Crash Course

Crash Course is the first DLC campaign for Left 4 Dead. It was free on the PC version, but cost $7.00 (formerly 560 Microsoft points) for the Xbox 360. It was released on September 29th 2009. According to Valve it is meant to bridge the gap between No Mercy and Death Toll. Crash Course is the shortest of any Left 4 Dead campaign and contains only two chapters.

This campaign was subsequently released for Left 4 Dead 2 on November 4th, 2011 as part of the Cold Stream DLC which also included ports of all earlier Left 4 Dead campaigns. Compared to the other ported campaigns from Left 4 Dead Crash Course is the least modified and retains most of its original layout and features.

Crash Course begins shortly after the events of No Mercy. The helicopter rescue pilot from the Rooftop Finale succumbs to the Infection and Zoey shoots him in mid-flight. The helicopter crashes in an industrial area outside of the city of Fairfield in Whitney County.

Starting from next to the helicopter crash site, the Survivors traverse Fairfield's industrial landscape. Initially there is no firm clue about their destination until they make reference to a truck depot and discuss the town of Riverside where a military evacuation center is reported to be. This plan obviously foreshadows and contextualizes the Death Toll campaign.

At the truck depot they discover an armored truck mounted on a workshop hoist which must be lowered before they can board and escape. Activating a generator for this purpose triggers a finale horde attack. In another act of foreshadowing, the generator stalls partway through the battle and one survivor must restart it: the same problem occurs in The Sacrifice, except the survivor who restarts it is certain to die.

Below is a complete list of video walkthroughs of the 2 levels:


 * 1) The Alleys
 * 2) The Truck Depot Finale

Note that the gameplay videos are on each campaign's info page and not on each map page.

Left 4 Dead 2
With the Cold Stream DLC mentioned above, Crash Course was edited and ported over to Left 4 Dead 2 and thus it includes all the new Infected, items and weapons. Video walkthroughs below show off the latter version of the campaign and all the changes:
 * 1) Map 1
 * 2) Map 2

Released in Crash Course

 * Sometimes only one or two of the second tier weapons appear at a given spawn site.
 * Alarmed cars now spawn at different locations.
 * Sometimes rooms that may contain items are barricaded.
 * New dialogue for Zoey, Louis, and Francis.
 * 10 new Achievements.
 * 2 new Survival maps.