There are some games that come along and have such a huge impact, their influence can be felt years, even decades later. Left 4 Dead is one such title, it changed the face of co-op FPS games and many titles have followed in its footsteps, to varying degrees of success. Back 4 Blood is a game that lays its inspiration heavily at Left 4 Dead’s feet, acting as a successor in a way. Despite that, the game has struggled to attract a regular audience, but that might be turning around now.
If you’ve not checked out Back 4 Blood before, here’s the rundown. This co-op FPS game puts you and three other players in a post-apocalyptic world where a virus has turned the majority of humanity into terrifying creatures. With four chapters to play through telling a story of survival against the odds, you play as a “Cleaner” as you shoot, fight, and melee your way through hordes of foes. You’d be forgiven for thinking this is just Left 4 Dead with a lick of paint, there’s even a game director that changes up each level depending on how well you’re doing, but there’s also plenty of innovation here.
The biggest and most wide-ranging introduction in Back 4 Blood is its card system. When you start a match, the game director picks its cards and then it’s up to you to grab some. These can offer mild buffs to ones that completely alter the way the game will proceed, meaning you’ll never have quite the same experience twice. Since launch, new cards have been introduced which dot the map in-game, encouraging players to hunt down and scavenge everything they can to try and boost survivability.
While never quite setting the world on fire, Back 4 Blood has held its player numbers on Steam steady over the years since launch. On average you’ll see two to three thousand players in-game at any given time, which isn’t a terrible number but to put it in context, oft-derided sequel Left 4 Dead 2 currently has 30,00 players in-game on a Friday afternoon. Thanks to a huge sale, however, Back 4 Blood is staging a comeback. At the time of writing there are 13,071 people playing right now, with a 24 hour peak of 15,229. As the weekend is only just starting, we can expect this to continue to rise – while the sale continues, anyway.
Back 4 Blood is currently 90% off until Monday, June 24 taking its price down to $5.99 / £4.99 down from $59.99 / £49.99. Head over to Steam to check it out for yourself and as the game’s DLC also has 80% off, it’s a great time to give them a look too.
You can also take a peek at our guide to the best co-op games you can play, as well as our recommendations for the best zombie games on PC.
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