Holy Crap, it’s finally here! Valve announced today on the official L4D blog that they’ve just released the beta of the Left 4 Dead ‘Authoring Tools’, or SDK as they’re collectively known.

This is great news! All those mappers out there who have been working feverishly on their L4D campaigns, versus and survival maps can finally get their mitts on the behind-the-scenes magic that makes a proper L4D map tick. Zombie spawns, weapon and power up locations, all of that is now available.

What really excites me personally though is the inclusion of Google Sketchup plugins. They will allow rapid prototyping of L4D maps that was previously missing from the SDK. The other great thing about this is that Google Sketchup is far more accessible and less daunting than the Hammer editor. I’m hoping it will allow mappers and non-mappers alike to be able to express and share their ideas to/with others very easily. I foresee communities springing up all over the place to share things they’ve made in Sketchup with others.

Particular to this is the potential for ‘prefabs’. Prefabs have existed in Hammer for as long as I can remember (Back when it was still called WorldCraft). They are essentially pre-assembled items, locations, buildings etc. that can be dropped straight into an existing map. The sketchup plugins should make this even easier. Hell, if it becomes (or indeed already is) possible to import existing Sketchup prefabs into Hammer, the possibilities are endless! Notre Dame? Done. Sydney Opera House? Why not. Fancy something a little more fantastical? Why not put Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardary in your map?

I’m really looking forward to seeing what people (myself included) can come up with. So stop reading this and get on with it!