Wow, where to begin.
Battlefield 2042 so far feels like a game that’s incomplete and still doesn’t know what it’s about yet. This game is not up to scratch in the interest of its set release date. Whilst the grandeur of 128 player battles is a lofty goal, lag and a lack of purpose are my main complaints on the Battlefield 2042 beta experience.
No Commander Mode, No Communications
But beyond that, Battlefield 2042 disappoints in many of the franchises key aspects. For example, battlefield teamwork and coordination to achieve specific goals are absent. In addition, there is no commander mode to see, and in-game communications are disabled by default.
Not once did I have a conversation with anyone I was playing with, and when I was the squad leader, I could not communicate with other squad leaders.
A Tired Game Engine
Frostbite engines age is starting to show with an odd mismatch of graphics ranging from Battlefield 3 style player models to very polished weapons. Whilst some aspects of the game stood out with a “wow” factor; this was seldom the case.
EA has taken to forcing the Frostbite engine upon its various studios in what can only be described as an attempt to claw back licencing fees on other game engines such as Unreal. This approach, in my opinion, means that the Frostbite engineering team has not been able to give the engine the focused attention that it needs.
Some players even cited bugs from the engine formative years still being present in the engine now. It’s woeful, to say the least, and telling of EA’s money-hungry attitude at worst.
My hat is off to EA for what has probably been the smoothest Battlefield release in some time, even though it’s a beta. Servers struggled to meet the demand to begin with but quickly scaled within the hour to handle the challenge.
Polish Please
This game will need a lot of polish and refinement before launch, less it suffers the quick death that previous Battlefield games have become known for in recent years. Some might disagree with that statement, but I don’t think that Battlefield 1 or 5 had the staying power of Battlefield 4 or the original 2005 Battlefield 2.
That said, I should say that DICE has been upfront in saying that this beta build was two months removed from the master branch, and they’ve indicated that a lot of the bugs have been or will be fixed for the final release.
Now all of that said, Battlefield 2042 has enormous potential. It may not be met at launch – but it may be addressed in due course if EA sticks to its guns on the title.
