If they don't take ideas from the forums, it'll be nothing more than "not listening to user feedback". If they do, great. Doesn't that mean people actually have a chance to input ideas and know they're not talking at a brick wall?

And yeah, sure - it's announced early. But can you really tack THAT much extra content onto a game? A sequel is pretty much needed, you can't just replace half the game in a DLC.

To Valve's credit, they are well known for hiring talented fans / Source modders.

I think the issue is more that Valve is taking these ideas without giving credit, or at least thanking the community for their valuable "user feedback". For your second point, this argument has been going on since the sequel was announced, so I'll keep this short:

First, it's not about how much content there will be in L4D2, we already know it has more then the original.

Second, and one of the bigger issues, is that the game was announced LESS THEN A YEAR after the original came out, which is (to many people) too soon (especially considering Valve's history).

There's also the chance that because L4D2 will have Valve's focus, updates and DLC for the original will be even more scarce. For me, I'd rather see L4D2 cut up into downloadable updates for the original, but the argument is moot as L4D2 is on the way and I'll be buying it on day one no matter what.

rofl who ever wrote this needs to stfu and get that dildo out of their ass

read the forums agreement before registering
they have full rights to any ideas posted on the forums

QQ bitch

Talented fans and Source modders being people who actually do the work to create their idea they had on paper.

I think that you (The Guy who wrote the article) have conveniently decided to completely ignore the fact that 6 months have passed from the release of L4D to this forum post where he posted his idea. I would take a very sure guess that Valve had the same concept and possibly a working gameplay proof of concept for playtesting purposes by the time he made his post.

you got a point there though i never complained seeing as i just now heard of this but i would be flattered if my idea was used for a game

I think this sums it up: http://farm1.static.flickr.com...d5b9de.jpg

How about this guy just admits he stole the idea from the old Penn and Paper RPG called "All Flesh Must Be Eaten" in that game there is a special zombie class called the Spitter and guess what it does??

While we are on the subject of stealing, you should probably let everyone here know what a wonderful job you did at paraphrasing my article, pretty much word for word, including the last paragraph. Valve isn't the only one that's big on not crediting their sources as well I see.

http://hellforge.gameriot.com/blogs/Caveat-Emptor/Valve-does-it-again-The-Spitter-is-from-the-community

Before you go around accusing people of stealing your ideas you should realize you're not the only one who wrote about the Spitter controversy.

Oh yes, I'm sure Adam here came across the information from pure research, four days after my article hit the top spot for Reddit, StumbleUpon, and N4G. And what a further coincidence that his ending paragraph is nigh identical to my ending paragraph. Yes, people wrote about the Spitter controversy--after I wrote about it, however.

I found out about the supposed theft of the Spitter on the L4D forums:

http://steamcommunity.com/groups/L4D2boycott/announcements/detail/91348489467357968

I didn't know about your article when I wrote mine, and I definitely didn't steal your last paragraph (I hadn't even read it until now) But I'm more than willing to include a link to your article if you want.

I desperately hope the next special infected to be unveiled is The Swallower, wouldn't that be great?

If that's the case then that's fine. It seemed suspicious enough when we both sarcastically suggest to look for the third SI on the Steam forums. But I'm just saying; do a Google search of "Valve does it again" and you'd probably then understand why I was more than defensive about the coincidence.

Valve did all the idea stealing, really? come one now, this comic has been around a while and already outlines the concept of a spitter zombie.
http://www.thezombiehunters.com/zombies.php#spitter

Oops, pooched that URL cut n paste.
One more time with out the space after the r and before the s in hunters
http://www.thezombiehunters.com/zombies.php#spitter

I completely understand, I guess great minds think alike?

OMG VALV STOLE FREEMAN'S NAME FROM MORGAN FREEMAN!

Lol, this whole comment string - Ironic much??

