Official Battlefield 3 Hype Thread
Launch Date: October 25th, 2011
GUFU Official Public Server:
General Info
Battlefield 3 is the 9th entry into the Battlefield franchise since the series's introduction in 2002 and is the sequel to 2005's Multiplayer Game of the Year here on Gamespot, Battlefield 2. After three Battlefield games expanding the unique team oriented and vehicle focused gameplay onto the consoles, Battlefield 3 returns to its roots on the PC. Featuring native DX10/11 support, 64 player battles, and a unique player networking service called Battlelog. Returning to the series on all platforms (yes all) are the ability to go prone, pilot jets, server browsers, and the communication rose. In addition to the returning features, Battlefield 3 brings a single player campaign, a first for the PC series, a co-op campaign, a first for the series, team deathmatch a first for the series, and a host of gameplay changes/additions to improve every aspect of the Battlefield series. With these changes and additions, Battlefield 3 is poised to take the top spot in multiplayer gaming for 2011.
Single-Player Campaign
In 2014 an Iranian insurgent group named the PLC starts to mass its forces along the Iran/Iraq border. You play a variety of United States Marines as conflict arises between the US and the PLA. Take the fight through the city streets as Sgt. Henry "Buck" Blackburn, and take the fight to the desert with an M1A2 Abrams tank as Cpl. Johnathen "Jono" Miller. Players will also participate in a night raid on the Iranian city of Teheran and be both the pilot and co-pilot of an F-18.
The single player story for Battlefield 3 will be a more believable journey through the not-so-distant future and feature real world location. Players will partake in both linear, scripted action sequences and more open world/sandbox levels. Each level will feature an amazing amount of interaction with the environment as nearly every surface will be physically damaged and destroyed by the fierce fighting. Walls can be destroyed, cover can be blown away, and entire buildings will collapse all of which will influence the dynamic battlefields.
The single player campaign will be longer than the popular Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 on the normal difficulty with the two more advanced difficulties to take even longer. Each difficulty will feature a number of achivements to encourage multiple playthroughs.
Co-Op Campaign
For the first time in a Battlefield game players will be able to fight shoulder-to-shoulder with a friend in a Cooperative Campaign. The Cooperative Campaign is a separate campaign from the the single-player campaign described above. This separate campaign is an attempt to fuse the pick up-and-play styIe of the campaign and the replayability of the multiplayer. Details about the storyline of the co-op have not totally revealed yet. The one mission demoed by DICE takes place in Teheran and takes a very different approach than the single player campaign.
DICE has said the co-op campaign will feature more open-ended action like the multiplayer. Players will either be working together for an objective, one player flying a chopper and the other gunning, or each player supporting the other in an asymmetrical way, one player covering another as he disarms a bomb. More details on the campaing are sure to surface as we approach launch date.
Multiplayer
Multiplayer has been the core of the Battlefield experience since day one. While the Bad Company series on the consoles saw an introduction of a single-player campaign, the PC-focused Battlefield titles have always put multilayer first. For Battlefield 3, DICE is bringing back the massive vehicle focused, 64 player battles that have been the staple of the series since 2002. In addition to the Conquest mode, DICE is introducing the Rush gamemode that was popularized by the Bad Company series to the core franchise. In addition to Conquest and Rush, Squad Rush and Squad Deathmatch will be included in BF3, both gamemodes started in the Bad Company series. New to the series is a Team Deathmatch mode. Unlike the rest of the game modes, Team Deathmatch will be an infantry focused, 12 vs 12 fight to reach a kill-count.
Battlefield 3 sets itself apart from other modern military shooters in a few ways. The first way is the emphasis on teamwork. All of the game modes require teams to work together so that they may accomplish the objectives. Players assume different roles on the battlefield that assume different tasks such a an engineer that can destory walls and vehicles and a recon who can scout enemy positions and take out entrenched positions with a well placed headshot. To aid with this, BF3 has a squad system which puts 3 people with one squad leader in a squad of 4 to coordinate their attack/defense. Missing from BF3 that was present in BF2 is the commander, a player who has an RTS view of the entire battlefield and could give commands to each squad. The commander has been replaced in favor of squad leaders with more abilities. Players may spawn off of only their squad leader if they choose to spawn off of their squad, not a spawnpoint. It is also rumored that the squad leader will beable to call in UAV recons and other supporting elements thus dividing up the power the commander used to have between the squads.
