with the aforementioned predators to a great degree for such a long time that, now, we keep most of our natural predators (and even some of our pests) as pets. We’re more inclined to snuggle with a tiger than feel a cold chill run down our spine. Though, obviously, the tiger is probably not going to be too snuggily unless it’s been trained, or bred into the most intractable scourge on the earth; the common housecat. Or puma. Or whatever they were originally. Ocelots.
No, for the longest time, the biggest thing we’ve had to fear, aside from being crushed by something delicious to eat, that also happens to have hooves and a strong instinct for survival, is other people. People who eat people are the creepiest people around. Is it any wonder that, when sleep apnea causes your brain to become oxygen deprived, you awake to a hallucination of a human figure standing over you, choking you, rather than a hallucination of a cat sitting on your face, pressing it’s impertinent little butthole to your lips and clawing your neck while it dreams about mice (a far more likely scenario for a cat owner)?
The first people were black. For the longest time, all people were black. To the original human, the scariest human forms were white, because they were unfamiliar, because they were colored like bones, and because people get pale when they’re sick (or dead). The challenge to being a social predator is living around other predators and being social. In the case of the earliest people, a familiar person has to be something good, despite the fact that a person, in general, is a dangerous threat. To the european or chinese descendant, the familiarity of the pale human form overrides the disturbing and threatening connotations of the form itself. Familiar human beings which become something monstrous, trying to kill and eat us, are unusually alien; the whole idea of the zombie is that the transference of the familiar and beloved person into a corpse, which is a thing which does not represent that person accurately (for instance, it has fewer hobbies, less to say at parties…), plays a trick on us. But, unfamiliar human beings (who we never invested in emotionally or otherwise–because they are strange to us), when they are trying to kill and eat us, are simply reinforcing their unfamiliarity. Which is easily the least terrifying part about them (maybe for them, this is normal). Cannibalism is a token branding put on people different from us. To the imaginary representative of all black people, the insanity of white people is personified in Silence of the Lambs. For 100s of years, the picture of the cannibal in european culture was swarthy vague concoction of samoan and african. The point isn’t that one group is a cannibal and others aren’t–all groups practice cannibalism occasionally (mmm, Medusa bacon!)–the point is that the demonification of the (already scary) human form is easier when it has unfamiliar attributes. On the subject of the colors black and white and their connotations, Melville put it better (and longer, if you can believe it) than I would ever want to.
Hopefully we laugh to diffuse tension, but it’s just as often that we simply get more tense. Laughter is strangled by concentration, and the more we have to focus on a task (for instance, an awkward, difficult, or needlessly complicated one), the more likely we’ll be tense while we do it–even when there’s nothing particularly scary going on. What’s really irritating, is when someone takes advantage of our weakness in this way, and forces us to do something awkward, just so they can make us tense in a situation where their own, for example, completely bullshit laughable artistic endeavor would otherwise make us laugh.
The best part about Left 4 Dead is that I thought about none of the above drivel while playing it. I just had a really great time. Sometimes Analysis makes something sweeter.
Sometimes analysis is something you have to do to get someone’s stupid crap out of your brain.
No matter who you are, you’ll love Left 4 Dead. Unless you hate first person shooters. Maybe even then, you’ll like it.
Unlike some bullshit zombie games.
January 12th, 2010 at 351
Very interesting analysis. I enjoyed reading this. It isactually so good that I personally don’t care one bit that it is only marginally related to the game. Inteligence is good even out of context. But it seems to me that the argument ‘burying the dead has nothing to do with recognizing other human beings, we kill other hman beings as if there is nothing to it’ belongs more in the mouth of the attention-seeking, forcefully-cynical teenager than that of a sane writer. You have all that about familiar and unfamiliar human forms. Woldn’t it make sense that we think twice about taking the lifes of familiars ans less so when killing unfamilars? That level of pessimism about our species sounds highly suspicious, not to mention deterministic. What if they’re wrong? What if we are more than just machines whose sole function is suvival? Just saying…
January 12th, 2010 at 457
This was a complete waste of time. Even when Tim spouts out “drivel”, it may actually be connected to the topic at hand. But when you disregard 95% of your own writing (“…I thought about none of the above drivel while playing it.”), why should we be forced to read it?
