The Highway

"Whispering Oaks! Shit, I used to go there as a kid!"

- Coach

"Oh great, now we can die there as adults!"

- Nick

The Highway is the first chapter in Left 4 Dead 2 ' s Dark Carnival campaign. It was first revealed at the Penny Arcade Expo and again in Tokyo Game Show '09.

Campaign
The Survivors begin at the race car from the last campaign, since the survivors can't go any further due to the abandoned cars along the highway. Survivors will travel through the cars, finding supplies along the way. Eventually, you will reach a highway off-ramp, make your way down. When the survivors reach a curb under a bridge, an army hummer is parked next to ammo and weapons. As you go under the bridge turn right and go up to the billboard, however a faster way is to head left up the incline between the two overpasses and following the bridge to the billboard. If you get on the billboard there is always a hunting rifle. Now, you will encounter a motel. Be on the look out as there is usually a shotgun on the roof of the motel. Be careful the motel is a common place to spawn both tanks and witches so stay alert. Survivors can find very useful supplies like Laser sights, weapons, explosives, etc. The parking lot has an alarmed car and pool. The rooms hold more supplies. Going up the side of the motel will take you onto the overpass, and using a billboard as a bridge, allows access to the roof. Once on the balcony, make your way down to the part with a destroyed section. Don't try to jump it, as you will simply fall down and have to come back up. Instead, go through the door of the room next to it. Go through the broken wall into the next room and continue until you reach an open window. Jump through it, continue down the balcony, down the stairs and you're out.

Next, make your way round the back of the motel, following the stone path. You will reach a large gully, and going down will result in a long sliding fall. Don't worry, it won't damage you too much, but be careful to look before you leap, as several ledges along the slope often contain useful items such as pills/adrenaline and pipe bombs/molotovs, or bad things like Witches.

It should be noted that the gully is a "point of no return." Keep in mind that Smokers, Hunters, and anything else that can "hold" Survivors can easily kill someone if the rest of their teammates have already gone down and they are still up on the cliff, so be sure to stick together. Once you reach the bottom of the hill, you'll have to wade your way down a river of muddy water to reach the hill leading up to Whispering Oaks. Be careful, as the water slows you down considerably. If you have to deal with a horde, there's a rock at the bottom of the gully that was overlooked when programming so Infected will stop chasing you when you're on it. Keep going to the hill up ahead.

Once you reach the top of the hill, watch out, as this is one of the director's favourite places to spawn tanks, witches and alarmed cars. Head for the saferoom in the trailer up ahead, and be ready to enter Whispering Oaks Amusement Park.

Survival
Bedroom Method: This requires a Combat Rifle and a melee weapon. A pipe-bomb is advised as well. Grab your supplies and head upstairs. Now go to the furthest room, it should have a katana, a first aid kit, a defibrillator and a Molotov. Using the defibrillator, take an extra first aid kit or some special ammo upstairs. Start. In this room, you have a good amount of supplies. Smokers can't get you, the horde is delayed, you have plenty of room to maneuver, and Chargers are almost useless. Jockeys are the biggest threat, as they can take you to the bottom floor. When the Tank comes, leave the room and take him down. When the second Tank comes, throw the pipe-bomb. Then take him down. Now pick whatever explosive you like and hold out. The Combat Rifle is required to take out Jockeys and Tanks from range, and the melee is used to: A. get you to the room and B. Help when you need to leave when Tanks arrive.

Scavenge
The Motel: This is the only scavenge level available for Dark Carnival so far. One very effective tactic for this one is to all scope the ground floor together to prevent hunters, chargers, smokers etc from picking off stragglers. A hunting rifle/military sniper rifle is a good asset to your team especialy for any Smokers or Spitters guarding the fuel generator. Proceed to the building directly opposite the pool exit and retrieve those first, then move on to the other ground floor cans. Once all have been retrieved, split up. A sniper and shotgunner should stay by the generator: the sniper covering the two survivours proceeding up stairs the shotgunner covering the sniper, whilst the others (assalt rifle and shotgunner) search the upper floor, sticking together. Due to the open balcony, the sniper should have no trouble covering the two on the upstairs floor. The upper floor team should be picking up cans and throwing them down to the generator whilst the shotgunner pours and the sniper keeps an eye out for that troublesome Spitter. Overall this tactic (if done correctly) should work. So good luck!