The second unique feature of Battlefield 3 is the emphasis on vehicle combat. The maps in BF3 are much larger than your average shooter and thus require modes of transportation to taxi players around the map. This naturally brings in a focus on the vehicles as players must now secure transportation if they want to be effective on the battlefield. Tanks and AFVs play a major role in the vehicle combat. New to the vehicle combat is the ability to disable the vehicle without destroying it and the ability to kill individual crew members. You can kill the driver of a tank stopping it in its tracks, you can kill the passenger manning a side gun turret in an AFV, or you can stop a tank in its tracks by damaging the engine. Disabled vehicles can still fight but are vulnerable to rocket attack. To make the vehicle combat a bit smoother for non-engineers, after a vehicle has sustained 75% damage, it will slowly begin to regenerate its health. This is one of the many occasions where DICE has sacrificed realism for balance.
The third unique feature of Battlefield 3 is the scale. While vehicles play a large part into the increased scale, aircarft such as the F-18 and A-10 become very important. The large maps give the ability for aircraft and helicopters to operate effectively. This coordination between infantry, vehicles, and air over a large map filled with 64 players creates an entirely unique experience. While the player limits for the console verisons are capped at 24, the maps are still going to be large, yet scaled appropriately, to allow for the same experiences to come through. All players of Battlefield 3 will be able to experience the very unique gameplay the series has always offered.
Multiplayer Modes
Conquest
At the heart of the Battlefield series lies the Conquest game mode. Conquest was first introduced in 2002 in Battlefield 1942 and has been the core of the series ever since. While the mode has had various improvements and tweaks made, the core remains the same.
Two teams on a map fight over specific territories on the map. When a territory is captured, players on the team that captured the territory may spawn there. Each team is given a pool of tickets. Each time a player respawns, one ticket is removed. If one team captures a majority of the territories, the enemy's ticket count starts to decrease. The first team to reach zero tickets or has the lowest amount of tickets when the game time runs out, loses the match.
Conquest maps are usually quite large and full of variety. Some maps may feature dense city fighting with a focus on infantry combat with vehicle support while other maps are large and open with a focus on vehicle play with infantry support. Conquest maps also have planes and helicopters that give support to the battle. All of this results in a very dynamic map that forces the players to work together rather than just camp and rake up kills.
Rush
Rush is a game mode that was originally featured in Battlefield Bad Company. Due to the size and steeper learning curve required to enjoy Conquest to its fullest, players often felt that they were playing whack-a-mole on large maps and that battles did not have enough action to keep them satisfied. To address this, DICE added Rush, a more linear approach to the Conquest game mode.
Rush features two teams, an attacker and a defender. The defender defends a set of two destroyable objectives while the attacker attempts to plant explosives on the objectives. The defender is given unlimited lives and and the attacker is given a set amount of tickets, to encourage attacks. When the attacker successfully destroys both objectives the map expands to a new set of objectives for the teams to attack and defend. Each map has a set number of objective points, when the attacker as successful destroyed every objective, they win. If the defender can bring the attacker's tickets down to zero or defend the objectives until time runs out, they win.
This game mode brought a more linear approach to the battlefields after DICE realized some of the best maps in Battlefield 2 played out in a more linear fashion. Rush mode still features vehicles and a very dynamic map depending on which portion of the map players are playing on. However unlike Conquest, Rush has a much quicker pace and the battle is always much closer to the player. Great game mode for playing over small periods of time.
Squad Rush
Squad Rush is a version of Rush where two teams of four attack or defend a single set of destroyable objectives. This infantry only game type encourages tight teamwork in extremely intense battles between groups of friends.
Squad Deathmatch
Squad Deathmatch is a 16 player game mode where 4 squads of 4 battle to score the most kills in a set amount of time. Random spawn points mixed with the ability to spawn off of a squadleader ensure a very dynamic map as the 4 vs. 4 vs. 4 vs. 4 gameplay brings in an exciting twist to the traditional team deathmatch. Following the traditional Battlefield stIye of gameplay, teamwork is extremely important as you much constantly watch your squadmates back's as the enemy is around every corner.
