An honest (elaborate) evaluation of the open beta

Question

I'm going to start of by splitting up my review in 5 parts; 'prologue', 'Battlefield's identity', 'Battlefield 6 (concerns)', 'feedback'', and lastly 'The elephants in the echo chamber'. For those who cant be bothered to read through everything: I'll be putting the TL;DR: in BOLD

Prologue.

I grew up playing shooters like Unreal Tournament (PC), the 007 games (PS2), Cold Winter (PS2), Time Splitters (PS2), Black (PS2), the Halo franchise (Xbox (360)) and stumbled on Battlefield 2 (PS2) with which I had a blast and was my first introduction to the franchise. We, me and my friends, ended up buying Battlefield Bad Company for our friend's 13th birthday (for legal purposes I'd like to clarify that we had his father's permission). Our friend group got together almost every weekend to play LAN playing different games (mostly shooters). Yet we hovered towards the Call of Duty games (Modern Warfare 2007 and thereon after) for LAN games. In our respective free time we each had our own preferences. I for example loved to compete and challenge myself trying to get better and better within said franchise. This lasted for 5 or so years but then fatigue hit (MWIII is the last of their games which I played on a weekly basis with friends). They stopped innovating and sometimes moved backwards, exampel: Ghost was on of their best games released in quite some time and got annihilated by a brain-rotten community, unable to see the vision and innovation which it desperately needed. Though they'd mastered the arena shooter genre, something was missing. The whole premise of those games was solo performance based and put the emphasis on KDA focus, KD if you'd ask the self-absorbed gamers. With maturity, I realized this sucked. You could carry your team yet get flamed into orbit. But then Battlefield 3 released, which I got early (AND FOR FREE!) due to a F'up with my Playstation Magazine subscription. This is where my perspective on shooters changed. From here on out I only played strat-based, teamplay-centric shooters with more realism; Battlefield, Insurgency, CS:GO, Hunt showdown, Hell Let Loose,.. I had finally found my piece of the pie.

Battlefield's identity (in my opinion).

As I've alluded to before. This game opened my eyes. You got points for any action that contributed to the team effort: healing, (re)supplying, repairing, capping, spotting and suppressing. This game appreciates you for the effort you put in. You're a team trying to make it happen. Who cares if you're not the best marksman pulling of clutch moves, your actions matter.
Your build fits a specific purpose giving your character a role. Your carabine > Assault Rifle > SMG's ttk differs depending on the distance, with locked weapons you also successfully prevented the whole lobby from running around with a sniper and a rocket launcher on their back. This game and its game modes suddenly made smoke grenades make sense and attractive, sexy even. You managed to put the smoke in smoking hot.
You distinguished yourself from your competition through vehicle gameplay.
Adding destruction to shooters only made sense, yet your competitors didnt even bother implementing it (as far as I'm aware, this is still the case, which I honestly find mindboggling, but let them dig their own graves).
With Battlefield 4 you added 'Levolution' which was a fine addition until you overdid it in Battlefield 2042.

In conclusion: All these things are what makes Battlefield Battlefield, removing any of these points would in my opinion be stepping away from it's core identity. But this does not mean that certain things can't be revised or altered, after all: innovation means taking risks and adapting, you cant make an omelette with breaking eggs. Yet I fear the possibility that the Battlefield fanbase gets pushed aside in attempt of pleasing non-franchise players. You win some you lose some, potentially the end of an era (for better or worse).

Battlefield 6 and my concerns.

First things first: The beta feels great! Though it's quite limited in what we've been able to playtest, it still nails what BF3 (and after) was like. However, it brings a lot of worry in my humble opinion. You have successfully made a better CoD and pulled a lot of their fanbase towards your game, BUT it is more than apparent that a specific player base is not familiar with the game's identity. It would be in the players best interest if certain things were explicitly stated, more precisely, what a ticketing system entails & the objectives matter more than your KDA. When I was playing the game (and looking at chat / scoreboard) it was very clear from how certain players (re)actions who is / was a battlefield vet and who wasnt; (again) not playing the objective and focusing on KDA (sometimes flat out camping), Supports completely ignoring you and/or not dropping supplies (doesnt matter how often you scream "I need a medic!" or "I need supplies" with the in-game comms). The other frustration was seeing people blow up heli's at spawn just because they wouldn't get there in time. In short, the solo player mentality was very present and took away from the experience. You are catering to a broader audience, some of whom don't agree with what Battlefield is and want it to be something else. This includes influencers. I don't care about skins but am not against them, as long as it doesn't turn the battle into a neon rave. I don't care about a battle royal, I have nothing against them (I play EA's Apex Legends on and off) but that's not what I'm looking for when mentioning Battlefield.

