IGN editorial:
Battlefield 3: The Call of Duty Influence
How to take on Call of Duty's campaign.
September 29, 2011
by Anthony Gallegos
If I had to sum up DICE's Battlefield franchise in just a few words, I might pick "big," "vehicles," "multiplayer." These particular words pop into my head because they've been so important to Battlefield's design philosophy; even the most recent single-player Battlefield entry, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, kept these ideas at its core. The Battlefield 3 footage I've seen thus far has evoked these same three watchwords at various points, but another has started to creep into my mind: "Linear." It's a dirty word for many Battlefield fans -- and one that EA and DICE seem to be hedging the franchise's future on... especially when it comes to taking on chief competitor Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.
Battlefield 3 trots out big, vehicle-based maps in multiplayer, but the single-player campaign tells a different story. Instead of something akin to Bad Company 2's relatively large spaces, Battlefield 3's campaign missions pack you into tight hallways and confined streets. Yes, Bad Company 2 was still fairly linear, but the open environments afforded some degree of choice when it came to handling tense situations. In one new Battlefield 3 campaign stage I saw -- which unfolds in what looked like a TV station -- enemies routinely jump through doorways, or weave in and out of cover. Combat's more about stopping and popping exposed foes, rather than finding creative approaches to flank and fire. It's not necessarily a bad thing (I enjoy Call of Duty's campaigns, and this describes them to a T), but it also doesn't feel like the Battlefield single-player experience I've come to expect.
DICE loves to tout the destruction that Battlefield 3's Frostbite 2 engine enables -- but I'm frankly a little underwhelmed. In stark contrast to Bad Company's large campaign battles, where you could routinely blast new routes into buildings (or bring said buildings down entirely), destruction largely plays a cinematic role here. You might toss a grenade into a room to kill enemies, blowing everything to bits in the process, but in most cases the walls seem pretty indestructible. The aforementioned TV station level features a room full of cubicles; while the office furniture can be blasted apart with ease, the building's walls remain intact, ensuring that intruders don't stray too far from the intended path. The dust particles and flying debris make the firefights more intense, but they don't present the same strategic options I'm used to from the other Battlefield single player experiences, a la Bad Company 2. Enemies also don't appear to use destruction against you the way they used to, making it much easier to just sit behind an impregnable piece of cover for as long as you like.
The line that separates Battlefield and Call of Duty continues to blur, but I think that's intentional. The developers insist that they want to attract gamers from all audiences; based on what I've seen thus far, this amounts to "court the giant Call of Duty crowd." Every level has "wow" moments where things go nuts and the scene opens up for you stare at; muzzles flashing and bombs exploding on the screen looks great, but it feels like it's mostly for show. For better or for worse, Battlefield 3 certainly appears to be aping Call of Duty's "epic set-pieces and grand battles" approach, where the gawking plays as big a part as the shooting.
My gut feeling: Enjoying Battlefield 3 will boil down to going in with the right expectations. This newfound linearity could take Battlefield in surprising new directions; I don't know that it will topple Call of Duty at the cash register, but I don't think it needs to. Give me sprawling and vehicle-strewn environments, and remind me that Battlefield is still all about large-scale warfare, and I'll march happily into our brave new two-shooter world.
