PSA: BF4 on PS4 Totally Fixed... I Think.

So the 64 player modes run as smooth as butter again right now. Seems like whatever DICE did tinker on their backend finally did come to fruition. Rejoice! At least for me, playing on European servers from Central Europe.

Everybody got the same experience? Is it finally A-OK to play BF4 on PS4 again for everyone? Thank god!

I was playing this morning on the Naval Strike maps and they were as smooth as could be. Let's hope it stays that way...

There are stories coming in saying they just flipped on their upgraded servers. Sorry no time to link!

Cool to hear. Maybe I'll give this a shot now eventually. Incredibly sad it took this long for them to fix the game, though.

I actually never really had issues with it even at launch, but nice if other people who've had issues can enjoy it. It's a really good game, shame some people had issue and acted like it was the end of the world.

@onekillwonder_: The Naval Strike rubberbanding was finally fixed? Everything else had been running great for me, but those maps were unbearable a couple weeks ago.

Man, and it only took them like 6 months!

Golly, it only took them 177 days to do it too! Good job Dice! Now I know to mark my calendar for 177 days after the release date of BF5!

-I'll believe it when I see it with my own skeptical eyes-

That's good. I'm still working on getting a PS4. I took advantage on Target's buy 2 get on 1 free sale and Battlefield 4 was the one I got for free on PS4.

I'm very glad to hear that. I stopped playing it after Naval Strike came out because I was getting very frustrated at not being able to play through an entire match due to the horrible rubber banding.

@spraynardtatum: @demoskinos:

To be fair, 4 out of those 6 months have been totally fine for many of us. Only the first month and the last month were quite unplayable for the 64 player modes universally, espcially the Naval Strike maps this past month. For most smaller modes, there weren't any grave issues to report - like ever.

What he said^. Most of the naysaying about it being broken is from people who haven't played it.

Might try this again. Of course, everyone on the PC who has been playing it for all this time is probably so good at this game that they can snipe me to death the very instant I spawn, and I'll have a frightfully bad K/D ratio because they know the maps like the back of their hand and they'll have vehicle and weapon and kit perks which will utterly destroy me, because they can spend 5 to 10 hours a day playing, whereas I cannot....

Scratch that, I don't think I'll go back to BF4. What's the point in humiliating myself?

@seppli: That's simply not true for me so I don't think that's fair at all. Why is your game working and mine isn't? What about the single player file corruptions? Or the bugged hit detection? Or the non existent balancing? Or the lack of sound at the beginning of matches? Or the Rubber banding? Or the Battlelog crashes? Or the random other crashes? Or random instant deaths? Or the deaths from players that are across the map?

Or the fact that they said they wouldn't release any DLC until the game was fixed? <===blatant lie. They've already released 2 so far.

The list goes on and on and a lot of this stuff is still in it! Battlelog crashes are fixed and apparently rubber banding is fixed but that's about it. Is it even safe to play the single player yet? Last time I tried a month or so ago it still corrupted.

Honestly I don't think it's being fair to say that it works for some. I think that's being lenient.

I don't want games to be put out in this kind of state and I think it's against your own interests to defend it when stuff like this happens.

I don't think that's true. The official forums for the game have been rife with people having legitimate complaints about the performance of the game. It was horrendous for the first month or two, then there was a decent period where the game functioned pretty well for me on PS4 for a few months, then the Naval Strike DLC came out and it went to hell for a lot of people on that platform. The folks who haven't had many issues are doing everyone else a disservice by discrediting their claims.

Gamebreaking rubberbanding, at the severity as it was present this last month, wasn't as bad since the first couple of weeks. After the rather borked launch period, it was fine for the most parts, until Naval Strike came out. Of course there was some of it every now and then, mostly during peak hours, but nothing I couldn't avoid. At worst, it wasn't bad enough to spoil my fun for the most parts. But by and large, it was good enough for me.

And there's the point. It was serviceable for me. I might not always have been happy with the game's performance in these 6 months, but 4 of them were totally serviceable for me. I know other people have higher standards, for the most parts I'd say unrealistic standards, and that's how I explain the disparity of opinion/perception.