(this part is more for the devs)
We had access to one ""big"" map, which was on the smaller side and isn't enough to say if the game is worth it. If I had to base myself off of the 4 maps we were able to play during the beta alone, my answer would be "not worth it, this isn't battlefield". To give you a better idea, my favourite maps (in alphabetical order) were; Alborz Mountains (the overall BEST map), Armored Shield (great circular map with tanks / AA / air), Bandar Desert ( fighting with or against the AC 130 was always fun), Damavand Peak (by far the best Rush map with extended tickets), Death Valley (compact yet great), Gulf of Oman (great Conquest map , Kharg Island (rush or conquest), Markaz Monolith (great for skilled chopper gameplay), Nebandan Flats (best air superiority map), Operation Firestorm (classic, and glad it's coming back), Scrapmetal (best close quarter map out of the QC dlc), Talah Market (late but great close quarters map with a sprinkle of tank gameplay) and one more map which isn't on the wiki.

Feedback.

Quick point: some of the spawns around objectives get you killed instantly, more apparent on some maps than other (in order of least problematic to most; Siege of Cairo, Liberation Peak, Iberian Offensive, Empire State) . This needs to be addressed and is more prominent in the close quarters, Domination, TDM modes (which personally do not like). Which leads me to my second point: Rush and Conquest are the bread and butter (in my experience), please do not neglect them. Breakthrough is a nice addition to that.

My impressions & expectations of the first week only got confirmed with the second week. The introduction of Empire State was not it and the lack of vehicles felt bland. This is a prime example of what doesn't feel like Battlefield (this is CoD with destruction,.. that's it). I personally will not touch that map ever again. I saw someone online asking the question why 'Brooklyn Bridge' and 'Empire State' aren't one big map. (disclaimer: not an american, I do not know how far these places would be from one another) If this could open it up to potential vehicle gameplay I'd be 100% on board.

Iberian Offensive got a lot of slack by the community, though I like the bare bones-y feel of it. My only gripe with it is that the destruction feels off on it. You can destroy almost everything, yet not really. Some of the blocks and walls are indestructible (which makes sense from a gameplay perspective I suppose), which leads to a form of disappointment(?). I don't think that making everything destructible would lead to open fields given how fast paced this small map is. Objective C feels like it could crumble removing it as a contested point for the objective, yet you'd still vie over the chokepoint.

Liberation Peak is small, but it encapsules all the great aspects of a conquest map on a denser scale. Could it have used a series of tunnels, sure. Is it really needed? No. But if you do, you could add them in the central mountain /hill or under C. I also do feel like (purely a hunch) stress-testing being pinned on A vs F, would show that A is harder to get out of than F. E still feels accessible from spawn (proper cover) whereas B (A included) are out in the open.

Siege of Cairo is the kind of you don't know you needed until you have it. This feels like peak close quarters. We all know there was outrage concerning people getting on top of the buildings and bridge. But I honestly would embrace the idea. In fact, when looking at the assets it seems like the idea was explored but then written off. If this could be made into a deliberate possibility for certain of the rooftops, that'd be great.

Vehicle Gameplay was good in what I could test, though it had it's issues. Pressing the keybinding to repair the tank didn't sometimes, the reason for this still eludes me. Jeeps had moments where they were nigh indestructible (2 RPGs to the body = still standing &machine gunner still plowing). Something that has been missing from the franchise thus far is a lobby where people are able to learn how to fly planes / helicopters, being able to do so only in the heat of the action at the cost of team support isn't the greatest. I did not have the opportunity to fly a helicopter myself, I only experience being the gunner.

