Originally Posted by Dengoru

guys do you need a payed stream account to play l4d on a pc online?



no i dont have a xbox>_>

Steam accounts are free.

You can buy games through it and play them. You can also play and download trailers of steam games and demos for free.
The idea behind Steam is to keep players games up to date. If you buy game from steam, steam will automatically keep the game up to date.
You can also stay in touch with your friends and join groups in steam community to meet like minded gamers.

VALVe (the game company behind steam) also gives out free content for their games. New maps, new weapons, new campaigns, new features and new gamemodes.
They also release small patches all the times to fix bugs.
Once there was bug after a big patch that didn't let players with certain video cart manufacturer start up the game. The issue was fixed within 3 hours after the big patch.
If something like this had come up with some other company that hadn't had steam to patch their game it could've taken them weeks and even months to put out a hotfix.

If you want to play L4D, of course you need to buy it just like with any other game. Playing it online doesn't cost a dime more than playing it on singleplayer, however this game is clearly multiplayer game, and I wouldn't have bought it for the singleplayer (the bots are dumb).
It should be obvious, but you do need internet connection. If you have dialup or modem, it doesn't count. The speed isn't high enough to support enjoyable multiplayer experience.

In a way it's like iTunes, you can play music(in this case games) through it and buy them, but you don't need to buy an iTunes account.