BACK 4 BLOOD

Evan Lahti: Before it released, we were concerned that adding aim-down-sights to the Left 4 Dead formula would slow it down too much. But Back 4 Blood’s guns are silky in your hands, containing nuance that exceeds their appearance.

As an FPS fan I love the attention to detail: the hip fire animation changes when you drop to a crouch, communicating clearly that you’re more accurate than standing, but less accurate than if you were in ironsights. Range matters. You can kit out a horde killer by grabbing attachments and card bonuses that increase bullet penetration.

The high volume of enemies and the fact that so many guns are one-hit kills against basic undead feels great. Lately I’m lugging around the .50 calibre sniper rifle as an anti-‘big guy’ gun, with the silenced Magnum as a sidearm.

Morgan Park: Were I still on my first playthrough of Back 4 Blood, I would’ve thought Evan silly for carrying the big sniper rifle that shoots slow. But now that I’m jumping back into the campaign on a higher difficulty, having a marksman for the nastier infected hordes is not only smart, but necessary. I think that speaks to Back 4 Blood’s strengths over Left 4 Dead: the game pushes you to try new things, and it’s not only replayable because shooting zombies is fun. There’s always a new deck to test out, a gun you’ve not given a proper try yet, or a nasty combo of Corruption Cards that puts a twist on a mission you’ve done before. It’s Left 4 Dead, but more, and often better.

Jacob Ridle: I’ve never had as much fun benchmarking a game as I did in Back 4 Blood, and that was in the company of the game’s confused bots. Seriously, I ran the same level maybe 30 times, and I genuinely enjoyed every run. If you have a cheery bunch of zombie-annihilating hobbyists to play with, there’s a lot of replayability in this game. The cards system makes each level feel a little different to the last, and with buffs, for both player and zombie, you’ll find you end up with a different playstyle nearly every run.