Battlefield V

Battlefield was irrevocably lost after DICE's Star Wars Battlefront proved to be successful. Everything that made Battlefield an engaging and visceral, skill-based experience was traded for the casual-friendly approach taken for Battlefront; in which cinematic immersion was prioritized over satisfying gameplay mechanics. To bring in a new audience of lowest common denominators with disposable income, DICE made numerous changes to its balance formula since previous installments; namely, weapons had enlarged cones of fire, time to kill was pretty long, weapons were turned into powerups instead of staying physical vehicles like they were in Battlefield 4 or the original Battlefront games, and the maps became simplified and more gimmick-centric (this applies to Battlefield 4 as well, but I think all BF games before that had pretty solid map design.)

Ultimately the thread that runs through Battlefront 1 and 2, as well as Battlefield 1 and 5, is that everything seems to be designed for mass appeal over lifespan-sustaining substance. I already mentioned that cinematic immersion was a priority for Battlefront and the current Battlefield title, but let me elaborate further: Visual polish, impressive cinematic set pieces, narrated menus, fleshed out player animations for nearly every in-game action, exciting new graphical features like RTX ray tracing, visual character customization, campaign missions, and narrative-based multiplayer content (operations) add absolutely nothing to the basic Battlefield experience and introduce needless tedium. After only a couple of hours playing the initial closed beta, I became frustrated with the animations for entering and exiting vehicles, opening doors, picking up ammo, and many other actions--some of which occur without any action on the player's part. It's downright frustrating to be in the midst of a gun battle with an enemy in multiplayer, and then a friendly soldier throws ammo at you, causing your arm to fly up in front of your face, obscuring your sights right before you die. As far as I've seen from playing the game recently on my dad's account, these animations are still in the game and still very irritating.

While there is nothing in Battlefield 5 that sticks out as obviously and egregiously terrible, it still somehow manages to be one of the most grating games I've played, and it shares this in common with the Modern Warfare reboot, which I'll bring up several times throughout this review given that both are competing for the same space, and publishers for both titles are taking a similar lowest-common-denominator-focused approach to design and marketing (which is in and of itself the greatest sin.)

For the foregoing reason, rage in Battlefield 5 is like a death by a thousand very tiny cuts: Every time I die because I was stuck in an automatic animation that obscured my vision, I feel rather sore. Every time I place 10 or 20 perfectly-aimed shots with a semi-automatic rifle into a guy at 100 yards and I only get so much as 1 or 2 hit markers, I get a little agitated. When I get killed behind cover or trade kill in close quarters, I become pretty heated. When I run out of ammo because the game sticks me with only a few magazines on spawn, and I practically have to camp around ammo resupply crates to stay loaded, it's very irritating. After I realize I can't change my assignment in the match and have to quit just to start gaining progress in something else, that makes me rage. When I realize that the only way to hit targets past 10 meters is to use a bolt action sniper rifle, I start to feel like uninstalling the game (ever wonder why everyone plays recon in Battlefield 1 and 5?) I could go on about how much of a chore playing this game is really like, you get the idea.

Of all design decisions made for this title, however, the most damaging to the core Battlefield formula is the revive system and the existence of ammo and health resupply stations. In previous titles, the only way to revive a player was to use defibrilators/syringes available exclusively on the medic class. Reviving was instant, and the player was never locked into an animation. Now, however, you can revive a squad member as any class through a short animation, and even the syringe locks the player into an animation that makes reviving a very risky process. Practically what that means for the medic class is that not only has the revive syringe become less powerful because using it makes you vulnerable, but also since squad mates can revive each other as any class, the medic is no longer needed. Even further compounding the issue, every class has access to medical pouches that can be refilled at a supply station, so now the medic doesn't even have exclusive rights to healing either. There is absolutely zero reason to play the medic class.

Ammo, however, is still important, right? Surely support, a class that in the past had exclusive access to ammo resupply, is still useful? Wrong! Players can pick up ammunition simply by running over dead bodies without swapping kits. If no bodies are around, there are usually ammo stations within capture points that will fully replenish ammunition. Additionally, vehicle pilots and tank drivers can repair their vehicles while sitting inside them by merely holding a button for a few seconds. Support/Engineer used to be crucial for keeping vehicles functioning, but now, that role is subsumed by vehicle pilots themselves. Again, there is zero reason to play support given that its exclusive class abilities aren't so exclusive anymore.

The entire class dependence dynamic that drove cooperation and teamwork in past games is completely gone, and everyone essentially just plays as if it's single player. These changes were made because in the past, lowest-common-denominator players did play Battlefield like a single player game, never healing other players or dropping ammo, so DICE figured it would be better to just bypass player dependence because this small group of incompetents weren't playing along; has that panned out well? Go ask a Battlefield 5 player whether he feels like the team play experience is better or worse, and I'm sure you'll hear about how no one is willing to drop ammo, heal, capture objectives, and so on. Again, designing the game for the LCD has made the experience insufferable.

