Cut content are features that were removed from the final product before the release of any Left 4 Dead game. These changes range from changed Survivor models and features to the removal of infected and weapons.

Left 4 Dead

Survivors

• Bill underwent only small changes during development. The only differences in his beta appearance to those finally used are: an olive drab colored hoodie, dog tag, a black military assault vest with the U.S. flag, longer beard and hair and black gloves. Personality-wise he was paranoid about the fact that the Survivors could turn into the Infected but these lines were subsequently cut.
• Francis originally had slightly long, black hair with a beard and appeared overweight. His vest was denim instead of leather. His original design was likely re-used for the Midnight Riders.
• Louis had short curly black hair, thin beard with goatee and a bandage on his forehead. He wore a brown jacket plus a yellow undershirt and blue jeans. In early 2008 Valve added a bandolier with shotgun shells, and a hood. His original backstory cast him as the manager of an electronics store, which may be a reference to the movie Shaun of the Dead wherein Shaun manages an electronics store. Louis and Bill's relationship was strained, they did not get along and often argued.
• In the QuakeCon 2007 demo, Louis can be seen having a white shirt.^[1]
• Zoey's appearance underwent significant change during development. Zoey originally had longer hair, a pink hoodie (different colors were tried including yellow and blue) with ammo chest-webbing, tactical gloves, khaki brown baggy shorts, white and reddish-pink striped legging stockings, boots with the logo "PUNX" in the back and knee pads. Zoey's facial features were the last of the Survivors' to be finalized and before their final iteration were more angular and she looked like a young woman (around 25 years old) instead of teenage, she also had another voice actress. Her character was to have a nascent romantic relationship with Francis.
• The last official appearance of the Original Survivors was at E3 2008. They were displayed in a trailer directly after Gabe Newell introduced the new Survivors. They were also shown before this in the director examples.
• A large volume of dialog was recorded for the Survivors and NPCs that was subsequently cut from the game. Much of this dialog still resides in the game files.
• Originally Valve had the idea of accentuating the role of News Chopper 5's pilot in "No Mercy" by casting him as an unwitting Green Flu victim undergoing change into an Infected. The cut storyline had him asking for a first aid kit, saying that he was feeling unwell after attempting the dangerous move of rescuing some other Survivors from the street. Shortly thereafter, he would state he was very cold, begin coughing, turn and become Infected causing the helicopter to crash; thus beginning the "Death Toll" campaign. However this scenario was judged to be unsuitable and it was cut… until "Crash Course" came.
• The survivor models have since been re-added to the L4D2 Workshop as part of the community update, the models are also available for L4D1 (ported unofficially).

The Infected

Common Infected

• A lot of skins for the Common Infected were cut during the game's development, presumably to save on memory. These skins were added to Left 4 Dead 2 as part of The Last Stand Community Update.

The Boomer

• Originally, the Boomer only had the ability to explode, which caused damage at the time. Later, the Screamer was scrapped from the game, and his horde-invoking ability was recycled and evolved into the Boomer's vomit attack.^[2]
  • During early playable demos, the Boomer had the damaging death explosion and the vomit attack.^[3]
• The Boomer vomited blood before being replaced by bile.
• The original texture of the Boomer represented him with a white pale skin and more detailed veins, this still exists on both his exploded models and his v_body model.

The Hunter

• The Hunter used to use the "zombie dog" stock sound effects in demo versions of the game.^[4] They're still found in the game's files, but in the "sound/player/pz" directory instead of where the other Hunter sounds are found.
  • Due to this, it has led to fans creating theories that there was a Infected dog in development, but there was never such a thing.
• The Hunter also seems to have had a voice menu taunt, in which he growls. The Response Rule [PlayerZombieTaunt] exists, but the soundscript is set to not make any sound at all.
• The Hunter has an unused animation of him hanging upside down. It is unknown how this was supposed to be done in-game, as no pre-release footage shows the Hunter doing this.
• The Hunter also has an unused first-person animation, which could be seen by player controlling it when he managed to pounce Survivor. It still remains in game files of both L4D1 and L4D2 and with use of third-party mods can be partially restored.
• Originally, when a Hunter pounced a Survivor, there would be no red light around the victim.
• The Hunter's ability was originally invisibility. He performed this action when backed up against a wall. It could also regenerate health, but this was cut along with the invisibility.
• During development, Hunters could jump off their targeted Survivor after a pounce by crouching, then lunging away.
• The Hunter's original texture was a dark blue hoodie and his skin was more tan, with a visible goatee, while only his eyes had blood on them. The final texture has blood on both the eyes and mouth, making him more vicious and animalistic in appearance.
• The Hunter in the beta stages of the game had the ability to lunge. The Hunter did this when the player controlling him would press the "Mouse 1" without crouching. This was cut as it was too overpowered. However, the Hunter still uses this ability in single-player. It is still possible to use this ability by the use of the developer console command: mp_gamemode versus, using this in single-player and changing to Hunter will allow you to lunge. The Hunter also has sound files for his lunge ability, when captions are turned on, you will see the lines [Hunter Lunges] and [Hunter lands].

