Monday, October 10, 2011
The last
time I so closely tracked the release of a new game was when Cities XL was in
the works. That game seemed to offer revolutionary graphics for the genre, and
much more in-depth gameplay than any other Sim City had offered previously.
This
time, the game in question is Battlefield 3, and the main game-changers for me
seemed to be the much-improved graphics and the supposedly more equitable
gameplay. The open beta for the game came out some time ago, and I quickly
jumped into it. With about 5 hours of gameplay to date, I feel I’d like to
write my own review of the first look.
**
I’d
first put out on the cards that especially for FPS games, a sizeable part of
the fun for me stems from my ability to play the game well, i.e. kill more than
be killed. So it was of little surprise that when I played my first half an
hour of the game, I wasn’t getting a good vibe from the game.
Weapons
For starters,
the realism in the game has been ramped up from the latest Bad Company 2.
Weapons deliver much more recoil and rounds deviation, setting it apart from
BC2’s more arcade-y weapons shoot out. In Mark’s words, it’s no longer so much
about who spots who first. It took some getting used to when I couldn’t spray
rounds as much as I did before, and it was difficult at first to appreciate
this increased difficulty technicality.
With the increased recoil, ironsights seem even more of a hindrance. You'd want to get laser dot ones as soon as you can.
Still,
other changes came with this, including the sniper’s lens light reflection that
allows one to more easily spot a camping sniper. This makes for more balanced
gameplay. Then there’s the ability to add all manners of attachments to your
primary weapon, something previous games lacked. For example, in the dark
tunnels of Metro, a flashlight attachment dazzles enemy troops in close
encounters, but gives away one’s location in bigger spaces. Red Dot sights can
be attached to different kit’s weapons, so one does not have to stick with a
certain weapon simply for the sights that came with it.
So far
though, there seems to have been a removal of the Magnum ammo and Armor jacket,
perhaps because in BC2 it was a bigger disadvantage to newcomers. There is
though, a flak jacket upgrade for the engineer class to reduce damage taken
from shrapnel, which probably means absorbing less vehicular damage.
Maps
Weapon
changes aside, the maps seem to have been improved in some ways. While the Beta
only tested for two maps, Operation Metro and Caspian Border, it was quite
sufficient to show that more effort was put into map making than in BF2. In the
latter, control points usually consisted of similar looking buildings clustered
around a point, while the rest of the map was more open and even less varied.
Maps were either all-urban or all-open, favouring one kind of attack style.
In
Battlefield 3, individual maps have different kinds of ways in tackling each
control point or M-com station. Of course, you’ve heard of Metro’s change of
pace from outdoors to indoors, but that is not all there is to it. Besides,
that map transition at first comes off as a bit contrived, but that’s up to the
individual to determine.
In
Caspian Border, (whose closest equivalent I can think of would be Zatar
Wetlands) one would imagine it to be an open-map concept whose formulaic control points are the center
of attention, and the commute between them uninteresting. Just like the
Wetlands. However, this isn’t the case at all. The control points all have
their own unique characteristics, and one can’t assault a point in the same way
he does in another. For example, one point, Forest, is a wooded area great for
camping in the bushes for an enemy attack. (and it’s also where the better ambient
graphics, with more shadows and varied colours, shines. There have been a few
occasions where enemies walk right past me, or search in vain for me when I’m
just meters away from them) It has few hard cover points, and is accessible
from many directions.
A road diverged into a wood. And I, I took the one without the tank.
Just
opposite it, separated by a small meandering river, is Hilltop; a tall, cramped
outcrop with a radio tower. It has vantage points overlooking the passage
between both points, a single warehouse unit that one can play hide-and-seek
with, and some hard cover points. Much further away is Antennae, an open point
with little cover, little vegetation, but a good camping point on a craggy ‘cliff’.
That cliff is easily accessible from the rear, preventing one from staying
there too long to watch for people below. Lastly, along one part of the map is
a long stretch of no-man’s land, partitioned with wire fences. It’s open and
dangerous, slows down people with the cutting of fences and generally breaks up
the hilly, open map.
It might
be difficult to imagine, but that’s not the point. It simply shows that unlike
the building-plopping slap job that was ubiquitous in BF2, and unlike the
single-combat-style maps of BC2, Battlefield 3 offers richer environments to
tackle. Even Metro’s transition from open-CQB-open fighting areas does not
switch back to the same kind of open gameplay that was at the start. At the end
of the map, terrain plays a much greater part, as one has to look out for
enemies not only on the ground, but at least three different level separations.
This wasn’t the case at the start.
