Not to leave anybody hanging, Valve will explain how the Left 4 Dead survivors made it all the way to rural Georgia through a DLC/Expansion for the original L4D. The major SPOILER alert here is that the tagline in the L4D 2 DLC is "No one survives forever" and it has been confirmed that one of the orginal L4D survivors will end up sacrificing his/her self in the events of the L4D campaign DLC. They must have ran out of rescue closets. No idea on who dies, but speculate away.

So the Left 4 Dead 2 early access demo for the PC and 360 goes live Tuesday and I figured I should grab it and setup a Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated server. Getting the files was easy, but setting up and getting the Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated server up wasn't.

The setup process for running your own Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated should be the same as my previous guide on a Left 4 Dead dedicated server but with a few tweaks. Sharing my steps for setting up a Windows Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated server will save everybody else some time and effort.

I am using a Windows host, so if you are using linux you will have to follow DOA's write up setting up a Left 4 Dead dedicated server on Ubuntu.

The main tool needed is the hldsupdatetool from Steam. You can go and grab the Windows version is located on the bottom right of the page. Open up the command prompt (Go to Start Menu-->Run type cmd and hit enter). Now go to the directory where you installed the hldsupatetool.

For me it looks like this:

C:\HLServerhldsupdatetool -command update -game left4dead2 -dir C:\HLServer

Easier way is to make a batch file and put that command into it; you can use that batch file to keep your Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated server updated. Just put the command into a text file and change the file extension to .bat

That command will hit Valve's server and grab all the files you need for your Left 4 Dead 2 Dedicated server; this is also how you keep your dedicated server up to date. Pretty easy to do (sofar).

Now what you should do is head to \HLServer\l4d\left4dead2 and make two text files named mapcycle.txt and maplist.txt.
Next head to HLServer\l4d\left4dead2\cfg and make a text file named server.cfg and put this in as a minimum:

hostname Server Name Here
// Rcon Cvars
rcon_password "your recon password" //Set's remote control password
// Server Cvars
mp_disable_autokick 1 //Prevents a userid from being auto-kicked
sv_allow_wait_command 0 //Allow or disallow the wait command on clients connected to this server.
sv_alltalk 0 //Players can hear all other players, no team restrictions
sv_alternateticks 0 //If set, server only simulates entities on even numbered ticks.
sv_clearhinthistory 0 //Clear memory of server side hints displayed to the player.
sv_consistency 1 //Whether the server enforces file consistency for critical files
sv_contact "your_admin@whatever.com" //Contact email for server sysop
sv_downloadurl "" //Location from which clients can download missing files

// Lan or internet play, Server region cvars
//sv_lan 0 //If set to 1,Server is a lan server ( no heartbeat, no authentication, no non-class C addresses )
sv_region 255 // Region Codes: 0 - US East coast, 1 - US West coast, 2 - South America, 3 - Europe, 4 - Asia, 5 - Australia, 6 - Middle East, 7 - Africa, 255 - world

// Server Logging
sv_log_onefile 0 //Log server information to only one file.
sv_logbans 1 //Log server bans in the server logs.
sv_logecho 0 //Echo log information to the console.
sv_logfile 1 //Log server information in the log file.
//sv_logflush 0 //Flush the log file to disk on each write (slow).
sv_logsdir "logs" //Folder in the game directory where server logs will be stored.

//Server Rates
sv_maxcmdrate 100 //(If sv_mincmdrate is > 0), this sets the maximum value for cl_cmdrate.
sv_unlag 1
sv_maxunlag .5

You could probably put more cvars and whatnot in there, but for now this will give you a basic setup that will get you going. From what I have seen, you could use a Team Fortress 2 config generator, but I am not sure what will work and what wont.

The final step for getting your Left 4 Dead 2 Dedicated server up is to start it. This is done by either the command line, a batch file or making a shortcut to the srcds.exe in your left4dead 2 directory. I did it the last way and added this command to the end of the Target parameter (after making a shortcut on my desktop):

-console -game left4dead2 +ip "your ip address" +hostport 27015 +"map" c5m1_waterfront.bsp

All you have to change is the ip address and put in the mapname (take out the "" characters) and your Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated server will be up and running in no time. By having the -console in there, it will bring up a console of the server when you double click on the shortcut, making for easy administration. The +map will start your server with the specified map. If you don't have it, your server won't work properly.

If you have any questions, leave a comment or follow me on twitter and I will help you with setting up your Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated server as best as I can.

If you need to contact me for help, you can follow me on Twitter

Edit: I was unable to get it to work with the shortcut to SRCDS.exe, but after you configure your server.cfg, just launch the SRCDS.exe manually and it will pick up on your server config file. That was quick, thanks to the comments I changed the article to reflect how to get it server started.

edit: If you want to connect to your own L4D 2 Dedicated server, use this command BEFORE starting the lobby: mm_dedicated_force_servers ServerIP . You also have to be the lobby leader. Replace the ServerIP with the IP of your server and it will connect to yours. Make sure that it isn't full though.

Left 4 Dead 2's Scavenge is for eight players; four play as the survivors scrambling to collect gas can from random spots in a cramped and confined location in order to fuel up a generator before a two minute timer expires. There are sixteen gas cans total and the survivors get an extra 20 seconds for each one they successfully get to the generator.

The other four players are controlling the special infected and must do their best to stop the survivors from collecting the gas cans. The two new Special infected--the Spitter and the Jockey--really shine in the new L4D Scavenge mode. The Spitter can use her acid to set any dropped cans on fire (Double Damage from acid AND fire!) and the Jockey can land onto the shoulders of a survivor to "steer" them away from their goal.

