How to restore Left 4 Dead 2 to 2.1.5.5 (Pre Last Stand) **OBSOLETE**

[Brock]

****OBSOLETE****

1- Close your Steam application, then go to Steam/steamapps/ and right click on appmanifest_550.acf then choose Properties, then click on the 4th tab called Previous Versions.

2- From there locate a version before 24th of September or the day you updated your game, then click on restore, you will need this restored version later on, now move the now restored version to your desktop, so you no longer have appmanifest_550.acf in your steamapps folder.

3- Open your common folder located in the same directory and right click on your main Left 4 Dead 2 folder and choose properties, then click on the 4th tab called Previous Versions.

4- From there you will find saved versions from an older date of your main Left 4 Dead 2 folder, find a version before the 24th of September or the day you updated your game, highlight it and click "Open", then it will open your main Left 4 Dead 2 folder as it was previously before the update, open the folder called "left4dead2" and scroll all the way down, then open steam.inf with notepad, and make sure the version is 2.1.5.5

5- After confirming you have the correct version, go back to the "previous versions" page and click restore, it will take a few minutes.

6- After the restore is complete, right click on left4dead2.exe in your main Left 4 Dead 2 folder (now restored) and create a shortcut of it to desktop, then add the parameter "-steam" to the new shortcut, as you won't be launching the game from Steam client directly, but rather from the new shortcut you just created.

7- Now you can open Steam back again, you will notice that it will create a new appmanifest file for L4D2 in the steamapps folder but Steam will not recognize the game, you will have the option to install Left 4 Dead 2 instead.

8- Simply start the game from the new shortcut and you should have the game reverted back to 2.1.5.5 pre Last Stand, you will still have any files that were added newly (not modified versions of previous existing files before last stand), so if you open your console you will still see you have c14 map which is the Last Stand, however if you attempt to launch it will be full of errors since it's obviously using modified files which you deleted when you restored the game to 2.1.5.5.

This thread is only a method to restore the game prior to the Last Stand update for whatever reason you want, you can copy the restored version of Left 4 Dead 2 to another location of your preference, then add the appmanifest file back again from your desktop to your steamapps folder, run Steam and it should update the game back again to the current version, this way you would have two versions of Left 4 Dead 2 (Pre and post Last Stand).

In theory you should be able to play with other players using the same version 2.1.5.5, however you will have to host locally using play online or a listen server from the console (requires port forwarding), as all official dedicated servers from Valve have updated and most if not all Dedicated Servers as well, and you must have Steam running at all times when running Left 4 Dead 2 from the new created shortcut (location of the main folder won't matter).

The files that won't be removed when you restore pre Last Stand are (maps, models, relists, scenes and sound) located in /left4dead2/update folder, and (pak01_015.vpk to pak01_019.vpk) in /left4dead2/ folder as they were added newly with the Last Stand update, there are probably more files as these are the ones I noticed.

Hope this thread can help you.

[uncleflagzz]

Based

[Death is Coming]

Originally posted by Flag:

Based

Dare I say he's /ourguy/?

[Flariz]

Nice!

[Karmaterrorᵁᴷ]

Originally posted by Brock:

This thread is only a method to restore the game prior to the Last Stand update for whatever reason you want, you can copy the restored version of Left 4 Dead 2 to another location of your preference, then add the appmanifest file back again from your desktop to your steamapps folder, run Steam and it should update the game back again to the current version, this way you would have two versions of Left 4 Dead 2 (Pre and post Last Stand).

You sir are a legend, going to do this right now, feels good to know i can always jump into "classic" L4D2 :)

[Demo]

Someone pin this thread

[Evan de Aspecto Ozaru]

Doesn't work for me

[Typical]

ok but how to restore to the last stand update?? after you did it

[Brock]

Originally posted by Karmaterrorᵁᴷ:

Originally posted by Brock:

This thread is only a method to restore the game prior to the Last Stand update for whatever reason you want, you can copy the restored version of Left 4 Dead 2 to another location of your preference, then add the appmanifest file back again from your desktop to your steamapps folder, run Steam and it should update the game back again to the current version, this way you would have two versions of Left 4 Dead 2 (Pre and post Last Stand).

You sir are a legend, going to do this right now, feels good to know i can always jump into "classic" L4D2 :)

Thanks mate, just want to clarify that you need to also restore the appmanifest_550.acf version to pre last stand, as it will download all the update files again after you put it back, this is safer to prevent errors as the game was updated more than one time after Last Stand was released (hotfixes), I've edited that part in the main post.

Originally posted by Loky Slavlack:

Doesn't work for me

Can you please elaborate on what exactly doesn't work? The game doesn't launch or you can't find the previous versions?

Originally posted by TypicalType:

ok but how to restore to the last stand update?? after you did it

Simply move back the (restored) appmanifest file back in the steamapps folder after you've copied the restored L4D2 version, then launch Steam again, Steam will think the game is pre Last Stand as per the appmanfiest file so it will download the update again (I'm testing it as we speak).

[Mezo123451A]

finally the speedrunners and all the others are happy to have the old version forever "how boring"

[Evan de Aspecto Ozaru]

Originally posted by Brock:

Originally posted by Karmaterrorᵁᴷ:

You sir are a legend, going to do this right now, feels good to know i can always jump into "classic" L4D2 :)

Thanks mate, just want to clarify that you need to also restore the appmanifest_550.acf version to pre last stand, as it will download all the update files again after you put it back, this is safer to prevent errors as the game was updated more than one time after Last Stand was released (hotfixes), I've edited that part in the main post.

Originally posted by Loky Slavlack:

Doesn't work for me

Can you please elaborate on what exactly doesn't work? The game doesn't launch or you can't find the previous versions?

Originally posted by TypicalType:

ok but how to restore to the last stand update?? after you did it

Simply move back the (restored) appmanifest file back in the steamapps folder after you've copied the restored L4D2 version, then launch Steam again, Steam will think the game is pre Last Stand as per the appmanfiest file so it will download the update again (I'm testing it as we speak).

When I go to the previous versions tab it says that there is no previous version available

[TM Clerical]

Originally posted by Mezo123451A:

finally the speedrunners and all the others are happy to have the old version forever "how boring"

Pretty sure speedrunners who compete have to use the same build which is the one from release.

[Brock]

Originally posted by Loky Slavlack:

When I go to the previous versions tab it says that there is no previous version available

Unfortunately this means that you didn't have system protection enabled on that partition (for restore points) or file history enabled, as these are two of the methods that allow the option of restoring previous versions in file explorer.

Even the ones who have previous versions on the list will have to copy them in the next few days as they won't be around for long, windows only stores them for a certain amount of time.

After that the only option is to obtain a copy of the game at version 2.1.5.5 from a user who has
it as its no longer stored on your computer.

[Pape]

finally an actually useful post in the forum

[Bibby Bibbins]

Somebody pin this thread.

[TM Clerical]

Anyone know if the version chooser on the speed run website still works?
https://www.speedrun.com/l4d2/resources