Left 4 Dead 2 pre-order demo on Live

By Tom Bramwell Published 28 October, 2009

PC version held back to today.

Valve has said that the Left 4 Dead 2 demo is now available to those who pre-ordered the game on Xbox 360, and that the PC version will follow today via Steam.

Those of you without pre-orders can access the demo on 3rd November if you're a PC gamer or Xbox Live Gold subscriber, or on 10th November if you're an Xbox Live Silver sub.

The demo features a section of The Parish, set in New Orleans' French Quarter, and can be played by 1-4 players either locally or over the internet - although Xbox is limited to two-player split-screen locally.

Check out our hands-on with The Parish to see what you're up against, or you can read about Swamp Fever and Dark Carnival elsewhere.

Oh, and if you're heading down to the Eurogamer Expo in Leeds today or London on Friday/Saturday, be sure to check out the Left 4 Dead 2 demo area, where different delights can be found...

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (22) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • ZuluHero #1 2 years ago

    Played this loads last night, all very familiar, which if you are a fan of the original is no bad thing. Its very fun :)

  • DAN.E.B #2 2 years ago

    does it matter where i preorder from?
    i ordered it this morning from play.com but havent been emailed the code.

  • charming_fox #3 2 years ago

    Aparently it was GAME you had to order it from and there were no codes left as of a few days ago, sir.
    Edited by 1 at 28/10/09 @ 09:15

  • ZuluHero #4 2 years ago

    @DAN:SOLO

    Unfortunately i think that early access is a GAME exclusive, unless you pre-order the PC version from STEAM. If you feel let down, you can always go into a GAME store and ask to pre-order it. You don't have to give a deposit and they should give you a card with a code on it. You're not obliged to buy the game from them when it is released, but it might be considered poor etiquette.

    TBH, given the current trends for retailers to out-do each other by offering these 'incentives', the gamer is the only one being screwed over, so i say everything is fair game.

  • matrim83 #5 2 years ago

    I hope they officially put Split screen in the PC version as well. The unofficial method worked pretty decently last time around but was a bit annoying to set up with the gamepad. With a bit more polish its really doable.

  • DAN.E.B #6 2 years ago

    thaks guys i will try game and hope they have more codes
    i,ll be buying it from blockbusters tho as i know a guy that works there and will let me have it on the wednesday!

  • kinky_mong #7 2 years ago

    It is a great demo. It's completely erased any doubts I had that it was too soon for a sequel, it just feels so polished and all the additions are great. November 20th can't come soon enough!

  • DefdumBlindkid #8 2 years ago

    Eh? So if you pre-order a game you get access to a 'demo'- WTF is the point in that?

  • bodypopper #9 2 years ago

    @defdumb
    Surely it's obvious. Valve is saying,' Thanks for pre-ordering and therefore saying you'll 'definitely' buy the game and want to have it on launch day. To reward you, here's a chance to get playing it early.'
    I don't know why people find this so hard to grasp - unless it's just sour grapes as they can't play the demo early without giving up their credit card number to a retailer.
    Those who are unsure and don't pre-order can still play the demo a few weeks prior to the game coming out and decide to buy it then. Or not.

  • Xerx3s #10 2 years ago

    I thought that demo's where supposed to sway a consumer to buy a product, not the other way around. As much as I loved L4D1, I won't be picking this up for some time. To many good games to encourage this kind of marketing nonsense.

  • Mooglepies #11 2 years ago

    I can see the headlines now; Valve PC Product delayed, literally dozens of people surpised.

  • skillian #12 2 years ago

    This is one game that you can pretty much guarantee will not see a last-minute delay on PC. I'd bet my house on that.

  • CouldntResist #13 2 years ago

    You should have seen the nerd rage in the steam forums. Hilarious :o).

  • gorf #14 2 years ago

    There goes Christmas

  • bad09 #15 2 years ago

    "Eh? So if you pre-order a game you get access to a 'demo'- WTF is the point in that? "

    It's becoming the norm now sadly. If it's something that will sell to quite a few anyway many are now using the early "DEMO" as a hook for the stupid people who can't wait to play a game to pre-order rather than to show off your the game and entice people to buy like it used to be.

    Still we ALL get to play the demo of L4D next week (the 3rd I think) pre-order or not so who cares......

  • DAN.E.B #16 2 years ago

    yeah i preordered it online at game rang them for the codes downloaded it then canceled it sweet
    its a must buy for me! new witches music is a bit shit tho!

  • 8bitMofo #17 2 years ago

    Demo has already been ripped, awesome!

    Thanks Valve :)

  • PlugMonkey #18 2 years ago

    Bad09: Considering that there have clearly been some technical issues on the PC side of things, do you think it might be possible that the 'limited release' demo might be little more than a beta test of what happens when this number of people all pre-load a game, and then try and go live, at exactly the same time? This morning my home PC was basically telling me that the Steam server was too overloaded for me to finish downloading the demo.

    Better to have a trial run and a 1-day delay on the demo than have things go tits up on the actual release.
    Edited by 1 at 28/10/09 @ 17:12

  • bad09 #19 2 years ago

    @ PlugMonkey

    I'd agree with you if this was actually a beta, it's not though is it, it's merely early access to a demo due in a few days to all anyway. Besides, if valve were getting you to buy the game in order to beta test the game online I'd be slightly worried!

    All these "early access" tactics are purely there to secure the high release price because the industry in waking up to the fact a lot of us are waiting for the right pricing these days. Rather than address the issue the no one mentions they are now working with some retailers trying to hook in people on release at release price with "demos" and "horse armour" DLC.
    Edited by 1 at 28/10/09 @ 17:30

  • PlugMonkey #20 2 years ago

    OK. So, it would be alright if it was a beta test.

    What is a beta test again?

    Is it not early access to some sort of demo?

    I'm not saying there isn't an element of encouraging people to pre-order - I'm sure there is - but it seems odd that they also happen to be doing essentially a pre-release test of the biggest release Steam has ever had to deal with.

    Edit: Especially in light of the fact that this pre-release test hasn't been 100% successful.
    Edited by 1 at 28/10/09 @ 18:23

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #21 2 years ago

    All these "early access" tactics are purely there to secure the high release price because the industry in waking up to the fact a lot of us are waiting for the right pricing these days

    My pre-order copy of L4D2 from steam cost me £20.25, I'd bet that's as cheap as anyone would get a copy between now and June next year.

    Demo seems to have unlocked now (is decrypting as I write), but it seemed to need to re-download 2/3 of the content today.

  • bad09 #22 2 years ago

    @ Mentalist(air)

    I knew someone would bring up the L4D2 price on Steam! :)

    My post was more in general about the practice TBH as DefdumBlindkid asked what was the point in it. Yes, obviously in this instance, the lovely super duper Valve have been quite reasonable in their asking price (I missed the £20 deal myself "damn!" but it's still only £27 at the mo), but that is rare and it's not across platforms.