Battlefield 3 Review (final draft)
Battlefield 3 is an FPS like very few others; this game relies heavily on tactics and teamwork. This is one, of only a handful of games that uses realistic weapon physics; for instance bullet travel time, bullet drop and attachment penalties are all there.
While DICE may not deliver a memorable campaign story it doesn’t need to when Battlefield 3’s online warfare raises every bar imaginable in my opinion. It delivers one of the best multiplayer experiences of the year. I doubt Battlefield purists will complain much about the campaign. I know they will be enlisting to bring down entire armies online.
From the beaches of Kharg Island to the hills of Damavand Peak, Battlefield 3’s multiplayer maps provide an immediate sense of scale. Everything about their design screams size, personalisation and the need to take creative initiatives to succeed. Choose to pop headshots from the prone position, spin barrel rolls in a jet outfitted with personal unlocks or see how many dog tags you can knife from your opponents. Battlefield 3’s multiplayer is about freedom of choice. DICE have accommodated for many playing styles: from the trolls and lols to the objective driven team players.
I always used to play Call of Duty and then I found the Battlefield 3 Beta! It was a big step up from the careless run and gun of the tiny CoD maps. I was nervous because I had never played a battlefield title before. The first things I noticed were the intense graphics and the player movement: it was so much better than CoD and the way the game plays out is more dynamic as well.
Multi-player cons
There are a few annoyances, of course. The inability to change loadouts outside of a game is a significant and rather surprising irritance – you’re only able to alter your equipped weapons while encased in a live server. The suppression mechanic doesn’t always work as intended, for example a large burst from a machine gun has no suppressive effect but one stray bullet will blind your opponent with suppression. Player hit boxes are lagged, for example when you are taking fire and then dive behind cover, you will still take hits. (Review: Voodoo Extreme).
Multi-player pros
The Frostbite 2.0 engine combined with excellent sound design that echoes sharply through each environment creates an intensity of experience that hasn’t been felt so convincingly before. Rubble and miscellaneous debris cinematically collapse on and around you as bullets thud into the wall you’re clinging to for cover; the tank you slowly swagger-drive towards a capture point is explosively impacted by an enemy rocket; you’re held underwater by the suppression of an enemy’s fire, near-blind and disoriented. It’s the collaborative effect of so many different, dynamic situations that succeeds in immersing you deeply in the war effort. The level of destruction in this game is brilliant. Not only for its own sake but it adds to the diversity of map play, the same tactics won’t work if half the building is missing. This destructive capability has even more uses; in most other games if an enemy were positioned behind a wall you would have to go around it to attack but in BF3 you just blow the wall up! (Review: Voodoo Extreme).
By James Pinnington
jpinnington 