Infantry Gameplay had some nice additions. Being able to drag and resurrect is awesome and it would be cool if there was a specific combat medic feature allowing to drag while the downed person can use his sidearm to shoot. More mobility is great, but shouldn't be overdone. The weight soldiers carry around isn't the lightest either. I noticed cases where the leaning feature sometimes worked in the (literally) opposite direction, now I don't know how it looked for the people staring at me, but seemed counter productive from my end. Aside from this and melee executions ending up jabbing your enemy most of the time instead of actually going off, there's nothing left to say except: Putting the healing and ammo pack in one seems like a nice streamlining decision.

Which reminds me, spawn beacons don't drop you in with a parachute, nothing new (2042 for example) but a feature I did enjoy a lot,.. shame for the snipers.

The elephants in the echo chamber

Let's address the most mentioned points by other people which sometimes have valid points. I'll also mention them from most problematic to least problematic in my opinion.

- Healing happens way too fast and almost takes away from the support class, especially when taking into consideration that suppression is no longer a thing like it used to. The fact that there's no more reason to move to heal up means you just go prone for 5 seconds and get back up no problem.

- Suppression being gone is a **bleep** shame. The fact that you're being shot at by a high(er) calliber round / salvo of bullets should be felt, decreasing the time before autohealing. The pressure it puts on you is right when being on the receiving end. When being on the dealing end (ex; playing HMGs) you should be rewarded for fending of a push / holding down the fort.

- C4 can be thrown way further than before. I'm a fan of the adjustment, but agree that the range seems a bit excessive as is.

- RPG Launcher tickling infantry doesn't feel right. I loved sniping people with it (direct hit still kills) yet absolutely understand it's underwhelming. I could get behind the idea that the damage is erratically distributed (AoE cone RNG distribution = sure). The grenade launcher also needs to serve its purpose. But it wouldn't be the wildest idea to make them have alternative explosives.

- Autospotting is overly sensitive, but it does not break the game. Increasing the time before autospotting within a specific distance in addition to pinging isn't the worst idea. Alternative idea: binoculars to autospot. Is it really that problematic? No. Is its current state Hyper sensitive? yes.

- Snipers are going to sit at the edge of the map or against a highly camouflaged background. Expecting to do this free of charge from a realistic point of view makes sense. From a gameplay perspective however, it doesn't. An "I don't like to be shot at with weapons that can't as easily reach me, and not even one-tap, whilst I have a field day" attitude is the real problem. If this really is an issue I'd say spotting a sniper autopings it for your whole team, as this would make sense to call out over the radio, and if that is the alternative I think we can all agree that the lens flare is quite the elegant solution.

- Locked Weapons the only reason this is so low is because it does not matter that much in my opinion. You end up playing your class for it's class abilities more than the weapons. Though I personally prefer locked weapons. The only thing frustrating is when you have a lobby of players running around with snipers & rocketlauncher / grenade launcher, then it becomes obnoxious.

- Shotgun I dont see the issue. I got demolished by them, I demolished with them. I've also been on both sides of the clownfiesta circus. This is a non-issue.

And that's all I can think of right now. If there's any specific questions anyone would have, feel free to let me know.

Will I be preordering the game? No, I have not seen enough to make my decision. I have played ONE 'big'ish map and this is not, by any stretch, enough to conclude that it is worth it. (see previous mentioned favourite maps; almost all vehicle heavy / centric maps)

saxmandk · Answer

And lacking hardcore....Missing some bigger maps with more vehicle to gauge the vehicle vs vehicle combat. For me the third person standard view in the IFV and Tanks makes it feel i play PUBG or something else than BF. The diversification with vehicle mods in BF4 was awesome. Riding on the vehicles and repairing them mid combat makes for some interesting gameplay with need for snipers etc to kill them, but the execessive repair spam feeled a bit much.

lapatchak97 · Answer

I personally think liberation peak is a poor map by design. The team that spawns with F flag is given the uphill advantage. And as you have noted it's "bigISH". Quite the far cry from what most would consider a large battlefield map. And though, we will be getting "large maps" in the game. If you go and look at the description of the maps to come a good percentage that remain are city maps. And then out of the two others that are going to be open large warfare maps, one is a recycled map... Eh