The Smoker

• The original purpose of the Smoker was to sneak up on the Survivors in a cloud of smoke, seize any one of them, and "pop out" again to leave the unlucky Survivor stranded.
• In early footage, the Smoker seemed to have had the ability to release pitch-black smoke whenever he wanted to. If the Survivors were near the Smoker when he fired his smoke, they would have been pushed back as if they were hit by a Boomer explosion.
• Originally, the Smoker's tongue would drag a victim at a significantly faster rate, but the victim would still be able to fire at the Smoker while they were being dragged.
• Instead of the tongue wrapping around the victims torso, it would wrap around the victims neck.
• The Smoker's tongue couldn't lift Survivors caught above the ground, should the Smoker be on higher level.
• The Smoker's smoke originally injured anyone who'd make contact with it, similar to the Spitter's acid.
• The Smoker used to be able to release his victim, via secondary fire or turning away while a Survivor was being pulled. This can still be accessed by using the console command tongue_allow_voluntary_release 1. (warning: may crash your game.)
• The Smoker's model lacked the tongue hanging from his mouth, instead he had a normal tongue like the other infected.
• The Smoker had a different Alert sound and a different Warning sound in pre-release footage.
• The Smoker was smaller in height, about the same height of the survivors (If not a bit shorter).

The Tank

• Not much is known about the Tank during development, but a pre-release screenshot and some footage shows that he had a faster rock throw animation and slower running speed during development in 2007.^[5]
• The Tank originally had a much lighter color skin, like the rest of the game.
• The Tank could originally throw multiple rocks at the survivors. This multiple rock throwing feature had its own animations, it was cut to just throwing one rock at a time.
• The Tank's original health was not 6000 but 9000, this unused text string still exists in the Tank's AI files but was cut down to make it easier for the survivors.
• The Tank also had a different Yell and Growl in the beta. It is heard in most pre-release footage, as well as the Left 4 Dead Introduction Video
  • In a 2008 trailer, he has a different voice from these.^[6]

The Witch

• Originally, The Witch was to attack the entire group upon being startled. However, this was cut from the final game because it was deemed too difficult, as she would often wipe out the whole group with little trouble.
• The Witch was going to have black hair and black clothes instead of white hair and pale green clothes.

Cut Infected

• In the files for Dam It, stringtables refer to a playable Infected named "Queen". Nothing else is known about this Infected.^[7]
  • The Witch was allegedly play tested as a playable Infected, the source reportedly being from asking developers in the Turtle Rock Studios forums, however since the forums have been closed around early 2020, this information can't be confirmed. If this was true, it's possible this could've been just the Witch's very early name, like the Tank is also referred to as "hulk" in the string tables and unused voice lines.
• The Screamer was a Special Infected that was cut due to being deemed too confusing, he was normally a harmless enemy that when triggered by the Survivors, ran away and let out a howling scream, attracting a horde. The only known photo of the infected is a piece of concept art. The Screamer never made it too far into development and was scrapped in 2005—2006 sometime before the QuakeCon 2007 demo.
  • Despite being cut, many ideas behind the Screamer inspired the designs of other Special Infected; his purpose of attracting Hordes was given to the Boomer,^[8] and the Hunter's scream was originally his as seen in an old trailer;^[9] it is also possible that his crazed laughter and behavior of fleeing from danger inspired the Jockey and the Fallen Survivor respectively.

Weapons

All the weapons had different sounds and realistic textures with scratches, including details like blood and dirt instead of clean versions used in the final game. The game had the muzzle flash lighting effect like in Counter-Strike, it was toned down to an unnoticeable state probably to improve performance. However, there is a SourceMod plugin that restores this effect.

Pump Shotgun

• An unusual ammo counter for the Pump Shotgun's magazine is still in the game's files. There are two versions: one for an empty magazine and one for a full one. This seems to hint that in very early versions of the game, the player's ammo count would have been shown with a physical representation of how much ammo was left in the magazine.
• In the shotgun's script file, at the "Damage" line, there is a comment with the number 22, which suggests the pump shotgun would deal 22 damage instead of 25 as it does in-game.

Submachine Gun

• Originally, its flashlight was mounted directly under its handguard.
• The Submachine Gun also had a full-reload animation of pulling the cocking handle after replacing the magazine.
• The ammo count of 480 in the original game hints that the Submachine Gun may have originally had its real-life capacity of 32 rounds.
• Early on, the Submachine Gun, along with a lot of the other weapons, would not have an animation for releasing the magazine from the mag well. Instead, the survivor would put the magazine in and cock the gun.

Auto Shotgun

• According to the Auto Shotgun's weapon file, it used to have a larger spread, less accuracy, fired two fewer pellets and had a 9-round magazine.
• In pre-release footage, originally the ammo capacity was 7 instead of 10.
• The Auto Shotgun is based on Counter Strike's XM1014 automatic shotgun. Early footage shows that the Auto Shotgun used unmodified XM1014 sounds.

Assault Rifle

• Early screenshots show that the Assault Rifle lacked text on its left side at one time.
• When the Assault Rifle was drawn in early versions of the game, the character would tap the firing assist upon drawing the weapon.
• It too had a different reload animation. After replacing the magazine, the player would both pull the charging handle and hit the bolt catch.
• It has 360 reserve ammo, so it may have originally had its real-life capacity of 30 rounds.
  • Left 4 Dead 2 uses 360 reserve ammo for all such weapons.