Team Deathmatch
New to the Battlefield series is the cIassic Team Deathmatch. This 24 player game type will pit two teams of 12 against each other in an infantry only battle. Team Deathmatch will take place on infantry focused sections of the maps to ensure that the gameplay is always fast and furious.
Multiplayer Features
The following is a list of gameplay features that have been confirmed for BF3. Unless specified, features listed are for both the consoles and the PC
- 64 Players on the PC, 24 players on the consoles
- DX10 native on the PC with heavy use of DX11 features
- Total of 9 maps with all 5 game modes active on each map at launch
- Four player squads with one player acting as squad leader which the others can spawn off of
- Players can switch from a squad voice chat to a team wide voice chat for better communication
- Fully destructible maps, both cosmetic and dynamic damage. Destruction 2.0, the ability to destroy entire buildings, is returning but will only be on certain buildings instead of all
- Players can now enter the prone position
- Jets in the Conquest mode
- Jets do not carry bombs, instead they carry anti-vehicle missiles that must be guided in by a laser designator by players on the ground (rumor)
- Jets can be outfitted with either air-to-ground ordinace or air-to-air, not both
- Support cIass can deploy bipod of gun on any surface
- Support cIass can "pin-down" enemies by firing near them which blurs the screen of the enemies and prevents health regeneration
- You can blind people with a flashlight in low-light scenarios
- Lights can be destroyed to make areas of the map dark
- Vehicles can be disabled but can still operate the turret
- Players in vehicles can be killed if a rocket or missile hits close to them while the vehicle doesn't explode
- Vehicles now burn after a certain amount of damage which degrades the vehicles and eventually destroys it
- Vehicles will repair themselves very slowly after they have take 25% damage
- Disabled vehicles will require an engineer to repair
- Players health will regenerate when not in combat
- All health regen can be disabled via server settings
- Customizable kits with various weapons/gadget loadouts
- Personalized dogtags
- Hardcore game setting
- Infantry only gameplay setting
- Ability to opt out of a revive
- Multiple firing modes (semi, full)
Multiplayer Maps
The following is a list of all the known multiplayer maps. There will be a total of 9 maps on launch. All gamemodes will be active on all maps at launch. This list will be updated as more info is released.
Operation Metro
Caspian Border
Grand Bazaar
(no media)
Operation Firestorm
(no media)
Tehran Highway
(no media)
Noshahr Canals
(no media)
Seine Crossing
(no media)
Kharg Island
(no media)
Damavand Peak
(no media)
The follow maps will be released with the "Back to Karkand" DLC pack.
Gulf of Oman
Sharqi Peninsula
Wake Island (aka the best map in video game history)
Strike at Karkand
This list will be updated as details emerge on new maps.
Gadgets, Weapons, and Vehicles
Following is a list of all the weapons and gadgets that were released with a "multiplayer fact sheet" that EA launched. DICE has confirmed that the list wasn't 100% complete and there were a few things added after. Battlefield 3 features 55 weapons, 27 weapon attachments, 16 equipment options, 14 specializations, 22 vehicles, 28 vehicle specializations, 350 dog tags, and 100 ribbons and medals.
Each weapon is upgraded. Unlike other shooters, if you want the ACOG scope on your M4 you must use the M4 to unlock the ACOG for the M4. Unlocking the ACOG for the M16 will not unlock the ACOG for all weapons.
Media
Official Trailers (in order of which they were released)
Teaser - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP0Ij1_VTY0
Gameplay Premier Trailer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wi2tae2PmmU
Fault Line: Episode 1 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekDutunw1mk
Fault Line: Episode 2 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBu_tH8muq0
Fault Line: Episode 3 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsHIHxYXeLs
My Life trailer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfrrAp1blaM
Fault Line: Full - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zw8SmsovJc
Frostbite 2 Features Trailer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pNOxynC1Dc
Operation Metro Multiplayer Trailer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPu7-LtLKmU
Thunder Run - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UwOrl036_A
Caspian Border Gameplay - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8S_eEv_A5k
Operation Guillotine Gameplay - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5eLbPQt_Pk
Operation Guillotine Gameplay: Xbox 360 version - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzA4dv0xkzg
99 Problems - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=coOHjF4_apI
Welcome to the Open Beta - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QzxLKSX8os
Log in to comment