Most of the issues you're describing aren't really bugs, or sub-par netcode, it's just the reality of a 64 player game with players from all over the world mixing willy-nilly. For gods sake, I often see people from South America and Asia on the same European server. Of course there will be synchronization issues. Personally, I find the game handles itself extraordinarily well for these circumstances, at least as long as the servers hold up. Sure, things can feel fishy when a dude seemingly bends a bullet around a corner, until you figure out he shot that bullet from 10k miles away at you - from the other side of the planet.

So short of locking servers to regions, and maybe offering a handful of cross region servers for those who want and need it, there's little EA/DICE can do about that. As long as it allows players from all over the world to play on any server of their chosing, stuff you accredit to bad netcode will persist. Sure there are bugs, and sure that's something that shouldn't be there, but only in a dreamworld a game as complex as Battlefield 4 won't have any bugs and glitches.

As it stands, DICE and their Battlefield franchise still do things nobody else in the industry does. And lots of things others do as well, DICE does bigger and better. That's why I am more forgiving of such things. Not that I don't want it to be better. I always want Battlefield to better than it is. That is the curse of the Battlefield fan.

Had a match on Parcel Storm which is usually terrible once the storm starts but it was fine, then I played on Hainan resort and experienced a ton of lag, hopefully things smooth out some more.

***Would like to point out that I live on the east coast of Canada (Newfoundland) and I have had terrible lag on 64-player conquest matches since launch***

@seppli:

Most of the issues you're describing aren't really bugs, or sub-par netcode, it's just the reality of a 64 player game with players from all over the world mixing willy-nilly

What about the single player save glitch? That absolutely has nothing to do with the playercount. Also BF3 didn't have these issues on PC (besides not having sound sometimes). Planetside 2 doesn't have nearly as many issues and the playercount for that game is in the 1000s. I'm not saying the game needs to be perfect. I'm saying that BF4 was released unfinished and judged next to other similar large games has the most bugs and most problems hands down. I think chalking it up to "games can't solve these issues when the player count is high" is blatantly incorrect. Games and infrastructure are always improving plus there are current games that already prove that it can be done 10 x better. Current games in the same franchise no less.

I think if DICE wants to release more Battlefield games they should follow the same release schedule as DayZ and not call it a retail release until it's good and ready.

I see where you're coming from and I agree that Battlefield does what it does better than any other game, but I have to say that BF4 is 100% the worst Battlefield game I have played and it has nothing to do with the actual content. It has everything to do with the grocery list of bugs and problems that hinder me from enjoying the game I paid actual money for.

As far as I know, that savegame bug plagued several games, and not just BF4. AC4 for example had the same thing happen to it. I played through the BF4 campaign twice, and ran into it on my second playthrough - but since I completed the game in one sitting both times, it didn't affect me much, other than that all my multiplayer presets were lost as well. I could just have loaded the savegame off the cloud to fix the issue. Not saying it isn't absolute bullshit, that such a bug makes it into retail. It just didn't affect my enjoyment of the game.

Personally, bugs aside, the only things about BF4 that I don't like is the Commander, and the slew of balance nonsense that comes with it, as well as the prevalent lock-on warfare in regards to Anti Air measures. For the most parts I find it's rather well balanced, and a lot more fun than BF3. BF4 is BF3, just bigger and better and more fun - at least when it works - which is hopefully always from now on. I'd still rather have a Cold War-era setting for Battlefield, with less of the high tech crap, and more old-school skill-driven line-of-sight dependent warfare, but hey, there's still plenty of opportunities for DICE to take it in that direction in the future. The Vietnam setting ones simply were the best.

That, or something along the lines of Bad Company 1. Put some real licensed music in the MP vehicles this time around, and it's a keeper.

@seppli:

BF4 is BF3, just bigger and better and more fun - at least when it works.

That's the thing. The working part is the most important part and they have royally fucked it up. There are lawsuits against this game because of the issues it has. While I appreciate the scope and I can see how it theoretically could have been great it's unquestionably poorly made.

Oh yeah, and I agree. Commanders are bullshit.

Tomatoes. Tomatos. I don't agree with the notion that it doesn't work most of the time. Let's just agree to disagree. And let's be glad that things got better again. That's a trend both of us can stand behind.