“Sometimes analysis is something you have to do to get someone’s stupid crap out of your brain.” I wished it had actually stayed there.
This “review” is nothing but an excuse to ramble without actually presenting and defending an opinion. The last 3 sentences should have been thrown away, and thus you would be left with nothing. I just hope someone reads this comment first, before actually wasting any time with the article.
January 12th, 2010 at 906
I’m happy this website is finally updated. I’ve been checking it almost every day since i found it. If not updates (none so far), I read an old article. The articles are so good I’ll read them retrospectively. Well done.
Not that I’ve been paying any attention to the authors of each articles (I will do from now on), is Samuel Kite a newby writing here?
And as for the actual article, bloody fantastic. Not much else to say, other then it was thought provoking and amusing; I thought all the burrying dead stuff was just a typical extended prelude as Tim does. Then, at the botton; “Oh yeah L4D was awesome”. Big smiley. Hearty approval.
January 12th, 2010 at 1333
lol
January 13th, 2010 at 715
@Wild_bull
The tone of that part is meant to be a tut-tut to the dual standard of our reverance for the dead and our willingness to declare human beings as ‘other’ and then treat them as objects. I like to think I’m cynical within reason.
There are constraints placed on us, though, survival being the most obvious. Even if it’s not about ‘kill or be killed’ there’s a practical and immediately obvious test of anyone’s morality that occurs in the workplace on a regular basis; are you willing to lose your job to do what’s ‘right’ in some given situation. Literally anyone can say they are faced with that choice if they truly sit down and consider the consequences of what they do, whether it’s directly ruling on someone’s fate (say, as an insurance adjustor or load provider), or as a participant in some activity (working at mcdonalds and factory farming, or the overabundance of carbs in the american diet). The rational response to that kind of moral conundrum is that there’s only so far you can go looking out for the rest of the world without looking out for yourself.
The question of whether it’s easier to kill someone and then mourn them, or let them live is that kind of question.
January 13th, 2010 at 2223
Nice troll
January 15th, 2010 at 1301
I hate first-person games, and also hate gratuitous blood and guts and gibs and gore and stuff, so I’m pretty sure (92% to be somewhat exact) I’d hate this game.
…though if the blood and guts and gibs and gore are non-gratuitous (or toggable or whatevs) I’d be slightly less inclined to hate the game (say, 84%), but that’s the kind of thing I’m too lazy to find out.
Nice review, though.
January 18th, 2010 at 1057
what about the joy of cooperation? the one time i played L4D it was me and my bros against the world
January 19th, 2010 at 1118
@ Tlon
Yes, but you were still competing against the rest of the world, right? Sociobiology has lots of beautiful explanations about how we love people who hate the same other people as we do for those inclined to pay attention to their crazy-fuck ramblings. Or something like that.
@ cosmicmuffet
You seem to accept the idea – the very widespread, very reasonable, probably correct idea – that individual welfare andgroup welfare can be antagonic. That makes sense. Living in society implies a tightrope, a difficult compromise between taking care of one’s ownself and taking care of others. Personally, though, I have the impression that putting things like this is a little misleading. Society, the group, offers us may things. We can specialize and be professionals instead of auiring all the skills necessary to live on our own. You do your job, someone else builds your house, grows your food, etc. The bushmen tend to disagree with that approach and everyone hunts, build huts, cooks, etc. Different strkes for diferent folks, but think: We tend to fell violated whenever sociey imposes a restriction on us. People are pissed off by having to pay taxes, not being allowed to masturbate in movie theatres, and so on. But where would we be without all this huge social machinery? Not in a website discussinh videagames, that’s for sure. I fell that the more we dedicate effort towards the betterment of society, through work, activim, and so on, the more comfortable the compromise between individual good and collective good will be for everyone. The rampant individualism we see these days, people suing everyone else for frivolous reasons, feeling offended in their rights for very little, not hesitating to disrespect other people’s rights – may be a transition phase, with 1930s totalitarism being the other pole of the oscilation. I know ‘make sacrifices for the collective good’ sounds stanilistic, but I hope enlightened, better people in the future will *voluntarilly*make that choice, instead of being forced to it. Strong societies have so much more to offer individuals. There is ‘enlightened self-interest’ and whatnot.
