Despite being another first person shooter in an industry littered with them, Battlefield Bad Company stands out of the crowd, if only for a short time. In the singleplayer, you take control of Preston Marlowe, a new member of Bad Company. Bad Company is basically the rogues of the US military. The expendables and ones no-one cares about. This means you get the hardest missions with the least support and expected to die. When you don't, HQ sends you on another mission hoping you'll all die on the next one. Once joining B-Company at the start of the first mission, you will proceed right to the end of the game with 3 squad mates. Sweet-water Haggard and Sarge make up your squad and not only protect and fight alongside you the whole way, but throw in funny comments and remarks along the way. While the story of this game is original, following a similar plot line to the film "Three Kings" where the rogue company goes awol in search of gold, that isn't what stands out. This is the first game that has truly very destructible environments. From start to finish in the seven extremely long levels, buildings, trees, pylons, virtually anything can be destroyed almost completely. While the environment is not 100% destructible, the fact that a large percentage of it is really adds to the game play making players seek new approaches to their play style. Alongside destructible environments are the enormous maps both in single and multiplayer modes allowing plenty of use of vehicles ranging from boats, golf carts and choppers. The maps are so large that a vehicle is needed very often to reach a new objective. It is worth noting also that some missions contain multiple objectives which can be done in any order and more often than not, from different angles. Driving your dune buggy to the nearby hill, you can snipe away the main force of an enemy base then sneak in afterwards and finish them off. Alternatively, lay down a mortar strike, destroying most of the cover then run in, guns blazing at the exposed Russians. Exposed is something that you'll find happens a lot to the player, and less to the AI. The AI is clever in taking cover and returning fire. Tanks and RPG infantry will level any cover you seek to hide behind within seconds so the player is forced to keep moving or find any scrap of non-destructible environment to lurk by. That said about the AI, they are aggressive. Snipe someone from afar and bullets will be streaming your way instantaneously. This is the first down side to the game. Sniping is extremely slow, as is reloading almost every weapon. Snipe an enemy and all AI in the region will open fire on you, knowing exactly where you are. This leaves little scope for sniping an entire base without their knowledge and is unrealistic in terms of the time it takes the enemy to find you. Combine this with relatively clumsy controls and kit layout and it can often become frustrating both sneaking and all out gun fights. I say clumsy because your weapon layout is allocated to the two bumpers. Right bumper switches between your primary and secondary weapon. The annoying thing about this is that a machine gun with attached grenade launcher counts as both of these; therefore there is no small arm to switch to in moments of dire need. It's frustrating, taking heavy fire and in the middle of an intense fight, to be forced to retreat in order to reload rather than expose a pistol and finish the fight. The melee button is also badly positioned, being the Y button. In this case, melee is slow and frustrating whereas it should be the opposite, quick, easy and rewarding (This is where it wouldn't have been hard to take a leaf from other shooters i.e Halo, COD4). Killing the AI isn't very fun. While the sound effects and the game visuals are stunning as walls blast to pieces and trees collapse under the tracks of a tank, simply mowing an enemy to the ground is sadly boring. There is no satisfaction in a kill and the enemy also dies unrealistically sometimes flipping or twitching into the air. The AI can also see you much easier than you can see them. Quite often you'll search a village from afar, finding no enemies, only to enter it and find it riddled with them. Sometimes the enemies don't load until you are close enough, therefore appearing out of nowhere, and other times they are behind foliage and walls. Unfortunately, you never get the same cover. Enemies will be hitting you with dead accuracy through forests and dense foliage however they will be near impossible to find. Another downside is the health system which consists of an old school number in the corner of the screen that decreases when you take hits. Take a sniper round and the number 100 will go down to 40. The only way to boost your health back up is by shoving an adrenaline needle into your chest which involves switching to it in your inventory, plunging it into your chest, and returning to your weapon. In battles, this gets annoying, plugging yourself every 30 seconds and while the intensity of the game could be insane, this constant distraction along with weapon switches and slow reloads dulls the action a little. That all said, the single player is awesome. The visuals are stunning with massive maps largely destructible and a lot of scope to play it several times. The games story is linear and the objectives, while not completely free, allow a lot of space for different approaches and player interactions. The weapons are all fun to use, and blowing up buildings in whatever method you deem fit doesn't get old. Its great fun planning your attack on an objective by planting C4 on a wall, blasting your way into a warehouse, with guns blazing to take down the first enemies unaware of your arrival. Multiplayer I believe is where the heart of this game lies. Battlefield has always been a multiplayer game, and although the single player is very good and engaging, its the online modes that shine. There is only one game mode called GOLD RUSH which is a basic attack and defend mode. One team defends gold crates while the other attacks to destroy them. At your disposal are choppers, tanks, mortars, sniper rifles, medics, and more making for some intense and explosive battles. The 24 player hosting allows massive tank battles and infantry combat in and around buildings. Destructible environments allow players to deplete their opponents cover before starting an assault. Both sides are great to play. While defending, players must hold out choke points, seeking to down any enemies trying to destroy the gold crates. As their cover slowly disappears, they are left increasingly vulnerable, adding tension and realism to the game. As the attackers, you have a limited number of troops and times you can respawn (which is a lot) so team work and sheer force is required to destroy the enemies dug in hard. Its a great game. Ranking up is enjoyable and rewarding, giving the player access to new and better weapons, making him/her a more formidable foe in the field and allowing him/her to choose what weapon layout to take into battle according to their class. Classes can be chosen at the start of each respawn so players can switch their play method according to what their opponent is doing. All this combined with massive maps, loads of players and potential explosions, who can complain? Battlefield is the first in the field with destructible environments, massive multiplayer explosive battles (surpassing COD3), and huge maps/missions allowing players to take their own approaches to the game. While it isn't amazing, it is great fun and worth picking up, just to see where the next gen of game physics is about to begin.
Other Helpful Reviews for Battlefield: Bad Company
Battlefield: Bad Company is the first Battlefield game I ever played. The past Battlefield games focused on multiplayer and since I'm primarily a single-player only the games didn't hold much interest. However a couple o... Read Full Review
I'll start by saying that this is a very good game and that only a few poor choice is stop it from having the best multiplayer on Xbox Live. The Battlefield series has allowed players to fight in World War 2, Vietnam, th... Read Full Review