Also I think you hit the absolute nail on the head by stating that this game is, without a doubt just a better version of cod. The stakeholders at EA want to make money and they realize that CoD is a cashcow. That's just an undeniable fact and is factored heavily into the creation of this BF.

vormax66 · Answer

Really nice post!I hope you dont mind me doing a friendly argument. I also like to add that we come from similar backgrounds. Grew upp on quake 3 and UT 2004 games.-Community and solo play.&nbsp;I agree with people playing solo is a struggle. Blowing up heli in spawn is just trolling but i think it happened once in my 45h in the game. Its an easy patch for dice non the less if it will become an issue. (indestructible first 30 sec of a game). While teamplay is lacking i played with a friend who played BF for the first time in his life. BF can be really intense so i don't think people really dont use their kit for other player cause of solo mentality its just more that they are fully engaged with managing themselves. Specially when you need to manage your machinegun, give people ammo and ress people at the same time. I find it to be a far worse issue when we have 30% of the team playing sniper or assaults running in circles around the map with a shotgun. I think we need to give some people the benefit of doubt. Community is also something that isnt static, it will change. For me personally i think its a bad idea to give support both healing and ammo. That makes sniper and assault solo-play classes. Support is the backbone for ALL infantry support and with an LMG with no real suppression mechanic its hard. Engineer is mostly doing its own thing. IMO assault should be medics and support LMG ammo. In this way we kind of force teamplay instead if having support not being fire support but all the support.-Mapsize. I agree that the maps are rather small. Liberation peak is not really a small map but it lacks meaningful terrain outside the center. Its also a sniper hell with people hiding on rocks as you pointed out. If we get a bit more cover and spread out points i think it could be a great map. Kings battery feel weird to me. The other parts of the map feel rather claustrophobic. SMGs and ARs dominate this map. Kairo is fun and tactical but it can feel random and unpredictable in conquest. The worst issue with the maps is vehicles, specially the heli and jet. So far we only have liberation peak. Playing jet is so far a disappointment. Locking on targets are hard, bombing is not doing much and mostly cause the maps is so small. Stinger and AA is making it even more problematic. Jets get insta locked on flyover so you just pop flares and get out of the map and wait for CD. Heli is even worse. Sometimes you get locked in spawn and if you take a close look at the reveal event it was the same from the top players. You enter the map, dump your ammo and you dive back into base for repair and CD. Less then 30 seconds of fighting cause you get bullied out of the map instantly. Alot of this can be balanced after release. In bf2042 they for example added cover to the hourglass map cause infantry had no where to take cover and i think the same could happen to liberation peak.&nbsp;-Healing and suppression.&nbsp;Again i think we should de couple support from healing. ATM the LMGs are mostly ARs with large mags with slow ads. Suppression should be a core mechanic. Right now as an LMG player you can get shot if someone is peaking you fast enough so it kind of looses its value. Slowed healing rate is nice BUT its a proactive effect. Players with full HP is not affected by it at all and you kind of want it to be proactive instead making it disadvantageous to peak when a LMG is blasting blasting at you or at least make them spotted like in BFV.-RPG and C4. I sort of agree with you but if RPG is too good against infantry you will get mad fast. It hurts and supresses and i think that is enough since infantry is not what its supposed to used against in the game. C4 throw range i sort of like. Too short and it will be really hard to use. If its to long it will be abused. I think they are in a good spot right now. Easy to throw into a second floor wall, over barriers or onto a passing tank.&nbsp;-Locked weapons. This point is a double edged sword. If we want teamplay we want supports to bring and LMG to the party and specially if we get actual suppression. We want recon to play backline with sniper/dmr or carbines. You want the engineers to focus on vehicle action and assault to do assault stuff. As of right now the Assault rifles are way too good with recoil mods. They can dominate close, medium range. LMG dominates no range really and SMGs great for CQB but they can reach out to medium too. Specially the mp7. Carbines are also way to good with certain setups. Problem i have its current state and open weapons is that people will simply not play LMG, SMG or DMR if other guns outperforms it at most ranges. As you mentioned yourself you don't want an engineer with sniper and RPG. If we want assault to dominate in most gunfights with AR and shotgun then sure but we can not have all classes use them. The beautiful thing with BF imo is when all weapon systems are used together. Suppressive fire for the LMGs, assault pusing the frontline, engineers engaging tanks and pushing with assaults while the recon spots and try to provide cover from range while providing a foundation for the squad to spawn from.We are all free to express our opinions and i think its important to encourage conversation. I hope you continue with elaborate feedback like this.&nbsp;Ps. English is not my native language so please have some oversight.

