EA's official cover art for BF2042, gotta admit, looks cool.
Okay, I'll have to preface what I am about to write by mentioning that I am a huge, and I mean, HUGE Battlefield fan. I have almost every single Battlefield game that existed so far. I played every one of them for hundreds of hours (remember Battlefield Play4Free? That too.) and at one point, I was playing it competitively.
Honestly, the reason I love Battlefield so much is that I love FPS or shooters in general. One of the most played FPS games that I have is ArmA 3, albeit it's not the same thing. ArmA 3 has its own pros and cons. Well, maybe I shouldn't just say ArmA 3 but ArmA series in general. Since the first game, ArmA has been focused on realism and militaristic experience. I could say "going as far as creating the "milsim" game genre" for ArmA. However, while that's a pro, that is also a con.
Why? Because it's hardcore. Everything is very hardcore in the ArmA series. Sometimes, as a gamer, you just want to shoot the shit, you know, and basically not worry about anything else. Hold LMB to win! That's not ArmA. You need to calculate your every move, every meter of bullet drop, every centimetre of bullet penetration, armour levels, ammo millimetres everything.
It's the same thing with other games such as Squad and Hell Let Loose (as well as Post Scriptum) those games are really good too, but they're way too hardcore. One might say "but Deathwing, Call of Duty exists, right?" and my answer would be, yes. It does. But there is a drastic difference between Call of Duty and Battlefield.
Even though Call of Duty has been trying to get closer and closer to how Battlefield operates by introducing new mods with helicopters, vehicles and overall grand-scale all-out warfare, it is nowhere near how Battlefield does it yet.
Battlefield has found itself a beautiful sweet spot. It is not as casual as Call of Duty, where you regenerate your health in about 5 seconds of being out of combat and it is not as hardcore as ArmA, where getting shot in the leg might just leave you crawling on the ground until a medic with adequate equipment can come and help you up.
Anyways, back to BF2042.
Trailer
It was AWESOME. That's how I can describe the trailer. There were a lot of homages to the BF community with dog-tag stealing and rendezook (ejecting from the jet, RPGing the jet following you and getting back in) after the horrible trailers of Battlefield 1 and Battlefield 5 (which a lot of people hated, including myself) it was a nice touch.
EA really went all out in attempting to show the "grand scale" of things, with the max player count being increased from 64 players to 128 players on a single map, EA wanted to show this. The screen was full, full of soldiers.
Maps were looking so good, vehicles were so good, robot dog was awesome.
BUT.
Hero Shooter
One of the aspects that are associated with Battlefield is its class system. Assault, Support, Engineer, Recon (older games had more, but can be simplified to these four) with the release of BF2042, that will be completely removed.
The game will no longer have any classes, but what EA calls Specialists -- these guys are quite similar to Rainbow Six: Siege characters. Each specialist has an ability and a perk. For example, on one of the specialists can throw a grappling hook and has a perk that allows him to move faster. Another one is a Medic, can revive dead teammates back to full health (usually you can revive to ~40) and has a syringe pistol which can heal or damage enemies from range. That... sounds more Overwatch to me than Battlefield.
With the introduction of these specialists and removal of classes, loadouts are very flexible too. Before, if you'd like to play as a Sniper, you would have to pick Recon. Now, it doesn't matter. You can be a medic while carrying a Sniper rifle if that's what you want, and honestly, I am okay with that.
This is getting too long...
I wanted to end this before I somehow turn it into a whole essay about Battlefield™ -- the game, looks awesome, and yet, the information we got is quite scary. If not done right, it'll be a curse as opposed to a boon for the Battlefield™ series.
Battlefield™ is a trademarked game. Battlefield™ is made by EA. (EA really loves it's ™s)
