What would you do if the zombie apocalypse happened right now? Where would you go and how would you survive? Where would you even get a weapon let alone a helicopter or some other sort of hardcore military transport to get you the hell out of wherever you were? There are a few simple rules to remember at the end of the world: find out exactly what sort of zombies you are dealing with. You don’t want to be strolling out into the open thinking all the zombies around you are ‘harmless on their own because they’re slow as snails’ Romero types. The last thing you want is to have a pack of quick ones around you. Secondly, learn how to destroy stairs and board up windows. And thirdly, keep a fresh pair of trousers handy and all the ammo you can carry.

Obviously a zombie apocalypse wouldn’t be much fun, you’d probably have to shoot a member of your family and that’s just really depressing. But imagining how you would survive in such a hospitable situation, well that’s a lot of fun. Left 4 Dead has been painstakingly produced over the last few years by Valve, a developer notorious for taking its sweet time when making a game, and famous for creating many Game Of The Year contenders but its lasting legacy to date is certainly the Half-Life series. Valve makes superb FPSs and it also has a dedicated community intent on providing support and voicing exactly what they want from a game. And the results of all these years of work? That’s right, a zombie game.

Before even inserting the Left4Dead disc into your 360, you should be aware that this game needs/must/has to be played online. Valve is primarily a PC developer and as such it has produced a game that truly shines when played with friends. As a single-player experience it may leave you wanting, and that’s simply because Valve has designed something quite special that only truly blossoms into some sort of blood-fuelled zombie flower thing online. So if you’re not online (and if not, why not?) you may not understand what all the fuss is about.

Valve’s latest shooter has truly nailed the atmosphere of the classic zombie movie. Moody lighting, destroyed houses, abandoned cars and the constant and unnerving recognisible groan from distant rooms. As Valve has focused on the multiplayer side of things you are tasked with surviving four scenarios (split into chapters), which generally last around two hours each depending on how good you and your group are. This is as well as the competitive side of the multiplayer (more on that later). It’s difficult to recommend a game that has been designed with only online play in mind, Ubisoft’s latest title EndWar is a case in point, but what Left 4 Dead does differently is offer an incredibly slick, scary shooter experience that can also be played through split-screen co-op so there is definite fun to be had with friends.

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