Hunting Rifle

• Early screenshots show that the Hunting Rifle's world model had a charging handle on its right side at one time. The handle was removed in the final version, alongside all cocking animations.
• At least one old footage shows that sometime in the development the Hunting Rifle had a running animation similar to other weapons rather than "left-to-right waving" that is seen in the retail version. Also its shooting animation didn't have as much punch as now: it was more resembling a third-person shooting animation.

M1911 Pistol

• Originally, the Pistols had limited ammo. It appears that the player was able to hold 240 maximum rounds in addition to the rounds loaded in them. This was scrapped and replaced with infinite ammo.
• At one time, when wielding a Pistol or two, neither Pistol had flashlights on them. dual-wielding Pistols, both Pistols had flashlights on them. It was later dropped probably due to fact that the left Colt's flashlight was still unusable. However, it can still be seen in the Intro Scene, where both of Zoey's pistols have flashlights attached.
• Extra pistols could be handed to teammates with the G button.

Molotov

• An early screenshot shows that the Molotov was gray and had a different shaped top before becoming the final design.
• In early footage, originally the Molotov had no label and used the default fire effect for the burning fuse.

Pipe Bomb

• According to the game's Developer Commentary and as shown in pre-release footage, the pipe bomb did not have flashing lights and beeping sound effects to attract Common Infected when it was originally conceived; instead, it served as a conventional grenade.
• In some older footage it can be clearly seen that Pipe bomb was a regular grenade at one time. Hidden in the game's files is a very early grenade icon for the HUD; this grenade looks exactly like the HE Grenade from Counter-Strike: Source. In early videos the pipe bomb exploded after about 2 seconds, and later in development after impact.
  • The original Survivors also have lines saying "Grenades here!", which would normally be used in case of finding Molotovs & Pipe bombs.

Other

• Weapons originally did not have flashlights on them, as seen in pre-release pictures. In addition, their worldmodels had blood on them.
• All weapons in Left 4 Dead originally had two reload animations: when the magazine is empty and when the magazine is not. The animation played when the magazine was empty is longer than the other animation because the player needed to cock the gun after loading a full, new magazine.
  • Can still be seen in the Left 4 Dead Authoring Tools (1 or 2; 2 has the M1911 Pistol viewmodel unused but still having empty reload animations) or with SourceMod plugin. The only weapons that still use their empty reload animations are the Pump and Auto Shotgun.
    • Left 4 Dead 2 on the other hand, included non-empty reloads for the P220/Glock + P220 combo and Desert Eagle.
• At some point during development, an M249 machine gun was supposed to appear as a usable weaponsas evidenced by few pieces of concept art. In these concepts, this weapon is seen held by Bill, hinting that this was originally intended to be his preferred weapon instead of the Assault Rifle.
  • in addition, in the January 2007 trailer, Bill can be seen holding the M249 and even firing upon common infected with it.
• Laser Sights were originally set to be an upgrade for Left 4 Dead, but the concept of upgrades were cut. It then was put into Left 4 Dead 2 as a lone upgrade.
• Melee weapons were supposed to be included at some point during development of L4D1, but were cut for unknown reasons.
  • The melee weapons most likely are Counter Strike/Terror Strike leftovers since L4D1 was built off of Counter Strike.
  • In the Hispanic translation of the Developer Commentary, it is mentioned that the developers had to choose between melee weapons and pistols having unlimited ammo.
• In development of Left 4 Dead, doors could be locked to stop incoming Infected long enough for the Survivors to escape entirely from a horde.
  • This was replaced with breakable doors, as it made things way too hard for the Infected team.
• During early development, Left 4 Dead's working title was, in reference to Counter-Strike, "Terror Strike" or "Terror".
• According to Kotaku.com, the campaigns used to be different. Beta Campaigns were "Dead End" (which resembles early "Dark Carnival"-like settings), "Drive-In Hell" (which also resembles "Dark Carnival") and "Fair Game" (again, looks like the final version on "Dark Carnival"), "Ghost City" (which includes a flooded city, like "Hard Rain"), "Line of Fire" (which shows a trailer park), "Wrecked" (a campaign never seen in both games which features a cruiser ship) and "Dead March" (features a "Swamp Fever"-like theme).

Healing items

• Early screenshots show that the first aid kit had a more box-like shape, didn't look like it was made out of soft materials, and had a carrying handle at one time. This design can still be seen in the final version's first aid kit icon.
• In the games files, The Medkit Icon had the first aid bag and the pills together.
• Early videos showed it was possible to share medkits as well as pills instead of the current healing teammates feature, but after adding temporary healing items (pain pills) this was scrapped.

Campaigns

No Mercy

• "No Mercy" looked significantly different in early versions; it was much darker, but where there was light, it would be quite bright. Also there was no fog.
• The skyscrapers and other buildings in the background would be a part of the skybox texture, which makes them look completely flat; in the final version, the buildings dotting the landscape are actual brushes and models.
• The sky itself was a dark blue, compared to the blue/green mix in the final version.
• Buildings in the campaign would have most of their lights still on, which was changed to very few of them in the final game.
• The working titles for this campaign were "Urban Underground" and "Hell Hospital".
• In the game's sound files, there are unused sound files for the Chopper Pilot: "Hey down there! I can't get any closer, but if you can get to Mercy Hospital I can take ya to the military outpost up north. You have to get to Mercy Hospital! Call me on the radio when you get there". This seems to suggest that the chopper pilot was originally going to notice the Survivors, but this concept was cut, although he still greets the Survivors in the game with "You've made it" on the roof's radio, as if to recognize these particular Survivors.
• Originally, the 28th floor was going to be much like the lower floors, but with large windows. It was revealed that play testers avoided these windows due to fear of falling, which would cause certain death. After the game mechanic of hanging from ledges was created, the windows and walls were removed entirely.

