[mr.miyagi]

A pretty open, honest and interesting account of the gameplay

Total Battlefield: Rico's Battlefield 2 Preview

After running a website for 4 months devoted to a game that I have never played, it was exciting to say the least that I was going to get a chance to sample this epic creation. With a fully paid trip to Redwood, California I was soon done and dusted with the 12 hour flight and sitting in a room full of eager gamers ready to play. With the mod day out the way, Community day was reserved purely for Battlefield 2 and another dose of QA Tester bashing.

Firstly let me say that the following article is just some impressions I had of the game. There are a lot of very good previews already published that will tell you specific game aspects should you be looking for more.

Where it all begins!
Upon loading the game you are greeted with a login screen for which you need to create an account to allow your stats to be gathered. Supposedly, this is then the name you use in game and no one else can use it. Whether or not this will change, to allow for clan players etc remains to be seen. The process is quick and easy, just requiring a user name that you will use in game, your e-mail address and a password. Once registered your ready to take to some multiplayer action.

Menu
Taking a look around the options there are a number of new tabs that deserve a mention. Hitting the BFHQ tab brings up four selections of Kit info, stats, leader board, and awards. Each tab provides masses of information associated with your account, even down to how many times you have killed (or been killed) with the defib, the ultimate humiliation weapon. The tabs are excellent to assess how well your doing, or to simply see which weapon you use the most for example. Pretty much everything you can think of is recorded in this section, and it's certainly interesting to browse through all the information here should you want to.

First Impressions
Once loaded, kitted up, and ready to go you are thrown onto the Battlefield. Straightaway I felt at home, maybe because I have seen every video and screenshot ever released of Battlefield 2, but more likely because it is the true sequel to the series and has a very familiar feel to it. The navigation and basic structure of Battlefield 2 such as the mini map and a lot of the keys remain the same, and allowed me to quickly get into the game.

Simply put, the graphics are stunning, and the majority of screenshots really don't do the game enough justice. The system I was using was a AMD 3200XP, 1GB RAM, GeForce 6800GT with a resolution of 1024x768 with settings at the highest. The gold is in the game play though, so with this “hands-on” preview I'll try and give my little taste of things from a gamers point of view, and let all the other previews cover the rest.

The game is faster, a lot faster it seems. This was probably the first thing that I noticed, and it reminded a bit of Call of Duty. The quick to raise iron sights and sprinting function also gave it that feel, which isn't a bad thing at all. Taking down an enemy seems about right; you certainly can't spray and pray with much success. Iron sights and careful shots will see you drop the enemy with a bit of practice. I've read about people not liking the idea of iron sights, personally I think they fit in the game perfectly. They bridge the gap between fun and realism, and are certainly an aspect that adds to the game play rather than detract from it.

Squads, Teamwork and VOIP
One of the coolest features to hit the Battlefield series has to be the squad mode. This option allows up to 9 squads per team to be formed, which the maximum of 6 players in each, including the squad leader. Once in, or leading a squad all your squad mates appear green on the mini map, and their names above their heads are green as well when you see them running around. This makes for easy find of your little team, which in the heat of the battle is very handy. One of the new features as part of the squads is that you can spawn on your squad leader, even if he is in a vehicle. Whilst this does leave itself open to a number of problems you might think, I didn't personally experience the gripes of which people have been concerned. One thing to note is that the squad leader is only a valid spawn point if your side controls at least one control point. If the enemy controls all the flags on the map and there is a squad leader still alive, no one can spawn on him until he or someone else on that team captures a control point.

If you are fortunate enough to own a headset, or received a free one by pre-ordering then you can take the experience to a whole new level using the Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP). You can use any headset, but you will be better off using a half decent one so that your team can actually understand you. Basically this allows you to communicate with your squad at the touch of a button, making teamwork and coordination a breeze. The theory of the feature seems great, and in game it is pulled off as intended, significantly aiding those that wish to work as part of a team. In my experience, it took a bunch of grunts running around like Rambo, and turned them into a small fighting force able to adapt to tasks quickly and efficiently. For example, on the Zatar Wetlands map, our squad managed to hold the enemy off at a bridge, where they were advancing to our control point. Whilst some of the squad fought, others supported with ammo and health making sure the squad could carry on fighting. Being a medic at this particular battle, it was my job to heal and revive fallen comrades, allowing them to carry on the fight, which is an imperative quality that the medic possesses.

The quality of the voice through the headset seemed pretty clear, even with the budget headsets used, they served their purpose. I think it is going to be very interesting to see how this feature pans out though once kiddies and people with poor headsets start using it. Fortunately enough, you can go to the scoreboard and “mute” anyone who you no longer wish to hear from which is always handy.

Should the unlikely happen and a fellow soldier sees the white light, gone are the days of the random Battlefield 1942 spawns. In Battlefield 2 there are no spawn waves, as everyone has their own individual spawn time. The default time is 15 seconds once they die. There are also a couple of death states, meaning that if you get blown into a thousand pieces (not literally) then a medic cannot revive you, and you will have to wait the full 15 seconds to respawn. However, if you are critically wounded, a medic can revive you. This basically occurs when you've gone below 0 health, but not significantly. If a medic does not revive you in 15 seconds, then you spawn at your desired control point. If a medic does revive you then you immediately spawn in where you are and your side does not lose a ticket.

