Back 4 Blood open beta trailer reveals maps, enemies, and more

A new Back 4 Blood trailer has revealed new details of the upcoming open beta next month.

The Back 4 Blood open beta actually kicks off a week tomorrow on August 5, but this is actually an early access period for those who pre-order any version of the game. This early access period extends to August 9, when it'll shut off until August 12, when anyone can take part in the zombie-killing festivities until August 16. Just below, you can check out a handy graphic of the beta start times and watch the trailer here. 

Additionally, we'll be fighting over two PvP maps in the Back 4 Blood open beta. This portion of the game has one team as four human survivors, and another four players taking on the role of elite infected accompanying the horde of zombies, trying to pick off the human players one by one.

In this mode, which is called "Swarm," we'll be able to play as six infected types: Bruiser, Retch, Hocker, Exploder, Crusher and Stinger. You've likely seen these elite infected types in previous trailer for Back 4 Blood, and you can probably guess their respective roles from their descriptive names. Exploder is a walking bomb, for example, and the Crusher has one massive arm to smite humans with.

There'll also be two co-op maps for the PvE aspect of Back 4 Blood. This mode has the four human players going up against AI swarms of zombies and the aforementioned elite infected, perfect for if you'd rather take on hordes of mindless flesh-eating monsters instead of human opponents.

In this mode during the open beta of Back 4 Blood, we'll be able to play as Evangelo, Holly, Walker, Hoffman, and newcomer Mom. While the first four human characters have been playable in previous closed tests for Back 4 Blood, this is the first time Mom is stepping into the zombie-slaying fray.

Finally, we'll be able to experience the Fort Hope community hub and cross-play/cross-gen support for the Back 4 Blood open beta. The former is a communal hub in which you can interact with characters and players, while the cross-gen and cross-play support is welcome news for friends who are spread out over multiple console generations and versions.

Back 4 Blood launches later this year on October 12 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S. It's a spiritual successor to Left 4 Dead, made by many of the developers who worked on the original co-op zombie game at Valve, and now work together again at Turtle Rock. Back 4 Blood will be available as a day one Xbox Game Pass release, brilliant news for existing subscribers to Xbox's service.

For a list of all the other games launching over the remainder of the year, head over to our new games 2021 guide for more.