Left 4 Dead has maintained a stranglehold on the horde shooter for the best part of two decades, but one studio has spent the last several years making repeated plays for Valve's undead crown. Saber Interactive – the team behind World War Z and Space Marine 2 – is pulling out all the stops to make John Carpenter's Toxic Commando the next great zombie shooter. And while I don't want to speak too soon, it might actually have done it.
I'm given very little time to adjust to Toxic Commando. Before I could even be handed the controller for my Gamescom demo, I found myself battered to the floor by some shambling denizen of the undead. Thankfully, that gives me an immediate introduction to two excellent features. The first is a healing drone that allows my teammates to revive me while barely pausing their zombie-killing rampage. The second is Toxic Commando's pistol, which I can use to thin out the hordes enough that someone can come to my aid, but will also prove key to my adventures later on.
