Kicking off e3 with a bang Value has announced that Left 4 Dead 2 will be released in November of this year. Not many details were released except for the inclusion of a new weapon…a friggin’ chainsaw. The first Left 4 Dead was extremely profitable for Valve on both Steam and Xbox 360. If this one makes it to market this year, it would be an unprecedented turn around time for a sequel from Value. Half Life and Team Fortress have had really long gaps between their releases.
I think this may have been Microsoft’s doing. The original Left 4 Dead was quite short and hungry for DLC. We haven’t seen much to download for the game. All we have seen is the survival pack. Valve has a history of releasing content in small chunks. By, releasing a whole new retail package, this release fits the Microsoft model of getting sequels out to market as quickly as possible. If this game isn’t any longer than Left 4 Dead, then another $60 dollars maybe a bit much.