The new L4D Scavenge mode splits the teams up in a best two out of three match in three rounds. There will be a "half time" where players will get a chance to play on the other side. Valve has confirmed that each of L4D 2's campaigns has a unique Scavenge map, for a total of six shipping when the game comes out on November 17. Hopefully the new L4D 2 Scavenge maps are not like the survival maps and just use immovable objects to chop off the rest of the map. Via Joystiq

Dark Carnival is the third of five new campaigns in L4D2; the first two are The Parish and Swamp Fever. If you aren't going to PAX (like me) you will just have to wait for the Youtube videos of people playing the new L4D2 campaign. Valve has been stingy with any new info, only revealing one screenshot of a zombie clown (great, I hate clowns).

They will also be unveiling a few more of the twenty new weapons included in L4D2. Hopefully it is something cool, like a flame thrower, hookers or blackjack. Screw it, I will go make my own zombie filled apocalypse with Hookers.. AND blackjack.

Although, this is what the L4D2 hookers look like, so maybe I should just stay away from that.

This is quite the montage of Left 4 Dead gameplay action set to Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World. The creator did a great job of matching up L4D footage to the "appropriate" parts of the song; Rainbows indeed. Give the video a watch and laugh your ass off! (if the flesh eating zombies don't try to eat it first that is).

"With Left 4 Dead in particular we've found that word of mouth really is the strongest thing," Lombardi told us. "With Left 4 Dead 2 we plan to do a demo before the game comes out that'll have multiplayer in it. And hopefully we can continue the free weekends with the full game post-launch."

It seems that Valve is hoping that the recent announcement of DLC for Left 4 Dead by the end of summer and the L4D 2 demo will help quell the angry mob of videogamers. Even though Valve is trying to show people that they have no plans to drop support for Left 4 Dead, some gamers still believe that the release of Left 4 Dead 2 will fracture the community. It does make sense; owners of L4D will have interoperability with L4D 2 owners to a point. The problem is that gamers who don't have Left 4 Dead 2 will be unable to join their friends playing the L4D2 content.

Although, despite the outraged from the community and the gamers boycotting Left 4 Dead 2, a lot of people really want to play the game. Valve is reporting that pre orders for the sequel are doubled that of Left 4 Dead had from the same place in the release cycle. That is a whole hell of a lot of pre orders since Left 4 Dead had more pre orders than the Orange Box! It seems that most people don't care ( and I am in that boat myself) that L4D 2 is coming out so soon. Yes, its only a year later, but I had TONS of enjoyment with L4D; plus all of the new content wouldn't have been able to be shoe horned into the original L4D. The Left 4 Dead 2 pre release demo will give us a good idea of how much content is new.

In other news, I have to decide if I want to kill one or both of my Left 4 Dead dedicated servers and possibly make them Left 4 Dead 2 servers. I doubt the setup guide for a Left 4 Dead 2 dedicated server will change much from the first one, but I will post up my guide as soon as I get my hands on that L4D 2 demo. That is, if I'm not too busy playing it myself that is. Also, how did a cricket player and bat get into Left 4 Dead 2? It is a mystery.

i would love to hear your ideas and thoughts on Left 4 Dead 2, so why don't you leave a comment?

I've been playing the new Left 4 Dead survial mode and sometimes I would think "gee, I wonder what this would be like with humans controlling some of the horde". Well, I don't have to wonder about it too much more. It seems that two modders put out a video detailing their exploits, and they hope to release the config files (if Valve doesn't patch how they did it).

On one hand, this could be extremely fun, but survival mode is tough enough as it is, let alone having 4 special infected being controlled by humans. It seems that their mod also bring is four more survivors (I am guessing bot controlled ones) so there is eight survivors vs the horde and the special infected. Needless to say, the special infected go down REALLY fast. Check out their page for any updates!

Now, the issue with Left 4 Dead custom maps is that not only does the server need a copy, each client will need that exact same map as well. It seems that auto downloading in Left 4 Dead does not work; Valve really needs to enable that so servers can have custom Left 4 Dead maps and it isn't such a hassle to play them. Grab the custom campaigns for Left 4 Dead and give them a try!

Straight from IGN

If the names Zoey, Francis, Bill, and Louis don't mean much to you, then you probably haven't played the exceptional shooter Left 4 Dead. But if they trigger memories of gunning down endless hordes of zombies and desperately fighting for your life while screaming at your buddies, then you're quite familiar with Valve's thrilling cooperative multiplayer shooter, which shipped late last year. Now Valve is prepping the first batch of downloadable content for the game, which it is going to give away for free to both Xbox 360 and PC players sometime in March or April. What's in it? Well, we went to Valve this week to find ou

IGN also has a gameplay video of the survivor mode. I was really skeptical until I saw that video. I was really hoping survival mode would also be a bit of VS ( humans playing the special guys again). Although, having a cunning Infected team would make survival much more difficult. Considering that Valve's creators can't even stay alive longer than 9 minutes.

In all of the play testing that the Valve designers have done while creating this mode, none of them have ever survived past the 10 minute mark. We're told the company best so far was about nine minutes, with a team of elite players battling like crazy to keep one another alive.

This is going to be insane!

When Valve announced the Left 4 Dead DLC, I didn't think that they would charge for it because this is VALVE we are talking about. They are great at giving free updates to the community, just look at Team Fortress 2. Granted, the Xbox and PS3 versions don't get the updated content at the same time, but they do eventually get it. That and it is pretty hard to get PC users to pay for DLC.