I do think it is time to give more frequent news about what’s going on and react to what people say to us via Twitter and the commentaries on the website. Here are some insights at what’s going on:
- First of all, yes the campaign is finished. We just need to sort out a bug that appears on the fourth level and then it will be fully okay. But again, this is not mandatory, we just want to avoid any potential problem in the future related to this issue, it could quickly become worse.
- Then, we’re not working on a Left 4 Dead 2 version anymore for the moment. We want to release the Left 4 Dead 1 version first, gather some feedback and then try to port it to Left 4 Dead 2 if it’s possible.
- Also, we’re building a little bonus section on the website to show you a bit of behind-the-scene materials. We really missed doing this after Portal: Prelude because we didn’t keep anything during the development. Basically, it’s a lot of screenshots of the evolution of the levels though the months, reference pictures and sounds, music drafts, graphs, statistics, studies and such. I takes some time to gather and build the pages, but so far so good, it’s almost done (it should be by Friday). We hope you’ll find the credentials to open it in the campaign (it’s not hidden very well), but our ultimate goal is not to piss people off, you will probably find the password on the Internet a few hours or days after the campaign is released.
- After the campaign is released, we’ll open a little forum on this website to allow players to talk about the campaign and report feedback to us. It’s already ready, it should be fast.
- Finally, we do have a bit more work to do on a video trailer but it’s basically finished too. It will go live at the end of the week or at the beginning of the next one. Don’t freak out though, it will be very simple and rushed, we don’t have more than a few days to waste on a trailer. When it will go live, it will necessarily mean that everything is done and that we’re ready to take one week away from the project before we release to think about things we could have missed and take a break.
Aside from this, some people don’t seem to understand that releasing something as important as I Hate Mountains is not quite a piece of cake and seems easier done than said. Believe me, this is not the way it works. We put more than one year of work into this, and it’s not the moment to rush things out. One little wrong move could led us to flood the network with a flawed version and believe me, it happened once with Portal: Prelude and this is definitely not something we want to experiment again. Files on the Internet tend to replicate themselves at an alarming rate.
More than any of you, we know it’s been a very long time this campaign is being delayed. It may piss everyone off, but at this point we really don’t want to do any mistake. Stay tuned for the video trailer and we hope you’ll talk about it around you once it’s released!
The trailer doesn’t need to be something like you did for PP – just random gameplay would work fine, I guess. After all, it’s a campaign, not a new game (like L4D itself) or semi-new/mod like PP was.
The L4D2-Version… can wait. Acutally, I am almost AGAINST releasing it for L4D2. Not only you planned it for L4D1 in the first place – L4D1-campaigns in L4D2 are never as good as they were in L4D1, no matter how much content gets added or removed. It’s always a downgrade, never an upgrade (doesn’t mean, that L4D2 is the worse game – campaigns made for L4D2 as main-game were partly even more fun than L4D1 was)
And for the Bonus-section… don’t spend too much time in it. Making-of, some addional content (like Soundtrack) and maybe – if you have something like that but I doubt it – outtakes of something. Like from testplay.
Wow, can’t believe the release of this campaign is so near! I’ve prepared a review of your campaign with the new screenshots, if you want to take a look (it’s spanish, but it’s mainly what you say in the your web) http://www.l4d.es/foro/general/1250-i-hate-mountains-campana-custom.html
Great stuff ;)
Le retard m’importe peu. Je préfère cela que plutôt de revoir un fiasco à la Dead Before Dawn. Vous êtes les seuls juges de votre travail.
Par contre la mise de côté de la version L4D2 me chagrine. L4D2 a apporté suffisamment au gameplay pour que je n’ai plus jamais envie de retourner sur le 1.
Donc pour ma part, il n’y aura pas de feedback pour l’instant, car je compte jouer à votre map uniquement sur L4D2.
Et puis la plupart de mes buddy ne jouent que sur le 2 (ou non que L4D2 et pas le 1).
Dommage. On verra pour la suite.
et bien de mon côté, c’est tout le contraire, je suis resté sur LD41, le 2 n’étant que bis repetita sans la saveur du premier, donc je suis bien content que cette campagne soit prévue pour le 1, et je l’attends avec impatience ;)
Thanks for the update Mac.
It´s always good and releaving to know what is gonna happen.
Thanks for your kindness, respect and your work in this game.
Cheers.
Chapeau les gars, on sent le travail fait avec amour et le soucis du détail.
Bon courage, ne vous laissez pas influencer par les impatients. Il vaut mieux éviter le fiasco Dead Before Dawn comme dit plus haut.(qui s’est avéré relativement quelconque et super mal réglé au final)
J’ai fait exactement la même chose que vous pour ma campagne, j’ai préféré la sortir d’abord sur le 1 car prévu pour, que de la sortir à la va vite pour le 2 qui était arrivé entre temps.
Il est évident qu’une bête conversion n’est pas la solution, ca demande pas mal de boulot d’adapter un map pour le left4dead2, ne serait ce que pour le lot de nouveautés qu’a apporté le 2.
D’ailleurs en ce moment, je fais la conversion de ma campagne pour le 2, et il est vrai que le passage du 1 au 2 ne se fait pas sans mal. Beaucoup de bugs apparaissent, certains models (même officiel) ne sont plus compatible et font crasher le jeu… sans parler des sons customs qui ne fonctionnent plus du tout depuis la mise à jour de the passing.
Si vous avez des questions sur le sujet car je suis en plein dedans en ce moment, n’hésitez pas.
encore une fois bon courage.
Je vois qu’on rencontre exactement les mêmes problèmes.
Bon courage pour la suite, tu peux nous tenir au courant de ton avancement par email si tu veux.
Nice to hear that you reconsidered your decision :-)
The screenshots look amazing!
For an old guy who began back in the DOOM days, it’s amazing to see how far computer gaming has come. L4D has got to be my favourite game………..ever. Zombies and killing them! A primal instinct for anyone who ever watched a George Romero movie.
Anyway, really looking forward to this one as I’ve been following your progress since I sfirst heard of this last year. You’ve obviously done considerable work and the reward may be nothing more than thanks from us gamers.
So in advance, from an old guy, “THANKS”!.
Best, Sam
Very good news :) and the previous screenshots are amazing. Can’t wait for it :)
We love you guys and we are waiting for this Campaign. It looks amazing and we can’t believe that the day for release has come…..thank you all for your hard work!
“Nicolas: Just fixed that last damn bug that was still holding the release of the whole thing”
And now….. release?? :-)
Happy to hear that!
Can’t wait.
Need any help with mirroring the campaign?
Yeah kinda, we’ll ask for help as soon as we need it, which means, when we’ll release it ;)
Cant wait for this Beautiful masterpiece!
[…] Hate Mountains, ça arrive ! – http://www.ihatemountains.com/2010/05/its-gonna-be-legen-wait-for-it-dary/ […]
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so far worst addon for l4d1, personnaly i dont see difference in graphic quality from this to other custom maps not that i see anything so pitch black i dont see any scenery anyway, ive played 18 other custom campaigns most great rest ok, but this first one fails, not enjoyable so dark it takes over 1hr just walk around mansion to find all stairs to top, then start haord takes 1hr get down safely or 10 seconds if jump down floors either way no matter how fast i am the heliicopter still leaves and crashes thats it game over i get surrounded hordes keep coming until im out bullets and health we all die, its just second level your campaign it cant be beat is this joke of some kind?10 times same result i finally quit