Valve stole my ideas story author accused of stealing story about valve stealing ideas, because story about same thing is very similar.
Valve accused of stealing SI ideas because idea about SI that fills similar role is very similar.
While not always the case:

[Problem A (not enough ranged weapon use)]
+ [Limited Solution space (Must be a zombie not entirely like what we have - that still fits)]
= [Similar Solutions (Zombie that "spits" something long range)]

Works for your story commenting about Idea theft.

Oh dear god this is stupid. There were thousands of ideas for special infected that came out of the forums. Chances are, no matter what valve chose to do it would look a lot like something from the forums.

I hate people.
Valve rocks.
they didn't steal anything.
it's not like it's rocket surgery!

LOL!!!

Well, whining certainly gives something to talk about it seems.

But wasn't GTA Vice City released one year after GTA3? People weren't complaining about it being "too soon".

Good point, and while I'm not necessarily one of the people complaining about L4D2 arriving too soon, I think this is more of a problem then your GTA example is that L4D2 is very similar to the original, in almost every aspect (besides some new items and a change in cast and scenery).

I see what you mean. But to be fair we haven't seen all of what this new game has to offer. People are making judgments based on so little information (not saying you are. No disrespect. ). I going to wait till the whole product is revealed before I make any judgment of my own. As far as the graphics being the same goes, gameplay is more important to me than graphics is but to each his own. Thank you very much for responding to me and hopefully the new game will match up to the original.

This is rediculous and you are a joke. So you make a suggestion for them to use, then get pissed off for them using it.

If only there were more gamers like you, I couldn't agree more.

If you actually read his (the supposed creator of the Spitter concept) reply to this controversy, you'd know he actually isn't angry with Valve for taking his idea.

you think valve stealing peoples ideas is bad try playing land of the dead road to fiddlers green then read the wiki on the game and you will see "similar" traits in left 4 dead that you see in in lotd:RF

I agree that even if valve has the rights to take ideas from their fan site, they don't have the right to take an idea from a person who was applying for a internship.

I'm a college student and well a few years before L4D was made I game them my resume, and applied for internship, and I told them about a great idea I had, and at the time I was Naieve. well My idea for a game was called factions, and there would be 4-5 people in each group. there would be super zombies survivors. and there would be 3 groups of survivors trying to get out of the city alive and each group would fight each other as well as undead hordes and special infected I.e(special infected. now a few years later when I saw the fact my idea was similar to the ideas I mentioned turned up in the game left 4 dead. I was like wow, valve really is a bunch of S.O.B's. and I read a article from valve saying we came up with the idea of pitting 8 bots against each other in teams of 2 and seeing how it would work out and we decided to make it a zombie game. I was thinking to myself, how the hell can those smug underhanded bastards stand there and write this garbage, when they know they are full of it.

If anyone should be upset it is me. I don't care if anyone believes me, cause I don't owe anyone proof. but, i guarantee if they took some of my ideas, they will do it again. But FYI pp, they didn't get all of my ideas on the game, so when I do release my version either called dead planet, Factions or something like that valve will defiantly rule the day they started stealing ideas. also their only game that they truly made which I believe was theirs, was half-life. General Mag is my x box live name you can reach me there or email me at sean_poet82@hotmail.com if you are a c++ programmer, I need all the programmers and testers plus adobe and Maya artists possible to get this game produced. It is time to let the steam out of valves company.

Yeah I have a few typos I saw after posting, one is (I game them my resume,)
Sorry for the typos.

I think Valve has the rights to take ideas from fans.
First reason being, you have this "Idea" that you think your the only one who has thought of it to be made. Firstly you mentioned your idea on valve's forums when if you want to do it yourself you keep secret, what Valve has done when taking your idea is to simply plug it into there game to keep the fans happy, including the one who made the idea happy.
Final Reason being do you honestly think you can easily go through with that idea to make a new AI and put it into the game yourself through a mod? Afraid not. As easy as Lua being you still have to mess with the game files to make there AI, movie sequences or what ever.

Personally I think this makes Valve great, keeping there fans amazed and keeping the games coming.