Vehicles
There are certainly plenty of toys to play around with in the Battlefield 2 world, and this time around they have had a revamp. Gone are the days of clipping a rock and going “BOOM”! The majority of land vehicles have also been given a speed boost, adding even more to the pace of the game. The jets have also been given a boost in the form of an afterburner, which rockets the plane across a map in no time.
One excellent new progression in the games engine, and one that you cannot easily see from screenshots is the new lock-on system. The feature is excellent, in that a pursuing pilot has an animated HUD that can lock onto a plane in an attempt to shoot it down with missiles. For the pursued pilot though, a missile lock indicator alerts the pilot to the danger, at which point flares can be launched to confuse the lock and any missiles en route. A small but simple addition, it makes dogfights a much more exciting experience.

Back to vehicles, and as in previous series, you can still only get 6 troops to a vehicle; this is supposedly there to coincide with the squad numbers. A bit like Battlefield Vietnam, virtually all position in vehicles either give you access to a weapon, or allow you to use the weapon of your class. Like in Vietnam, it allows passengers to continue the fight, even if its damn near impossible to get a kill half the time. Usually if you need to shoot at something and you're a passenger, you'd be better off getting out! That's not the case for the mounted weapons though, as both land and air units are equipped with some serious firepower.

Maps
When DICE said that they were basing the maps on fictitious locations, they weren't lying. It is also obvious that they have taken the “fun” stance over “realism” every time, which is reflected in all parts of the game. Don't get me wrong the maps are great. The detail in them is pretty amazing and very immersive, such as the fire raging from windows in Strike at Karkand. On the scale side of things, I would hazard a guess that some of the maps I played were a bit bigger than El Alamein from Battlefield 1942. As someone who prefers realism in his games, I would have loved to have seen some maps geared more towards that of real life conflicts, but the game has tried to keep away from any political interest which although unfortunate for some, is understandable. Having only played 5 of the 12 maps, I can't comment on all of what to expect, but from what I did play, each map is very unique and offers something quite different. With the ease of making custom maps using the ever so easy mod tools, it's going to give the game longevity perhaps missed in other games.

Sound
For me, one of my favourite aspects of Battlefield 2 is the sound. It is obvious that they have spent a good amount of time working on this aspect, and it really adds to the immersion that others and I felt whilst playing. No matter what they sound like in real life, and not knowing either, this wasn't my concern, whether or not in game I felt like I was shooting an M16 or a peashooter was. Each weapon has its distinctive sound, and I'm glad to say it was truly a delight.
Probably the best example and experience of the sound effects is when artillery rains down, courtesy of the commander. The whole ordeal is a story in itself, but the falling of shells and crushing destruction once they hit, is something to watch and listen to adoringly. One particular moment I was lying prone on a roof, a good few stories up. Situated above and across from a busy intersection between two control points I had a good view for which to snipe some crummy testers. Out of nowhere falling shells start to rain down metres from my location, deafening me through the headset and causing shell shock leading to blurred and slow vision on screen. With each falling shell it sounds as if it could be the last thing you hear, and once its over its certainly a relief!

Commander Mode
Every preview written so far in some way mentions this, so I'll try and put into a realistic perspective of how it actually worked out for me. I guess I tested out this new feature for about half an hour, trying to get to grips with what all the symbols meant without the manual. It was quite tricky, and as has been stated before, has very much an RTS feel to it. With squads listed on the left hand side, and your arsenal of tools located at the top, a few simple clicks allow you have a very different but important impact on the game. Having never tried this feature as seen in games like Natural Selection, I was curious as to how it would perform. Once a squad has been ordered to carry out a task, a message pops up on the squad leaders HUD where he can either accept or decline the order. The idea of an RTS with real life units is great in concept, but when the units don't do what they are told it can make for a very difficult experience for the commander. Needless to say, with little idea of what I was doing, the majority of my orders were met with little acceptance. Having little control over my units, I could still make good use of the commanders other tools. As mentioned countless times, the commander has Artillery, UAV drone, satellite scans and supply drops at his disposal.
A side feature of the commander is his ability to nail campers, with a quick zoom and scan of the map they can sometimes be spotted. They can then be dealt with using the conventional artillery, or if you feel like humouring the guy, drop a supply crate on his head for extra style.
Overall I thought that the commander mode is a very good addition to the Battlefield series, but will be interesting to see how it's used on public servers. I think that clans will particularly enjoy the use of commander mode, as it combines the squad feature and takes teamwork to the very next level.

Conclusion
Battlefield 2 is an absolutely awesome game, one that I can easily see myself wasting many hours on. It is clear to see that they have focused less on realism than some may have hoped for, but then we would have missed out on great features such as the medics defib to name just one. The version I played seemed to have very few bugs, and certainly won't be a repeat of Battlefield Vietnam with the balance crisis. Possibly the only thing that I could gripe about is the height in which players can jump. You can see it in a few of the videos, where guys manage to launch themselves about 6 feet in the air. Other than that, the game seems very fine tuned, and definitely worth sticking around for. If you are a fan of the previous Battlefield games, you are going to love this one even more.