4llc4p5 · Answer

Hey, thanks for your feedback, always appreciated! (seems like we're in agreement for some points) and raises a few points the devs might still want to read as well.

I'm sure you're right about people coming around to understand the game better. It's more of a "hey it wouldnt be a bad idea to give new players a quick rundown on how you lose games / score points." for newer players.
splitting up healing and ammo is perfectly fine. But it wont resolve the - insta heal / no suppression issue.

On the sniper point, I dont think the people making the 'lens flare' memes / posts realise their idea of a fix is the same picture without the intel, which is the same situation but arguably worse... which I find hilarious, which doesnt change the fact that they still need to land their shots. Now at least you know you're being targeted by a gun that has a heavy advantage over you.

On the vehicle part, I think it works, but you need more experience, which we didn't get to have time for in this beta alone, yet true that it's harder to learn on such a cramped surface. I do agree that the TTK on air vehicles is still very quick (just like in Battlefield 2042). the amount of stinger shots you start with may be a bit overdone.

The issue with suppression is that there is none like there used to be in BF3 / BF4 which brought debuffs & gave points for the player laying it out. That in combination with almost instant healing makes a healing kit useless unfortunately. Imagine giving someone floaties to visit the desert or sunscreen for cave exploring.

The whole point of reducing C4 throw range is that you cant just 'outgun' the engineer vs vehicles. So I agree with the RPG aspect but it doesnt make sense that a point blank shot at their feet doesnt even kill them when 2,5 can take out a tank (with the high autoheal time, 2 sometimes didnt even do it, only a direct hit, which is absurd).

For the locked weapons part: I'm advocating FOR not agianst, but allowing the option will lead people to playing the locked variant eventually anyways. When it comes down to playing the actual objective (if you've played a lot of battlefields at least, and or the ones where suppression existed) you'll notice that sooner rather than later the players run specific weapons for specific roles. If you do not force people into locked weapons (which I could live with) you're most likely going to end up with lobbies of players not playing the objectives, runnign snipers and RPGs. Changing the capacity to kill with RPGs & be stealthy with snipers is FOR SURE going to lead to that. People arguing for any of those points; locked weapons, no lens flares, deadlier anti personel RPGs must take that into consideration (or are me-me-me players).

I'm open for further feedback. Glad to see the dialogue evolve :)

techtackidk · Answer

I think turning the mountain in the middle of Liberation Peak into a tunnel network (or maybe even it’s own objective) is an awesome idea I didn’t think of before. It’s probably a good way to make C less stagnant by splitting the teams’ focus between a mountain base and the base at C. And I also agree with your idea of making the roofs in Cairo an actual part of the map. I’ll be honest, I’m guilty of jumping the roofs in Cairo myself, and it’s a really powerful position…Unless someone on the other team is also doing it. I think parkouring across the rooftops was a ton of fun, finding new ways to reach parts of the map you wouldn’t otherwise be able to access. On top of this, if they made the buildings in Empire State fully explorable and let players on the roofs of those buildings it could totally be like a tiny Seige of Shanghai or Dawnbreaker, which I think is a fun idea. The maps - I think - just need to be fully unlocked and realized to push the bar a bit higher. And yes, the lack of vehicle combat and big maps is a big letdown, but here’s to hoping we do get a big urban map like the ones I mentioned, because I always found the sandbox was best realized on those maps.

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An honest (elaborate) evaluation of the open beta

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