Boasts an insane degree of motion-capture and mod support.
Killing Floor 2, Tripwire Interactive's sequel to its co-op zombie-based FPS, has finally been officially revealed.
Earlier this year its presence was leaked in a Steam snafu, but the studio stayed mum on the situation so it only remained a rumour. Now PC Gamer has an exclusive reveal detailing Tripwire's sequel.
The first Killing Floor began as an Unreal Tournament mod, but was fleshed out into a full game where it went on to sell 2.5 million copies. At the time Tripwire was comprised of 10 people, but it's since expanded into a 50-person studio. Given the first game's success, this sequel will be a significantly higher budget affair.
The Steam for Linux beta has been rolled out like mince pie pastry for everyone to enjoy.
Just install and register to use Steam and you're in.
The list of games available to Linux users of Steam is growing, too. Killing Floor is there as is The Book of Unwritten Tales and Amnesia. There are 39 games available there now.
Is Killing Floor the Tesco Value baked beans release of Left 4 Dead? Well, it's cheaper, contains many of the same ingredients, and isn't as nice, so perhaps yes. At the same time though, it's a game with a different approach, a fine Unreal Tournament 2004 mod heritage, and some great ideas that may not provide the fine-tuned wonderfulness of L4D, but at least make me feel guilty about beating it with a stick and screaming 'You're not Valve! You're not Valve!' while openly weeping. As such we'll kill the comparisons for a while. Sure, both games have pallid fat men that spew on people, but it's a spew of a different consistency and intent.
Essentially, you and up to five internet chums are fending off wave after wave of increasingly powerful, and numerous, dead-heads in various UK-based locales. Your shambling foes are encouraged to take a bite of peach with increasingly powerful weapons bought from a sultry lady who runs a gun shop, which opens up between the ten onslaughts of zombies on each level. Much like the pirate 'What're ye buyin?' man in Resident Evil 4, she's mastered the power of teleportation as well as a nigh-on arcane protection from the horde. At the close of each battle her shop opens its doors in a different part of the map, a part of the map that you and your team will have been working towards while battling the zombies - meaning that you're often on the move and rarely defending the same corridors from the same angles.
There are staggering zombies, crawling beasts, naked invisible wench ladies, huddled witch-types with screams that blast ear-drums and turn the air bright red, and a chap with a giant LED stuck in his chest who you won't like very much when he gets angry. It's a limited yet balanced menagerie, and one that looks great when limbs start getting detached. The constant Painkiller-esque rock riffs that accompany the action are an acquired taste, as is the game's strange insistence on slowing affairs down for a spot of bullet time to coincide with someone's particularly well-taken shot, but anyone with a taste for chaos and carnage is likely to be able to overlook both. Said slowdown allows you to deftly take a few heads off and cast an achingly slow gaze over wall textures in equal measure - but the satisfaction garnered by the former outweighs the inconvenience of a bit of slow-motion furniture surveillance.
Popular young-persons' Unreal Tournament 2004 modification Killing Floor is to be beefed up into a full game and released on Steam, Tripwire Interactive has announced.
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