Moreover, it's questionable that the developers spent so many resources on the campaign and the game's miscellaneous "polish." This cinematic content constitutes a grand total of a few hours of gameplay that is linear and paced dreadfully slowly, but yet nonetheless offers up a ton of trailer aesthetics and marketing material to move copies before launch day. The sheer amount of man hours spent developing these set pieces and features should have been spent on play testing, bug fixing, balancing, and the development of new maps and weapons for multiplayer. If the gameplay were good enough, merely showing it off at a game expo should have bespoken the quality of the game sans the need for over-the-top spectacles.

Unfortunately, as is all too characteristic of post-Battlefront DICE, I don't see this bipartite style of content packaging going away any time soon. With the release of 2019's Modern Warfare and its "controversial" campaign (I believe personally that this controversy was overstated, and really, MW had nothing new to say, let alone anything that would tread on the toes of any political orthodoxy.) Still, MW's star campaign missions reached the eyes of millions of viewers and no-doubt drove sales, which means to the brain-dead marketing team at EA that they must carbon copy Activision's approach to mass appeal.

That, however, would be a mistake. Battlefield is and has never been known for its campaign as evidenced by the fact that despite lacking any curated single player content whatsoever beyond bot matches, Battlefield 1942, Battlefield 2, and Battlefield 2142 collectively managed to sell staggeringly well. What did those games possess that Battlefield 5 doesn't? Robust, unrestricted, and meticulously executed multiplayer gameplay that allowed skilled players to dominate and which rewarded practice. Even Battlefield 3 and 4 rewarded players who had solid aim and good awareness--almost every weapon was very accurate, even on full auto, which complemented the fact that the maps are sometimes extremely large. Sniping was comparatively rare because so many other weapons were great at long range too, and everything was designed around the game's titular feature: the battlefield. In contrast, Battlefield 5 is preoccupied with presenting to the player manifold gimmicks and costumes and trying to rein in combat to within 10 or 20 yards, rather than allowing long-range engagements. Even the map design is clearly intended to bring players closer together, as flags are sometimes only 50 meters apart, vehicles few and far between, foliage and buildings partition the maps into small battle arenas, and most of the "field" bits of the maps go totally unused as anything other than a team spawn. It's as if EA realized how popular the small clusterfrag maps like Metro and Lockers were, and mandated that DICE design all of Battlefield 5's maps in a similar vein. The result is incoherent, brainless, and alienating.

Today, DICE has lost touch with that which its community resonates with and is evidently more interested in impugning the preferences of fans than creating something they will enjoy. Over and over again, fans are insulted for their patronage; during the pre-launch reveal, fans criticized the trailer, for example, because it showcased themes inconsistent with World War 2 historically. To me and to a wide swath of Battlefield fans, Battlefield 5 didn't look like a Battlefield game, let alone one that takes place during a real war. How did DICE respond to this major backlash? CEO Patrick Soderlund insulted the fans, calling them "uneducated" and urging them to not buy the game. Battlefield 5 subsequently had lower pre-order numbers and launch sales than even Battlefield 1--a testament to how poorly DICE has, and is, handling the series.

The schism between developers and fans doesn't end there. Around Christmas last year, DICE released a controversial patch to the game that radically altered weapon balance, generally increasing the time-to-kill (decreasing damage) on all weapons. Players complained quickly that this change made numerous weapons completely impotent and unusable, mainly guns like SMGs that already had very low damage values, alongside semi-automatic guns that had lower DPS than automatic rifles. The game's balance was completely ruined, and players speculated that the change was designed to make the game friendlier to new players right before a Christmas sale that would introduce the game to a larger audience. After weeks of outrage, the changes were eventually reverted, but the damage had been done. Content crators who are ordinarily enthusiastic about Battlefield, like Jack Frags, have now stated that they cannot rely on DICE to stay responsive with its player base and make positive decisions any more. Similar controversies erupted for Battlefield 1 as well, which had similar issues with TTK and weapon inaccuracy. I'm starting to see a pattern here: Make the game less lethal so that good players have a hard time being dominant against the lowest common denominator. Hmm...

