While some wish to boycott Valve's Left 4 Dead 2, many are anxiously waiting to dispatch animated corpses in the Deep South. Today Valve announced that pre-orders will nab gamers exclusives on both an in-game "American Baseball Bat" and a downloadable demo of the game before it hits store shelves. The promotion is good at the Steam Store and Gamestop, but other retailers like Toys "R" Us and Best Buy are offering in-store credit to those who pre-order L4D2 at their stores. Left 4 Dead 2 is slated for release on November 17th.

The American Baseball Bat



Tyler says: While I'm not complaining about the incentive, I wonder why Valve chose the baseball bat as the exclusive item for pre-purchasers? The baseball bat is such a standard zombie pacifier, wouldn't people be more motivated to pre-order L4D2 if it was something a little crazy, like the lawnmower from Peter Jackson's "Dead Alive"? Or what about a jousting pole? You could skewer zombies shish-kabob style! Joking aside, the thing that will get me to put my actual dollars down on the table is the 20-day demo.

What about you folks, do demos motivate you to drop cash on a game early?