Left 4 Dead engine branch
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The Left 4 Dead engine branch was released in 2008 with 
Left 4 Dead , and continued in 2009 with 
Left 4 Dead 2 . It was maintained side-by-side with the Orange Box branch, but was ultimately discontinued with the release of 
Portal 2 .
Unlike other branches, L4D does not require earlier versions of Source to be installed. It stands entirely alone.
Features
New since the Orange Box is:
- Subtitles for intro movies and other Bink-based videos
- Allows subtitles (including custom ones) to be put on timelines for when they should show
- "Counter-Strike bot" AI
- Source's original AI routines appear to have been completely replaced by the successor to Mike Booth's Counter-Strike bot. As well as unknown changes to code structure, the old nodegraph system has been superseded by polygonal navigation meshes that are automatically generated by the engine.
- AI director
- A "dungeon master" for the entire game which controls NPC spawning, music, weather effects, map layout, and more.
- VPK add-ons
- An archive format for easy mod distribution.
- Lag compensated props
- prop_physics entities can be selectively lag compensated.
- Split-screen
- Up to four players can play on the same screen at once.
- Shader and effect detail options
- New options that allow for better performance on low-end machines.
- Swaying trees
- A material parameter that gives the effect of trees swaying in the wind.
- Template:L4d2 add
- A powerful new scripting system using Squirrel.
- Template:L4d2 add
- Water can now flow through a map using flowmaps.
Availability
Source code for this branch is not available. However, server plugins are possible, and authoring tools exist for custom content.