The Apartments

• The spawn area originally had Molotovs on the weapon table.
• Originally, the safe room at the end of this map was supposed to be in a clothing store in a building, which was to the right of the current entrance to the subway.
• The apartment was supposed to be a hotel at one time, judging by the HOTEL sign on the apartment building in early versions of the game.
• A large sign was supposed to be in front of the building to the left of the apartment complex, which indicated that the building was a convenience store.
• An extensive network of rooms and an outside courtyard exists in a map area, located at the end of Holly Street past the subway entrance. This map area is redundant for gameplay purposes and is probably a legacy of a cut scenario abandoned during development.
• Originally, there may have been an extra room in the hallway of floor 2 before the living room. In hammer (or noclip), you can go behind the wall and find some unused space and a door texture. This may be because the developers found it to be pointless since there is already a room around the corner in the kitchen area.

The Subway

• There was to be a long tunnel that lead to the last set of subway cars the player goes through. This was scrapped, likely because of how boring it was.
• All of the subway entrances were blocked off with metal gates, instead of wood.
• The lights inside subway cars used to flicker on and off.
• The generator room seemed to be a bit brighter (mostly due to different colours; walls were cream-colored instead of green) and was slightly bigger than in retail game.

The Sewer

• In earlier footage, it seems that the players had to get to the roof by going through the building to the left of the gas station, not by using a lift.
  • Plus, the Survivors originally had to progress through the gas station. It was changed because of frustrations from many players accidentally shooting the gas pumps.
• An early picture of the front of the Hospital shows that there was an advertising billboard to the left of the hospital at one time.
• Originally, there were 4 ways to go to the sewers.

Rooftop Finale

• In early pre-release images, there was a building in front of the supply room that had electric generators in it. There was also a tower on top of the supply room.
• The entire map was originally quite dark before Valve added a blueish-green skybox and fog.
• The area which the players exit as they enter the rooftop had a different design during development.
• The buildings in the background were all sprites in a 3D skybox, whereas in the final version, the buildings mostly consist of brushes and models.
• A screenshot found in the game's files shows the streets surrounding Mercy Hospital were visible at one point. This was likely removed when the campaigns were being redesigned and the fog was added. It also shows that there were many buildings with lights on, which is consistent with the other pre-release screenshots of No Mercy which were released. In some of the pictures, it seems that there was a stadium in the background, which indicates that there was a sports event going on at the time of the outbreak.

Death Toll

• Judging by the cut lines, the bridge in "the Turnpike" exploded seconds before the Survivors could have used it to go through.
• Some of the lines that Zoey and Francis say when talking with the Church Guy were originally meant for an argument between them and the pilot from the "Runway Finale". In the sound files were the lines they said to the Church Guy, while their file names suggested that it happened in Dead Air. Some of the "Runway Finale" pilot's cut lines seem to respond directly to these.
• The five chapters of "Death Toll" were different: 1. The Caves; 2. The Drainage; 3. The Ranchhouse; 4. The Main Street; 5. The Boathouse.

Boathouse Finale

• Originally, the finale took place near a houseboat that was docked at the edge of a river.
• An early photo of the area, seen in the "materials/console" directory of the game files, shows a houseboat. The houseboat was such a memorable part of the map that this map's filename is "l4d_smalltown05_houseboat". It is unknown why the houseboat was removed, but based on the screenshot, it seems that the houseboat would be too easy to defend.
  • Of note: The image shows that there originally was no burning city in the background; instead, a clear, dark sky could be seen.

Dead Air

• Based on an early "Runway" image in the game's files, it is evident that "Dead Air" was originally intended to have a light blue "moonlight" visual tint.
• There is an unused map called tutorial_standards that was originally going to be part of this campaign, as the "Dead Air" outro title can be seen at the end of this level.

Runway Finale

• An early version of the map seen in the "materials/console" directory shows that the area was virtually pitch-black at one time, with the only lighting being near some parked planes.
• It seems that the idea of "Dead Air" taking place in a ruined city was not a part of the campaign from the beginning. In addition, there was no rubble near or on the runway, which suggests that the idea of the airport being bombed was not developed when the airport chapter was first made.
• Originally, in cut lines, the C-130 Pilot was supposed to have a partner named Terry who was the one going over to fill up the truck, but died while holding the radio that the Survivors use.

Blood Harvest

• Francis would've commented in the start of the campaign that the C-130 Pilot couldn't land a plane, it was eventually re-used in the Sacrifice comic by Bill explaining the problems with the various rescue vehicles.
• Beta versions of Blood Harvest were much greener and brighter than the final version. In addition, there was no fog, making the sky much more visible.
• Some chapters of this campaign, like the others, were also named differently: 1. The Hilltop; 2. The Train Tunnel; 3. The Bridge; 4. The Barn; 5. The Cornfield.