Vehicles
Vehicles
were something I didn’t get to try until sometime later, when they re-opened
Caspian Border for testing once more. (Or just because many were crying out for
it) The most surprising thing I noticed was that it wasn’t a given that many
were rushing for the planes and ‘copters. The planes, now a direct spawn point
themselves, (looks like they took all that team-killing seriously then. Helps
that you need not worry of your teammate shooting you in the back as you run
for the plane) were a few times left uncontested. Flight control was jerkier,
in the realistic kind, and gone were the days where those in the sky ruled the
scoreboards. Things could be shot out of the sky more easily, and it’s more
difficult to rush out of a burning vehicle just seconds before it explodes.
Gone too, then, were the days you thought you had the satisfaction of killing a
tank gunner, only for him to flee from the vehicle unscathed.
Oh, and they replaced the Bradley with the LAV. The LAV's chassis is also used for the anti-air equivalent.
I
remember one of the reasons I loved vehicles in BC2 was because of the EW
upgrade that allowed me to become aware of enemy troops sneaking around my
vehicle. Realism has thrown that back out the window, and in addition, swiveling
small caliber turrets around to track targets are now much harder to do. One
could always tweak mouse sensitivity, but that’s seemingly impractical. It’s
also less accurate now, compared to the pinpoint accuracy that one was forgiven
with in BF2. Also, I assume it’s got to do with realism, but now if you power a
buggy through water, you get separated from your vehicle.
Of
course, an interesting dimension to the new gameplay is that one can disable
vehicles too, rather than just play a game of armor reduction before the
destruction of the vehicle. It seems like the performance of the vehicle will
degrade after a certain ‘heath’ point, something that builds on BC2. All in
all, the vehicles seemed to have undergone quite some balancing efforts.
Graphics
Lastly,
the graphics of the game are pretty darn pleasing to the eye. As I mentioned
before, the more realistic shadows lend a slight change to gameplay. One doesn’t
necessarily need to find a secluded spot to camp anymore, but can find a
position with good shadows along a path that is just as effective. Patterns are
broken up in the swaying grass and rocks of different gradients and shade
spots. Flashlights and tactical laser lights dazzle enemies tastefully (what?)
and in general, it feels much nicer to play. Mark mentioned it looked like a
souped up version of one Call Of Duty, I believe, but I don’t find that to be
the case.
Still,
there’s nothing really legendary to the graphics, and when firefights become
intense, there really aren’t many players who would concern themselves much
with the ambience of their surroundings. Yet a point worth noting anyway,
especially when graphics have the ability to change how you play.
Interface
Talk has
been made of how odd it is that the game first transits to a web browser before
gameplay, and initially I agreed it seemed very different and clunky. Yet one
quickly sees the merits to it, when not only are things made more streamlined,
(All your stats, your friends, your server browsing page and game news are put
into one neat package) the whole process is, very importantly, sped up
considerably. No complains with the speedy display of available games, no glitchy
jump of pings in the list. While waiting to jump into a game, you can browse
your stats or chat with friends. If you want to do something else, you can also
just bring up a new tab to use Facebook, Google or whatever catches your fancy.
See another server you prefer? No need to get stuck with the existing one, just
cancel the load in a fuss-free manner.
There really is everything here, within clicking distance, with little loading time.
I must
say, this new way of playing multiplayer FPS takes all the hassle out of
logging in, checking browsers and updating stats, something every previous
Battlefield iteration I had played was plagued with.
In-game,
one interesting regression is that the HUD now displays your health in
percentage, so you know more accurately how alive you are in a battle. I would
note though, that the process of kit, squad and spawn selection seems slower
and bulkier than compared to last time. The old way of doing this could have
been stuck to, and I don’t think developers are going to change this when the
game officially releases.
Ignore the numbers in red boxes, those were added from elsewhere. You can see from here that they've segmented the three sub-pages, making the process clunkier.
Conclusion
On the
whole, despite all the talk, I must say that I’m already a bit of a sucker for
the game because I’ve loved the gameplay of this whole FPS series, more or
less. It serves to entice me more that the game playing community is much more
active and present, the gameplay itself is smoother and fairer, and that the
graphics do make it more pleasing to the eye. The beta didn’t have the campaign
mode nor co-op, both of which I’m looking forward to when the game does release.
I’d say
I’m willing to spend $64 on some novel fun for these reasons, and I look
forward to playing with friends when I come back early November to an age-old
time-wasting endeavor. My first order of things is to bring up my KD ratio to
1.
Labels: gaming, interesting, military, opinion, thoughts
posted by joseph at 10:35 AM