The Survivors proceed through the map as normal, fighting off hordes of common zombies and completing objectives to reach the safe room. It works like this: a team of four Survivors face off against a team of four Infected over the course of a campaign, alternating roles between rounds. Even if you played the game years ago you may not be aware of its brilliance, so let me break it down. Left 4 Dead 2’s solo and co-op campaign gameplay is still great, don’t get me wrong, but the game’s true beauty is hiding in this nuanced, communication-heavy, extremely dynamic online multiplayer mode. So! You’re probably wondering why, and I have two words for you: Versus Mode. I’m not alone either! Beyond the eight or so close friends I play with regularly, it’s averaging around 20 thousand concurrents per day as of late, making it a firm fixture in Steam’s top 100 most-played games. If you ignore my foolish teenage dalliance with DOTA 2, the most-played game in my Steam library is Left 4 Dead 2, a game that came out in 2009, and one that I’m still playing multiple times a week, eleven years later. The thing is though, I’m a total hypocrite.

READ MORE: Please, bring back the video game demo.

I just don’t tend to replay old games, unless they come back as proper remakes, like Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2. As a youngster, I loved Bioware’s space opera RPG series, but there was no way I could bring myself to play through those games again. Approaching the launch of Mass Effect Legendary Edition, I had a revealing internal dialogue.

Doom 4 co op campaign