Ultimately, DICE's decision to target the players with the lowest level of skill has made an unsatisfying game for everyone. Granted, they haven't stooped to the depths that Activision has in MW, which has deceptive forced-50 match making that punishes you for doing well in a match by placing you against a team of absurdly good players while matching you with absurdly poor players on your own team (patents exist that describe this behavior and it can be replicated by experiment, this isn't a matter of anecdote.) Still, there is no excuse for so blatantly and willfully ignoring fans, insulting them, and refusing to cave to any feedback until it starts to hurt sales. If it weren't for DICE's outright hostility toward players, I might have a slightly higher opinion of this game, even if I'd still despise it mechanically. It is the actions of a company toward its fans, and how much contempt they hold, that really determines how sore I feel about them and their games, and if it keeps going like this for DICE, their longevity looks pretty grim.

What that means for Battlefield 5, of course, is that anyone who picks up the game right now can't trust that it will stay balanced, or "fixed" for any length of time, and while playing, you will understand truly how much DICE hates you. I advise against buying this title, and if you want an enjoyable Battlefield experience, pick up Battlefield 4, which still has a small but dedicated amount of people playing.

Battlefield is a large team-based multiplayer first-person shooter set in World War 2. When you first start the game, you have an interesting introduction where you switch between many characters in a short space of time. You are a soldier with a machine gun who shoots a few enemies before being killed by a tank. You then control a tank and take down a few vehicles and RPG soldiers. You then play as a sniper until he gets killed by a plane. You then fly the plane, before finally playing as another soldier.

After you finish this brief introduction, you can jump into the online modes, or play one of the short single-player campaign missions known as War Stories. I wasn't a fan of this mode, since it mainly involves your character doing solo raids in a stealthy manner which goes against the main idea of Battlefield.

There are many modes to the online game, but they basically play the same. There's a large map with 2 warring armies. Each army is split into groups of 4 players known as a squad. You can choose between 4 soldier classes when you respawn; Assault, Support, Medic and Recon.

As you play the game, new weapons and equipment is unlocked, but they are basically set up as follows: Assault is good with standard guns and has explosives that are great against vehicles. Medic can dish out medpacks and quickly revive allied soldiers, whereas other classes can slowly revive their squad members only. Support can dish out ammo packs, repair vehicles, quickly build defences, and carries larger machine guns which are great for laying down suppressing fire. Recon can spot enemies from afar and uses Snipers for long range attacks.

As a team, you take down enemy soldiers and battle over marked areas of the map. Doing these actions depletes the enemies “tickets” and when that count reaches zero, then it's game over. To take the marked areas, you eliminate enemies then stay within that area for a certain amount of time. The more soldiers are in the area, and the closer they are to the centre, then the shorter that time is. The squad leader can issue commands to attack or defend these areas.

By defeating enemies and playing the objectives set by the squad leader, you accrue Attrition points which the squad leader can use to call in ammo drops, vehicles, or air strikes. Working together not only helps you stay alive, but also gives you rewards.

You start off with a small amount of ammunition, but I found the deaths came pretty quick so it was a rare occurrence that I ran out of ammo. For players that survive longer, it will be a problem. You can collect ammo from fallen soldiers, there are Supply Stations on the map where you can collect ammo from (the areas that you need to control), and the Support class can dish out ammo packs. Health only partially regenerates, but then you need to use a Medpack. You can collect replacement Medpacks from Medical Supply Stations or from Medics.

The environment is highly destructive which is very impressive. Sometimes, it's a simple as shooting out a glass window to give you better view to shoot from. It is great when you hide inside a house only for someone to destroy part of the wall with a nicely placed rocket. The buildings can be completely ripped apart, especially if they come under an aerial bombardment.

There's not much you can do about a fully destroyed house, but you are able to board up broken windows, and certain areas allow you to place sandbags to wall off areas and give you extra protection. Barbed wire coils will stop infantry, and Czech hedgehogs will stop tanks.

The graphics in general are absolutely amazing. You can really use smoke to your advantage to create cover - which is a tactic the Medics often do since they can equip a smoke grenade launcher. If team-members are down, you fire a smoke grenade their way, run out to them and revive them. The smoke means the enemies will struggle to get a clean shot at you, helping you revive and escape in time.

There are loads of cosmetic tweaks which can be bought with the in game currency that you gain by completing the daily challenges and set achievements.

With each game you play, you will earn XP for your overall rank, and for each Class and Weapon. When Weapons are levelled, you can customize them with upgrades for less recoil, faster reload, greater hip-fire accuracy, quicker aim-down-sights etc. I'm never a big fan of this system as better players get rewarded, which causes a bigger gulf between the better/older players and the worse/younger players. I'm not sure if it is for this reason, but I found I was a mid-skilled player during the first few weeks, then found myself struggling at the bottom of the leaderboards after.

There's been a few patches since release, and Dice have added an extra story to War Stories, a Practice Range, and a new map. Maybe this content should have been there on release, but rather late than never.

I did enjoy my time playing Battlefield V, and if I was better at it; then I would most likely play longer.