Left 4 Dead is an action-horror game known for its co-op play and zombies mechanics.
And according to ex-Valve writer Chet Faliszek, the game almost didn’t have them.
In a chat with YouTube channel Kiwi Talkz, he said Valve’s president Gabe Newell initially pushed back against the idea of zombies.
As Faliszek explained, “at the time, once I went to dinner with Gabe and he was like, ‘if you look at zombie movies, Night of the Living Dead is about racism, Dawn of the Dead is about consumerism…what is your game about?”
“And I’m like, well, it’s about working together, it’s the game itself, it’s a reflection of the game. We’d kind of get pushed more and more because I remember (Newell) said, ‘well, let’s not do zombies, zombies are just cheesy.”
Walking viewers through the concept of Left 4 Dead, Faliszek said: “So I was just like, why don’t we just (…) make some of the characters in the (game) aware that they’re in a zombie movie essentially. Zoe and Louis understand that like, ‘oh my god, this is the thing from movies,’ but they play it seriously.”
You can catch the whole interview here, with the bit about Gabe and zombies coming in around 9:30.
It’s been 14 years since Valve launched Left 4 Dead and it has gone on to sell over 12 million copies, become one of Valve’s top games and would inspire another wildly popular sequel – Left 4 Dead 2.
*Featured image from Valve