Please do not misunderstand. Maybe you’re right and I’m talking nonsense here. I do believe your cynicism is perfectly reasonable and makesperfect good sense. You are a videogame reviewer, you have no hung-ups about not being all optimitic as if you were surrounded by young minds, teaching middle school. I, however, have seen my share of middle school teaching. I entirelly respect your point of view. Also, you write very well. I understand almost everything you write. Unlike Tim Rogers. I often can’t bring myself to understand the first thing about the point he is trying to make. I think he might not necessarilly makes much of a point of always being undestood. Maybe he despises people like me, who does not understand his brilliance. Maybe that’s why he never answered an email I wrote him. My questions must have seemed stupid before his awaken eyes. Or maybe he didn’t have the time. Oh well, whathever. Good job, keep it up.
January 19th, 2010 at 1631
… people who tell me I’m cynical for discussing reality make me cynical when I’m trying to be idealistic.
January 20th, 2010 at 323
I never meant to suggest you were not being realistic. I believe you are. I apologize for offending or disheartening you in any way. I was just sharing a tentative opinion, that’s all.
February 3rd, 2010 at 1151
I have to agree with Nybble, this “review” was anything but one.
When I read something to do with games, I expect the game mentioned. Along with your Assassin’s Creed review, it becomes more of an analysis on life than the actual game.
I know you have to expect it on this site a bit, but really, I like to read about games. This is about aspects of human life and death. Not one connection to Left 4 Dead until the very end, where yes, you say that none of this made you think of Left 4 Dead.
Great.
February 3rd, 2010 at 1159
Also, lol, since I know my last comment was filtered, I have to say I regret saying it was not a review. I’ve read many articles on this site but only read the explanation page now.
I don’t take back anything else I said, though.
March 9th, 2010 at 936
Come on. This article has all the pomposity and rambling that keeps me coming back to the site, but none of the game-specific content or love of Rogers/Parker/whoever.
Can’t you talk about how uncrunchy the Standing 180 Spin move is, compared to the one in mirror’s edge? Or about how the whole game is crammed with redundant and obnoxious GUI widgets? I don’t want a progress bar for opening doors, a progress bar for being grabbed by a monstrous tongue, and a progress bar for receiving first aid. Doesn’t Left 4 Dead feel like $29 discount game that came out before the guys at Valve were old and wise enough to make Half-life 1? And even that’s way more of a compliment than I want it to be.
The only thing I ever liked in the Left 4 Dead series is the sound you hear when you smash a zombie in the face with a frying pan or electric guitar. That was genius. I kept laughing about it when I played the Left 4 Dead 2 demo, and one day a stranger I was playing with kept making me laugh even more by personally imitating the sounds with his voice over the microphone.
Oh and the thing where you’re on the ground dying and madly firing your dual pistols right up until you lose consciousness and expire, in a vain attempt to aid your friends or simply out of your own desperate wrath. That was good. (Did you see the Dawn of the Dead remake? I couldn’t believe when I read that Zack Snyder was the one who made it. It’s great. Mostly.)
I WANT 20 pages of philosophy about mortality and decay, but I want a heavenly treatment of the game too (I say heavenly because you gave it 3.5 stars). Before I read the recent Sam Kite reviews I was convinced that Actionbutton.net was the heaven and hell of videogames.
Far Cry 2 was given hell. Outrun 2 was cuddled. In the Left 4 Dead review here, nothing happens, or worse.
March 9th, 2010 at 1303
Those bars add tension. Do you know how much better your brain tastes when it dies tense? It’s unbelievable. You wouldn’t believe it.
In any case, this is clearly my Resident Evil 5 review.
March 12th, 2010 at 1916
This review is outside my comfort zone for a video game review, and therefore awful.
sorry guy guess you’re just a bad writer