Earlier this week, a blog post on the official Left 4 Dead web site revealed the de-thumbed hand shown on the game's cover is that of company artist, Andrea Wicklund. Apparently the team had decided to not use Photoshop to create the hand and wanted to use real photo techniques to create a dark and moody effect.

Did you know that the hand belonged to a woman?

Wickland's hand was also used again to create the cover of the upcoming (and somewhat controversial) Left 4 Dead 2. Yet, rather than snap new photos of her chopping on two other fingers, the ESRB cooked up some rules about people eating hands so the new cover merely shows those two additional fingers tucked in towards her hand.

We also noticed that Wickland isn't wearing a wedding band or engagement ring... so if you're on a first dinner date with someone who looks like her, you can ask, "Your hands... they look so familiar, but I remember them with less fingers." A perfect icebreaker.

Micheal Mullen is the Managing Editor of AOL's GameDaily. Over the past 14 years, he has written about video games, technology and celebs for ZD Net, GameSpot News and Electronic Arts.