Farmhouse Finale

• An early screenshot of the Farmhouse Finale in the "materials/console" directory shows that early versions of the Farmhouse looked significantly less fortified by the military; there was no sign that designates the area as Echo and there was much less military equipment surrounding the farmhouse
• Early images show that the rescue vehicle was a flatbed truck with a minigun on it instead of an APC.
• Unused lines from Rescue 9's APC Driver indicate that the farmhouse was to be blown up after the truck picked up the Survivors.

The Last Stand

• Before this Survival map was released, a video showed that instead of turning on the generator, the idea was to use a radio to call for help instead.

Versus

• Originally, the only mode was to be Versus. However, Valve found that it was very difficult to balance the game so that both teams could have fun, so they split the game into modes.
• In Versus, the Infected players had the ability to select which Infected they wanted to play as. This menu can be seen in early footage. This idea can be found nowadays on some modded servers.
• Players were able to take control of Common Infected while waiting to respawn after being killed as a Special Infected. This was scrapped as it was deemed too difficult for many players to attack the Survivors as they were always competing against AI-controlled Infected.

Other

• At some point you were supposed be able to crawl while incapacitated as survivor. It was likely cut for balancing reasons. Unused thirdperson animations for all survivors still exist. Both crawling and related animations can be enabled with sourcemod addon.

Left 4 Dead 2

Survivors

• In at least one footage Survivors hold weapons in the same way as L4D1 Survivors, but Rochelle still shared male Survivor animations instead of Zoey's.
• In his first concept art, Coach had a football helmet and a light blue and white shirt with a red "S" on it. Then in the E3 2009 trailer he is seen in a light blue and yellow shirt without the red "S".
• In early designs for Ellis, he has a white shirt and a green hat. His appearance changes in the E3 and Comic-Con playable beta version, then wearing orange pants, a blue and white shirt and a matching hat. He used to have a cap that had a Saint George's Cross on it; this may indicate that at one point he was to be English, rather than Georgian. At one point, he wore a John Deere hat, but this was changed, likely for licensing reasons.
• In the commentary for Left 4 Dead 2, the developers stated that Nick's character was originally an escaped prisoner who stole a nice suit, but he was eventually adapted into his current con man persona. Nick is the only current Survivor who retained his appearance from either beta screenshots or trailers out of all of the playable Survivors.
• The designers of Left 4 Dead 2 changed Rochelle's clothing designs several times. In the trailer, she is wearing an orange shirt. The designers then changed it to a red shirt and then to its present pink T-shirt. Her hair has also received some minor changes; the designers changed it from dark brown to black, and made it shorter, from a waist-low ponytail to a bun. Her original, longer hairstyle can still be seen in various artwork of her latest design. Rochelle's braided hair jiggle bones still exist on her final model, albeit unseen due to nothing being attached to them. This model with longer hair has been recovered by the community looking through the SDK content provided by Valve and is now available in the workshop.

The Infected

The Charger

• Concept art shows that the developers had planned for the Charger to be either a large infected with an armored upper skull yet tiny "T-Rex" arms, or a "tripod" dog-like animal.
• Originally, the Charger had many different attacks and had gone through multiple versions with different twists on his charge attack. In one version of his build, his charge attack made him trample over Survivors rather than grabbing them, and his melee attack was replaced with an overhead strike that smashed the Survivor to the floor before the Charger started pounding them.

The Jockey

• Concept art shows the Jockey as being gray-skinned, much larger and more ape-like, as well as being completely naked. Another shows him without a large amount of muscle mass around his neck and upper back, as well as being much more skeletal.
• An early version of the Jockey's attack had the Survivor stay in first-person with the Jockey's hands obscuring the screen.
• Like the Hunter, the Jockey was to be a Special Infected able to dismount his targets after mounting or ensnaring them as he wishes.

The Spitter

• As seen in concept art, the Spitter at one point had a purple flower patterned yellow dress, gray hair that stuck up, and a rather skeletal appearance. This design was scrapped as it was deemed too costly to properly render and animate the dress.
• In another piece of concept art, the Spitter had a bun as her hairstyle, and unlike the other pieces of concept art, this design actually had a nose. Her design was also larger in size. Reminiscence of this design can be seen within the manuals of physical copies.
• In another piece of concept art, the Spitter had a more veiny appearance, pigtails that stuck out like antennae, along with a large, rounded stomach to give her a logical place to brew her acidic goo. However, during playtesting, it became apparent that many playtesters thought she was pregnant or called her pregnancy-themed names. Valve decided that this was rocky territory and made her stomach flatter to avoid any confusion.
• The Spitter also had a comical pigeon-toed bird walk, changed for being more humorous than eerie.
• The Spitter's spit was going to behave in a manner similar to the Boomer's bile, in which the acid would stick to the Survivor that it came in contact with; this concept, however, was scrapped since it made it too easy for Spitters to incapacitate Survivors.
• Originally, the Spitter's acid would change colors as it became more potent. It was to start off green, then change to yellow, and finally red.

Common Infected

• There is an unused gore effect featuring a gigantic slash completely down the Common Infected's spine. It is possible that this would have been used, should the axe have kept its overhead downwards slash, and was used on a Common Infected's back. As of The Last Stand Community Update, the Pitchfork appears to use this unused gore effect, as it can create vertical gashes on an Infected.
• An "Infected Suit Guy" is present in Left 4 Dead 2, with support for gradients, however he was merely for testing the new variation system.

