The Passing

"The Passing will become the most important campaign in the Left 4 Dead story, as all the Survivors are being called together in one campaign."

- Doug Lombardi

The Passing is the first DLC campaign in Left 4 Dead 2, which includes a new campaign and "new co-operative challenge modes of play" and introduces a new firearm, the M60; the Golf Club, and a new Uncommon Infected called the Fallen Survivor. It was released April 22, 2010.

The Passing takes place between Dead Center and Dark Carnival and is set in the suburban town of Rayford, Georgia.

One of the most highly advertised features of this campaign is a meet-up between the Left 4 Dead 2 Survivors and three of the Survivors from Left 4 Dead. However, the original Survivors are not playable and have only very minor cameo roles at the beginning and end of the campaign.

The campaign is playable in all of the current game modes, as well as the newly featured ones. It is free for PC, and costs 560 MSP ($7.00) on the Xbox 360. On Xbox 360, the download size is 284.04 MB.

The campaign is called "The Passing," which could be interpreted in several ways. It may simply be referring to a brief, chance meeting as each party of Survivors pursues its own survival strategy, in which sense it may be a play on the old sayings "two ships passing in the night" and "two strangers on a bridge". It could also be idiomatic in the sense of denoting a "passing of the torch" from one set of Survivors to the other (i.e. the depleted and worn-down Left 4 Dead Survivors pass from the player's sight and control, leaving the Left 4 Dead 2 group to continue the struggle), a hypothesis which is reinforced by an Achievement unlocked upon completing the campaign. Finally, it may also refer to the "passing" of Bill who gave up his life to save the others. Bill's death and the appearance of the Fallen Survivors could also explain why the campaign's tagline is "Nobody survives forever."

By way of explanation, Valve released a DLC for Left 4 Dead called The Sacrifice in which the players work through a new campaign featuring a bridge with a failed generator scenario that demands one player give up, or "sacrifice," their life to let the other three Survivors escape.

A digital comic book released by Valve at the start of the fourth quarter of 2010 shows what happened to the original Survivors before and after the events of Left 4 Dead.

Available inside the campaign only

 * The Fallen Survivor.
 * The Golf Club.
 * A new Midnight Riders Song: "Save Me Some Sugar," which can be played on the Juke Box.
 * A new Bride model for the Witch.
 * New Common Infected models: Midnight Riders fans and Wedding Guests.
 * Foot Lockers containing a nigh-infinite quantity of usually limited items (Molotovs, Pipe bombs, Pills, Adrenaline)
 * New dialogue for all eight playable Survivors.
 * 10 New Achievements
 * 1 New Avatar Award (Left 4 Dead 2 baseball hat)

Available outside the campaign

 * 1 New Avatar Award. (Left 4 Dead 2 Gnome Chompski prop.)
 * 1 New achievement (Mutant overlord)
 * The M60.
 * New Survival maps.
 * New Scavenge maps.
 * New weekly game modes dubbed "Mutations".
 * The Baseball Bat now randomly spawns within all maps alongside other melee weapons including at the start of campaigns and inside safe rooms. Baseball Bats used to always spawn at the start of a campaign for people who pre-ordered Left 4 Dead 2, but no longer appear at the start.
 * Weekly blog posts by Valve