Valve is now responding to those who are voicing their plans to boycott the upcoming release of Left 4 Dead 2 that was recently announced at E3. While the developer does admit that their plans to bring out a sequel so quickly is new for them, plans regarding the original Left 4 Dead title have not changed.

Valve has been quick to point out that they have an excellent track record for their support of their titles. In fact, the developer claims that they will continue to support the L4D1 community that numbers over three million.

The developer claims that it remains to be seen if players will migrate from L4D1 to L4D2 when released. Valve is still moving forward with their plans to release authoring tools for L4D1 to allow mod builders within the community to develop new add-ons for L4D1. In addition, community matchmaking, as well as 4X4 matchmaking and additional content, are still planned for release in the upcoming months, but no specifics have been announced regarding a timetable for these releases.

Some complained that the L4D2 that they saw at E3 as well as the trailer might have left the impression that the game was too similar to the original L4D1. While people might see a lot of similarities between the two, in actual fact a lot of work remains to be done over the next several months which will add plenty of new features to the game.

We believe that a lot remains to be seen here, but Valve has always been a community oriented developer who has supported the community. While many might question the wisdom of releasing a sequel so quickly, we believe that the enhancements could be more than just trivial additions to the title. We are sure that the last chapter has yet to be written on L4D2 and only time will tell whether this game will end up being what people think it should be.