Uncommon Infected

• The Fallen Survivor was going to be in Left 4 Dead 2 in the first place, but was cut from the final version due to people having trouble in the beta version with him (though he was re-introduced in "The Passing").

Cut Infected

• The Leaker was being developed in Left 4 Dead 2. It had similar attacks to the Spitter and the Boomer, and the ability to plant itself in the ground and act as a bomb. It was removed because the Survivors could run, as the Leaker would alert everyone while it was planting itself. Code for the Leaker still remains in the game files, and it is actually possible to enable Leakers to spawn in current version of the game (both as bots and as playable Infected in Versus) with console commands (required sv_cheats 1.) The Leaker implemented into the game appears as a Boomer and can only be killed through fall damage, or his primary attack in which he explodes, causing major damage to nearby survivors and igniting a small fire afterward.
• There seems to be lots of concept art that never ended up in the final build of Left 4 Dead 2, or was seen in early development of the game. These include an Infected with a large colony of rats bursting out of his stomach (referred to by the original artist as "rat man",^[10] however on the bottom is written both "Verminaids" and "Verman" which could possibly be the definitive names of the rats and the Infected), a giant Infected called "Meat Wall" (looking like a sort of mix of the Boomer and the Tank), concept art of an "unknown infected" with broad muscular shoulders, and an infected pig and hog called "Hellpiggy" and "Hellhog" respectively. A 3D model found in one of Valve's books also shows an Infected with pronounced neck muscles and throat.

Weapons

• In the very early footage it can be seen that the ammo reserve for every weapon was the same as for its L4D1 counterparts.

Chrome Shotgun

• In early gameplay videos, the Chrome Shotgun shared the Left 4 Dead Pump Shotgun animations. The stats were shared as well.

Silenced Submachine Gun

• In early gameplay videos, the Silenced Submachine Gun used animations from the Left 4 Dead Submachine Gun, along with its stats. (Damage, Range, etc.)
• The fabric strap doesn't seem to move at all, although E3 videos showed the strap moving when a user runs or turns. This has been restored in The Last Stand update.

Combat Shotgun

• Early beta footage showed that the Combat Shotgun re-used the first game's Auto Shotgun animations, including pulling a non-existent stock when the gun was pulled out. It also seemed to have the same damage, fire rate, and so forth as the original Auto Shotgun early on.
• Early videos show that the folding stock on the Combat Shotgun jiggled a bit while moving. This has been restored in The Last Stand update.

Hunting Rifle

• In some footage, the Hunting Rifle behaves exactly like its L4D1 "old" counterpart, meaning: very low accuracy while moving and L4D1 animations without the spinning wrist glitch, although it already had 150 ammo in reserve.

Sniper Rifle

• In the first video released, the Sniper Rifle's magazine was shaped like the PSG-1's 5-round magazine, while later footage showed the magazine shaped like the G3's 20-round magazine.
• Early footage showed that the Sniper Rifle re-used the Hunting Rifle's animations.
• Also, it had worse running accuracy than now, but still not as bad as the former had before The Sacrifice DLC.

AK-47

• In some footage, the AK-47 had a faster rate of fire (now used for the M60) and it had a running animation similar to the Counter-Strike Weapons, with running while pointing the gun to the ground.
• Also, it appears it had a bit brighter and more colorful texture than it has now.

Combat Rifle

• During the beta version of Left 4 Dead 2, the Combat Rifle shared the same statistics and animations as the M16 Assault Rifle in the first Left 4 Dead, it was fully automatic and had a 50-round magazine.^[11]

P220 Pistol

• In the beta version, the P220 Pistol had a lighter color scheme and its texture was much more detailed.
• On some footage, it can be clearly seen that pickup pistols weren't Glocks, but P220s.
• Also, in beta, it re-used the reloading animation of the M1911 Pistol. It used the same sounds, except for the firing sound. Also, the Glock used the P220's firing sound in some early footage.

Magnum Pistol

• The only difference between retail-version Magnum and beta-version Magnum is that in first-person view it was positioned a bit closer to the center of the screen than now.
• The Magnum Pistol was originally supposed to be called the "Desert Cobra". A string calling the Magnum the Desert Cobra is in "left4dead2_%language%.txt" under a line about the Magnum.
  • This pistol is still called so in Whitaker's Gun Shop.

Axe

• It was originally planned that you could decapitate a Witch by sneaking up on her and swinging the Axe at her head, but this was later scrapped.
• In early gameplay videos, the Axe had an animation in which the Survivor would bring it over their head and slice downward, probably chopping the Infected in half. This was later abandoned due to fact that this swing took much more time to make than the rest of animations. Some mods enable this animation; however, while it can be seen in viewmodel, it doesn't show in third person (Survivors don't have animations for this swing animation).
• In the beta version, Axes could be found in "The Parish" campaign.

Baseball Bat

• Early on, the Baseball Bat was supposed to be made of metal, explaining its sound effect in the teaser. Its old design can be seen in the Left 4 Dead 2 Strategy Guide and in the texture file "4meleeweapons".
• Along with the Cricket Bat, the baseball bat had an additional, 4th swing animation, very similar to the third-person swing animations. It was cut probably due to the same reasons as the 3rd animation for the Axe—being too long.

