So after what seemed an eternity of fucking around (see below), this year’s Christmas gaming bonanza has finally begun, and I’ve had a chance to play the two big-name co-op shooters of the year.  Which is better? Heir to the throne of zombie-slaying game perfection, Left 4 Dead 2? Or new contender– comic-booky, post-apocalyptic, RPG-hybrid thingy Borderlands? And more importantly, which game’s launch caused me the least misery?

Both games' launches featured plenty of ugliness

First to the fucking around. Apologies for the expression, but some sequences of events are just too tragic for civilised language to describe. Here’s what happened, in point form:

1. Left 4 Dead 2 is banned in it’s original form, thanks to Australia’s pathetic game rating system. They appeal, the appeal fails, and eventually it is announced that an edited game will be released here, sans decapitations and dismemberment. This is obviously unacceptable, so after much research into solutions (thanks bro!), we finally decided to get a UK friend to buy our Steam copies (yes, it works! no, I don’t take responsibility if you’re breaking local laws).

2. Borderlands is set to release on Tuesday of last week. We have pre-purchased, and there is a countdown timer of Steam. With one hour to go, suddenly the time jumps up to three days to go. Right. Turns out only Americans get it Tuesday. Oh well, fine, the Left 4 Dead 2 demo is due out the following day at 6:30am, my local time.

3. In the meantime, we discover through my brother’s constant research, that the wrong version of Borderlands has been pre-loaded on our computers. Even though (unlike L4D2) Borderlands was cleared for sale in Australia in it’s original form (decapitations and dismemberments intact), somehow the developers or the distributors have managed to send us the low violence edited version. What? Does everyone just assume we’re children now?

4. Anyway, just before 6:30am the next day, Valve announce that the L4D2 demo has been delayed until 4:30pm. Okay, no problems– my brother will be at work until then anyway. Several delays later, and it’s finally released sometime around 11am Thursday. Whew! We play it.

5. Borderlands arrives on Friday, and after some initial doubts, it seems that they’ve managed to patch the violence back in. So only three days and eighteen headaches later, I have both games.

Oh, you want to hear what they’re like? Unfortunately, I’ve already written far too much on the launch problems, so I’ll have to summarise quickly:

Borderlands: pretty, but hard on the eyes; has a decent sense of humour; inventive and fast-paced but grindy as hell; millions of weapons that are conceptually fun, but get old quickly; interface issues out the wazoo; co-op hectic and wacky but unbalanced and seems tacked on– two players worked much better than four.

Left 4 Dead 2 demo: takes the solid formula and makes it feel new; variety of new weapons, items and special infected mean loads more variety; new running climax events are much more thrilling than the stationary ones of the first game; you can decapitate zombies with an electric guitar!; even after only two levels, I’m in love again.

Borderlands: 3 stars

Left 4 Dead 2 demo: 5 stars (bring on November 17th!)

Launch for both games: EPIC FAIL!

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