Battlefield has always been about having fun with your buddies and blowing the heck out of not only other players but the environment you are surrounded by as well. Unfortunately, Battlefield 2042 feels like the game overflowing with a lot of nonsense that takes away anything you would consider to be fun. From rolling the dice on the loadout customization to getting your hands on a vehicle and unlocking upgrades for your weapons, everything feels very tedious and unnecessary.
I spent most of my time running from wall climbing hovercrafts and one-shot tanks killing me from distances that are way too far for precise eliminations. When I wasn’t doing that, I was doing my best to level up my firearms to unlock attachments to be able to shoot the enemy better. I have to say out of all this, the latter was the worse since it seems like the sights on the scope are so far off. I couldn’t hit the damn broad side of a barn with a brick, which I will get into more later.
When the game works which is so barley, you have a better chance at winning the damn lottery. It’s hard not to enjoy the sheer “Battlefieldiness” of the whole experience. Battlefield Portal is by far the best place to play in this world. You get not only the nostalgia of playing previous games, like Bad Company 2 or Battlefield 3, but everything is on point. You and your group of friends relive the days where Battlefield was at the peak of all first-person shooters.
This was glorious, to say the least. From the amazing graphics to the smooth performance and the sound, oh the glory of hearing your weapons firing and destruction all around you. Stating this to be a stunning game is by far an understatement. I have to mention my first tornado experience in the game in which I was lifted off the ground into the sky. I pulled my shoot open, and I rained hell on the enemy with my sniping rifle when I could hit them. One out of every 13 shots isn’t bad, right?
There are a few modes in Battlefield 2042 and each brings its own game style to the overall experience. They are Conquest, Hardzone, Breakthrough, and Portal. Battlefield’s classic Conquest mode is one of two modes in the All-Out Warfare section of Battlefield 2042. If you’ve played a previous Battlefield title, you’ll know what you’re doing and it is still the same. Each team starts with a number of reinforcements representing the number of lives they have for the entire match. The first team to lose all their lives is the loser, simple and straightforward.
Breakthrough is very similar to the classic Rush game mode from past Battlefield titles and is the second All-Out Warfare mode in Battlefield 2042. Defenders have unlimited reinforcements so they can always keep their defense up, but attackers have limited lives. If you run out of lives before taking over all the spots, you lose. Hazard Zone is as close to a battle royale as Battlefield 2042 gets at the moment. Your squad, along with several other enemy squads will need to find, collect, and extract as many data drives as you can from crashed satellites scattered around the map.
In this mode, if you die your out. Game over man, game over. Portal is easily my favorite of all the modes previously mentioned. Portal isn’t really a Battlefield 2042 mode so to speak. It’s more of a hub for community-made and classic Battlefield game modes from older titles. It is a giant sandbox of warfare history that allows players to create custom game modes with interesting rules. Each and every Portal game is a new experience and joy to participate in.
When playing Battlefield 2042, you no longer create your own class. You now pick a Specialist or Operator. Each Specialist can equip every weapon, gadget, and piece of equipment but they have their own ability.
Boris, which is one of my favorite specialists right now, has a little turret that is more effective when he’s close to it. For me though, it seems like the Specialist was created for the new mode Hazard Zone. Otherwise, to me, it seems like they wasted the chance at building classes just for this one type of playstyle.
When it comes to weapon customization, I feel that this is just an absurd way of making things work. While in-game, you can literally change your weapon attachments at any time. I truly believe this is just to make the characters bend to the idea that they have all the power. I don’t like it myself. I like the idea of thinking ahead and planning how I want this and that before I get in the fight. I love classes and the concept of building the weapon how I want it and not having to worry about it. I don’t want to be constantly thinking “Oh this isn’t working so let’s make this weapon more powerful instead of just swapping it out for another gun or class”.
This brings me to my biggest pet peeve out of all the games, the lack thereof with realistic hit markers. I was using the starting sniping rifle the SWS-10 and was wanting to level it up. To level it up, of course, you need to get kills. I was no more than 6 feet from an enemy and his back was towards me shooting at other squads. I brought up the gun and put the crosshairs on the back of his head. NO way I could miss, yet I did. 2 clips worth I missed. I got up behind him and I literally put the gun to the back of his head and I missed 2 more times. He then noticed me and spun around shot at me one time and killed me instantly. I screamed into the abyss of my microphone. How the fuck is this possible?! I became so irritated that I had to walk away from the game. I was so furious. I didn’t play anymore the rest of the day.
Battlefield 2042 has been a letdown over and over again, from the games crashing to the constant bugs. From the weapons that are so bad that you can’t shoot an enemy within 2 feet of you when you unload a clip, to being run over by a hovercraft that drove up the side of a skyscraper. I am praying that when the game goes live for everyone on November 19th they take all of this into consideration and start pushing out patches to fix these issues.
I miss the older games that made me want to pick up a controller or jump on a keyboard and mouse and waste hours and hours of time with squadmates. The only thing for me that this game has done, showing how NOT to make a Battlefield game. Battlefield 2042 is available now on PC, Xbox, and Playstation for Gold ($90) and Ultimate ($110) editions and will be available for Regular ($60) edition on November 19th, 2021.
This review was written based on a digital review copy of Battlefield 2042 for PC provided by EA.