Bile Bomb

• The Bile Bomb appears to have originally affected Survivors near the blast radius, according to a game instructor line stating "A Survivor bile-bombed you" ― however, this line is normally used when biled as an Infected in Versus. There were also lines stating that Boomer bile attracts the horde, and that the player shouldn't throw it on other Survivors. Players found it too annoying and it got removed, but only partially—when Survivors get hit with a bile bomb, it still breaks. The Blinding effect is disabled by default, but it can be enabled by turning on cheats and typing in the console command vomitjar_radius_survivor # (where # is the value). This can also be achieved with mods.

Crowbar

• In one of the videos, the Crowbar had a much faster swing (about as fast as a Machete or Nightstick).

Frying Pan

• As with Axes and Bats, Frying Pans also had an additional, longer 3rd swing animation, which was cut from the retail game.
• The Frying Pan had different sounds when you hit a survivor or infected.

Heavy Machine Gun

• The Heavy Machine Gun was originally going to have limited ammo, but this limitation was given to the portable M60 Machine Gun instead.
• There is a Heavy Machine Gun present in the beta version of "The Waterfront" and "The Park", located on a tower just before the CEDA checkpoint and the Bus Station. Whether this was going to be a placement in the final game, or simply used to test the weapon's use is unknown.

Cut Weapons

• In the files for Dam It, stringtables refer to two weapons not found in the game, the "heavy rifle" and the "heavy shotgun".^[12]
• In the first game's game_sounds_weapons.txt file, listings for a flare gun and a LAW rocket launcher can be found. It is likely that these weapons were scrapped early in development, as none of the pre-release footage shows either of these weapons.
  • The flare gun soundscripts were likely removed because they were leftovers from Half-Life 2, it is however mentioned as a handwave for the Survivors leaving their guns on Virgil's boat.
• There were originally going to be a riot shield and a didgeridoo as usable melee weapons in Left 4 Dead 2. The riot shield was fully modeled, textured, and can still be spawned in-game both via the console and during custom campaigns, while the didgeridoo had a low-poly model, but no textures.
• In early development, Coach was seen with a compound bow which was never put into the game.
• There was an item called the Ammo Pack. They would be placed in the medkit slot when picked up, and used a reskinned first aid kit model. Much like the Incendiary and Explosive Ammo packs, they could be deployed for use by teammates, with which they could resupply their ammo. This was cut because it went against the idea of players having to pick up new weapons when their current weapon was low on ammo and because playtesters would deem ammo packs less usable, so long as ammo piles still existed. Its texture sheet can still be found in the texture files.
• The two ammo upgrades were originally designed to be static items that the Director placed in the world; however, testing showed that players were unwilling to move away from an area that had ammo upgrades, so they made it so that ammo upgrades had to be picked up and placed somewhere.
• Originally, the melee weapons were supposed to break after prolonged use. Break sounds for the Axe and Frying Pan weapons can still be found in the game files.
• The designers removed dual-wielding melee weapons after several tests.
• The pistol's texture file is named "4pistols" and according to this file and some files found in the Valve Starter Kits, a Ruger P-85 and the returning M1911 were going to appear in the game.

Healing items

• The placeholder for the adrenaline shot was nothing like a syringe; rather, it was a re-skinned bottle of pain pills in yellow. The texture can still be found in the game files. Then, it became an syringe similar to the one used in the HUD, before the current look for adrenaline.
• Likewise, the Defibrillator's worldmodel placeholder was a re-skinned first aid kit model. Its textures can still be found in the game files; the Defibrillator was yellow, with a lightning bolt instead of a cross.

Campaigns

Dead Center

• Originally, the Uncommon Infected were going to be the Riot Infected, not the CEDA Worker Infected.
  • In the "Zombie Survival Guide" trailer, Ellis is seen shoving a Riot Infected while the survivors are running through a Mall.
• Originally, Whitaker was supposed to provide covering fire to the Survivors during their trip to and from the supermarket (sound files can still be found inside the "sound/npc/whitaker" directory labelled as "defendchatter").

Dark Carnival

• Already on "The Highway", Survivors were able to find Tier 2 weapons other than Hunting Rifles, but it could be set up in that way only for showing new capabilities in gameplay.
• On "The Fairgrounds", in the room before the point of no return and carousel Gauntlet Crescendo Event there was 3 Tier 2 weapons to pick up instead of 2.
• Also on "The Fairgrounds", just after shooting gallery instead of just an entrance to the hallway there was an additional room with two white garden tables and two pool tables and a short, tight passage to the actual hallway, looking pretty similar to the rooms under stage on "The Concert".
• Originally, "The Coaster" was planned as a monorail and the Survivors were supposed to climb roofs and jump to a monorail from there. A barricade was planned at some point, but was scrapped entirely.
• According to sound files, the Survivors (mostly Nick) were going to argue with a driver who has the Midnight Riders tour bus to pick them up. "The Concert" was the same, except the driver smashes through a door and pick them up.
• Originally, "The Coaster" was supposed to be a survival level, but it was cut it in the final version because players would be able to stand on the wood that holds the track up, with the Infected unable to reach or attack them. The survival level can be accessed by the use of glitches or by using a mod from gamemaps.com.
  • Though the exploits have been fixed, the level still hasn't been returned.
• Originally, the coaster was supposed to crash, causing the alarm to go off.
  • This would have explained the fire in the "Zombie Survival Guide" trailer.
• Originally, Valve planned "The Concert" to be set on a train, akin to a county fair-type setting. This was cut because it "wasn't as much fun as you would think". A leftover of this scrapped finale can presumably be found in the game. At the far-left of the sitting area is a pathway, with a spaced-up area, which is presumably for the unused, old train finale. The pathway is blocked off by fences.

