Valve accidentally leaks Left 4 Dead’s earliest prototype in a new CS 1.6 update

Valve just accidentally leaked Left 4 Dead’s earliest prototype in a new CS 1.6 update, and you can check it out too.

During the late 2000s to early 2010s’ surge of zombie games, there was no other title that stood out like Left 4 Dead. Valve’s innovative zombie shooter essentially laid the groundwork for many subsequent clones in the genre, though it’s still beloved to this day.

However, Left 4 Dead wasn’t always the way it was, as obviously early versions were made to test out the devs’ concept. And it seems Valve has now accidentally leaked one of the earliest versions of Left 4 Dead in a surprise update. 

Found in a recent Counter-Strike 1.6 patch, L4D prototype is almost completely foreign to the end product, however, it gives us some insights as to how L4D got its start. 

Revealed by Valve leaker Gabe Follower, but first found by Twitter user PDylan, the early prototype was called “Terror Strike”, however, it played quite differently to the eventual L4D. 

As written in the gameplay description with the prototype, “The terrorist with the bomb must make it to the house and plant the bomb. Zombies will respawn a little but after being killed.

“Once the bomb is planted, every zombie will respawn and a horde will come for the survivors. The survivors must survive the horde by killing all the zombies. The round is won when all zombies are killed while the bomb is planted.” 

Obviously, bomb planting is not exactly a main feature of L4D, it was adopted from CS, but we can see the beginnings of L4D’s core structure here. Eliminating zombie hordes while focusing on an objective. 

This early version is extremely rough, with CT models standing in for the zombies, the map having no textures other than simple tiles, and you don’t even spawn in the iconic safe room. But with all that in mind, this early version is now playable for those who want to check it out.