Back 4 Blood — Warner Bros. Partners with Left 4 Dead Devs for New Co-Op Zombie Shooter

Warner Bros. Interactive and Turtle Rock Studios have announced Back 4 Blood — a four-player, co-operative first-person shooter set in zombie-filled environments.

Sound familiar? Well, it should. Turtle Rock Studios is the team behind the beloved Left 4 Dead series, which has been dormant since the beginning of the decade. A breakout title for Turtle Rock, the developer was acquired by Valve ahead of its release in 2008. Left 4 Dead 2 released the following year, before Turtle Rock and Valve severed their ties in 2010.

Now an independent studio, Turtle Rock last released Evolve — an asynchronous 4-vs-1 multiplayer game for current gen consoles and PC — to tepid reactions in 2015. Following an update to that game in 2016, official support for the game ended in October that year.

Warner Bros. Interactive President David Haddad describes the game as “an awesome opportunity” in an enthusiastic press release. “We are thrilled to partner with the proven Turtle Rock Studios team on Back 4 Blood to advance the co-op zombie genre forward with innovative multiplayer gameplay.” Haddad continues: “The talented team at Turtle Rock has been developing amazing games together for a long time, and this is a great opportunity to work with them to create a new gaming universe built specifically with the large co-op zombie shooter community in mind.”

Phil Robb, Co-Founder and Creative Director at Turtle Rock describes the new game as “the biggest challenge in the studio’s history”, emphasising that the team knows that Back 4 Blood has to stand out in a crowded multiplayer marketplace.

Back 4 Blood is described as “an original, premium title” — a.k.a. not free to play — which will deliver the kind of co-op zombie shooting action that made Left 4 Dead and its sequel so good, updated with new features and state of the art technology.

UPDATE - Warner Bros. has confirmed that Back 4 Blood will be released on PS4, Xbox One and PC, although release dates have not been announced.