So when are Polygon going to put their score back up to it's original standing and aggressively talk about it on twitter....oh that's right they won't as it won't bring in enough hits!

Yep, I second what Seppli said. Most of the time that I've played it's been fine for me on the PC version.

Losing your entire singleplayer progress multiple times = broken

Given further proof that their review system is a good idea, but in execution it's dog shit.

Cool.

It's not fixed until I can shoot with R1.

@gaspower: Do you know if the single player bug where it corrupts your save file and you have to start the entire game over has been fixed yet?

Evidence that it isn't.

The thread goes all the way up to 2 days ago meaning people are still having problems. Here are some quotes:

"March 15th 2014, still cant save, good thing I didnt get premium. You lost a very loyal customer. I can understand small bugs and glitches but you totally f****** this one up. Ill just spend my money I was going to use on premium on Call of Duty and forget this game." 3/15/2014

"Happens to me on PC. In case EA has not looked at a calendar in a while, it's April 4, 2014. Your game is still broke. I don't get how you can't care about your work.Especially when so much has gone into it. Y'all must be ADD freaks." 4/4/2014

"lets get this problem fixed EA. no saves for single players = broken." 4/6/2014

"well, ive just bought this stinking pile of poo on the assumption that perhaps it works. eh no, unable to save the single player campaign. 5 months after release. It will be the last BF game i part money with. This **bleep** is going back to the shop." 4/15/2014

"Is anyone from dice or ea reading this thread? I don't think it's too much to ask that we get a formal update." 4/24/2014

"There sticking there head in the sand and pretending all is well. My guess is of it gets fixed it will be by accident." 4/24/2014

People still aren't able to play the campaign safely. Even if that doesn't effect the multiplayer (though there are still many issues with that) I'd have to agree with @somedelicook that losing your entire singleplayer progress multiple = broken

@spraynardtatum: Like I said earlier, I'm only backing up with what Seppli said as of our anecdotal experience with the game and I'm not disputing the fact that it still has issues. I'm not constantly going on to their forums and reading up on updates on bug fixes since I did say that in my personal experience with the game, I haven't been always experiencing issues.

I was not even talking about the issues with the single player saves and I was merely pointing out my time with the multiplayer modes (also I finished the SP with no issues). I don't know why you're going as far as linking me and giving me quotes from their forum threads and then asking me a rhetorical question and then proceeding to answer it and also linking to a customer service thread from December of last year wherein I didn't even ask for proof from you or anything like that . I wasn't even asking you to prove me wrong since I clearly wasn't saying that people haven't been experiencing issues. I'm very well aware that people have been complaining. I was only pointing out my time with the game and I'm not speaking on behalf of everyone but only backing up what Seppli said as some one who hasn't been experiencing a lot of issues.

@gaspower: Sorry, I came off like a dick.

It's just frustrating, as someone who has had a ton of issues with this game, to see people saying that the game runs fine for them. I've seen people do this as a means of discrediting peoples legitimate problems and making it seem like people that have been affected are overreacting. Sometimes it also feels like damage control. Not saying that's what you were doing, I'm merely explaining that that is why I responded with all of the quotes and stuff. I see now that approaching it the way I did just pissed you off and you probably don't even care that other people are having problems. You just came in here to say that your game seems okay and you didn't want to get involved with the bullshit that others are dealing with. Hope you keep having good luck with this game because frankly I think that's what it all boils down to with BF4.

I played the game this weekend to check it out and it seems better for me. Still had a crash and a really laggy match but the rubberbanding seems to be fixed. At least on Large Carrier Assault.

@spraynardtatum: Hey, I get it. It's not like I am indifferent or don't care that many users are having problems its just the overall narrative has been that the game is "still" pretty broken even though over time it has gotten better and personally I could vouch for that. At the same time, I haven't always been playing this game since launch so I've only been playing it in spurts so that's also a factor as to why I'm not always experiencing problems since I don't play it for hours on end. Still, I did play the game, enjoyed it and have had encountered the same problems (rubber banding, server crashes, etc.) but it hasn't frequently happened to me that it came to a point where I stopped playing it like many others have.