Swamp Fever

• Originally, the Uncommon Infected were the Fallen Survivors instead of the Mud Men, but they were cut from the game and later put in "The Passing".
• The Heavy Machine Gun at the "The Plantation" was going to be in front of the entrance of the house, not on the second floor.
  • This is still visible near the end of the "Zombie Survival Guide" trailer.
• The wooden walkways would sometimes collapse when walked on (lines still exist for Nick's dialogue), forcing the Survivors to trudge through the muck and take the other path. Valve removed this because playtesters found this extremely tedious.
• The strung-up Charger found in "Plank Country" before the crescendo was originally a Boomer.
• The radio in "The Plantation" was actually a button.^[13] It could also be seen that the gate would just open by itself at the end.

Hard Rain

• Initially, the Survivors had to travel some distance into the first chapter to get weapons. During playtesting, it was found players were hesitant to do this, thus failing to get to upgraded weapons in time. This problem was overcome by putting weapons and supplies in the nearby Burger Tank restaurant.
• According to Chet Faliszek at Eurogamer Expo London, early builds of the campaign had the players turn on the lights of houses and other areas on the way to the gas station so that they would be lit on the way back, but players found this to be a menial task, and so the idea was scrapped.
• At first, the Survivors were going to use flares to signal Virgil (and start the finale) and he would sail back to pick them up. The idea of firing off a flare gun was later dropped in the final version; its sole legacy is a brief and occasional exchange between the Survivors at the start of the campaign when Nick is accused of leaving a "gun bag" containing a flare gun behind on Virgil's boat.
• In the Population.txt file, there's populations for "rain" which includes mudmen and rain versions of Common Infected that would be used during the return to Virgil. However, since the nav meshes for the return variants of the maps still use the non-rain names, these populations went unused. There's a mod that returns this functionality in the Steam Workshop.^[14]

The Parish

• Originally, the Uncommon Infected were going to be the CEDA Worker Infected, but they were replaced with the Riot Infected.
• During the finale, the bridge itself was going to be continuously bombed by the military, as seen in the "Zombie Survival Guide" trailer.
• The prototype version of this campaign combined the first two levels ("The Waterfront" and "The Park") together.
  • The crescendo of the second level was somewhat changed. Instead of entering a simplistic CEDA trailer, the Survivors entered a sanitation center, which would spray them with disinfection gas, and sound an alarm as the doors open. The map is still in the game files and is playable through the "map c5m1_waterfront_sndscape" command in the developer console.
• "The Bridge" was created with no cars or anything other than the Infected in the way. Valve changed this later, as described in the Developer's Commentary for this chapter.
• "The Quarter" was going to be a Survival map, but was cut for unknown reasons.
• In early testing, the alarm sound file for "The Park" was high-pitched, longer-lasting noise similar to the alarm used in Half-Life 2: Episode 2 at the White Forest base if any Striders were to get too close to the silo.
• During development, "The Park" was conceived as a procedurally generated maze. However, in testing, this was found to be too distracting from gameplay and difficult for players who often got lost in the area. However, the concept was salvaged in the "The Cemetery" wherein The Director chooses from four alternative layouts and navigation pathways.
• Also, during development for "The Park", there was no trailer; rather there was a small concrete hut that did not have to be entered next to a fence and that would trigger the alarm once players reached the fence. In addition, there was a Heavy Machine Gun facing the direction from which the Survivors came.
• In the game files, there are sound files that are early versions of the military at the end of the Parish. Things to note is that an unnamed character (whom you use their radio to contact the military) is named as Lieutenant Maverick, it sounds like the soldiers were repairing their chopper, and it sounds like there would be a 15-minute time limit since one of the files says, "Hurry it up! Bridge detonation begins in 15."

Other

• Valve considered calling the sequel Back 4 More.^[15]
• People believed there was going to be a "Miracle Pack" and an "Apocalypse Pack". However, Chet Faliszek later responded that it was testing code for getting through Microsoft's certification.
• According to a listing on EA's official site, there was possibly going to be a PlayStation 3 version of Left 4 Dead 2.
• Originally you were supposed to be able to "stomp" common/uncommon infected (Also apparently worked for Witches for some odd reason). If you shoved lone infected sometimes you would kill it instantly (often even if you werent at shove distance from infected). Unused thirdperson animation intended for this still exists in the game. CVar for enabling this feature also exists and can be used in current version of the game via console commands (requires sv_cheats 1) and mods to enable "stomping" with animations.
• Just like with L4D1, survivors crawling while incapacitated was also planned to be included in L4D2 but was ultimately scrapped, likely for the same reasons as in the first game. That, or it was just a leftovers from the first game. As with first game, all survivors still have unused thirdperson animations for this, and Sourcemod addon can still be used to enable crawling with animations. However, there is now also a CVar for enabling it ("survivor_allow_crawling", only without thirdperson animations, survivor will just slide on the ground). crawling can be enabled with console commands (requires "sv_cheats 1") and mods.

Gallery

References