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Battlefield 4 Devs Talk About the Many Benefits of the Frostbite 3 Engine

Talkin' 'bout them toolsets, yo.

Jun. 25 2013

Posted by: Alex

In This Episode:

Battlefield 4

61 Comments

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gus

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At 3:30, upper right on the screen "E3DEMOHACK" :-D

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knoxt

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huhhhhff. Ok DICE, I'll give you oonnnnee more shot, but this is it, I swear. And yeah, voice chat is a must at this point, they fucked up twice in a row on that for pc.

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TinyGrasshopper

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Edited By TinyGrasshopper

I've always wondered why doesn't every major publisher do this. Maintain an in-house 3D engine so you don't have to pay Epic every time you want an engine for a game. That way the engine can be cheaper (presumably, I really have no idea what Epic charges) and still be a best-in-class engine where they could throw in all the crazy whiz-bang features they need.

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Player1

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The idea of having a potentially different muliplayer map every single play through is an extremely exciting idea for me. Would work towards eliminating camping (much different than sniping) and teams regurgitating strategies. I'm interested to see how much freedom this engine gives.

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Jazz_Lafayette

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Edited By Jazz_Lafayette

I don't know what to think. Obviously, the engine is extremely impressive, but on the other hand that guy said the words "Gen 4" and "levelution."

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Zaapp1

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It's interesting to see how developers trying to make games and their environments more realistic often comes down to just making more things interact via physics. It's long been something that's pushed out of the way in service of more "fun" gameplay, but I guess with the new generation coming, maybe we can get decent enough physics processing for it to still be fun while improving realism.

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Seppli

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Edited By Seppli

@blastroid said:

@jcali said:

Battlefield > COD

I would say

Battlefield <> COD

or

Battlefield != COD

(Depending on your language of choice)

COD = Fast paced. Die and get back in the fight.

BF = Walk 15 minutes because you got left with no vehicles and then get sniped in the head and have to walk it again.

Both are fun in their own ways.

Outdated opinion.

BF3 did CQC really well. So there's lots of fast paced maps and modes. Just because CoD only does one thing, doesn't mean Battlefield is the same way. It does the CoD-type of fast paced action just as well (better even, if you don't like killstreaks, because there are none).

Just play Close Quarter and Aftermath expansion maps and modes.

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Nethlem

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All this looks kind of underwhelming...

Sure "levelution" sounds like something really cool and all, but i already expected BF3 to have "levelution" after they showed off all that awesome destruction. It felt like a no-brainer to have massive scale destruction in BF3 multiplayer, yet they didn't have it.

Now they are selling it as the big "new" thing and i just can't shake the feeling that they held this feature back on purpose for the sole reason to have something "cool" they can sell BF4 with. It's crap like this that gives me buyers remorse, could have just skipped on BF3 and gone straight for BF4...

Well let's wait and see, maybe we get lucky and this time around we end up with a decent PC version. But even then it's a pretty hard sell, seeing how EA is already pushing their exclusive pre-order content and how little love the PC version of BF3 received.

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Bollard

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Can't wait till the Battlefield sound is literally just a recording of someone farting.

Nearly there now.

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demontrace

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I just hope they get rid of that stupid and ANNOYING lens flare bullshit they have in Battlefield 3. Good God you look up in a direction remotely near the sun, and you get blinded like nothing else.

I'm pretty sure modern militaries can afford sunglasses, although I don't remember the sun being quite so devastating to your vision if you're looking in the sky, but off to the side of the sun, not directly at it. I know I possess the ability to do that, and I'm no trained soldier either.

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TheRedDeath

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BF4 looks a lot like BF3. Also, I never played the story campaign in BF3, and I never will.

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zipperface

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Hopefully one of those benefits is integrated voice chat.

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mattclassic

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"You might see an explosion go off"

NO SHIT

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arkasai

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@gunsaredrawn: The jet skidding across the deck in that one demo looked pretty impressive. I also think the rubberbanding you're seeing is just sever latency common to games with vehicles in multiplayer.

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selfconfessedcynic

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You know, the could have had the same devs and much of the same content but be talking about Mirror's Edge and I'd be millions of times more interested.

Still, BF4 is certainly technically impressive, I guess.

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GunsAreDrawn

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BF = Walk 15 minutes because you got left with no vehicles and then get sniped in the head and have to walk it again.

Maybe in the old days but it isn't very much like that anymore. It's very similair to the COD style that you just mentioned because the maps are considerably smaller and have less ways to flank, unless you're playing on Armored Kill maps, It's quite easy to run into people in a short amount of time. We never used to have fast and unlimited sprint either, it all seems really focused on making you engage with people often.

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GunsAreDrawn

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While this is interesting it leaves me wondering if they've fixed all the collision bugs and such that takes you out of the game when you see it. When jets take off you can see them rubberbanding and there is no smooth motion and if you crash into another vehicle it has a similair effect. Wish they would have some decent physics in this game too.

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SchrodngrsFalco

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"debri will fall onto the ground and shatter" ...as the debri clips through the floor...

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JDDrewes

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@mormonwarrior: You can pick up BF3 for super cheap now, I think Origin was selling it for $20 last week

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veektarius

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Battlefield 3 was hot stuff, looking back. I'm more interested to play this than I would have expected a couple months ago.

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trav

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PREPARE 4 LEVOLUTION

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dannyodwyer

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Edited By dannyodwyer  Staff

Frostbite Minecraft PLZ

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Benmo316

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Seeing how the engine works and what it's capable of is great. Now will the more believable character models turn into a good storyline for the campaign? The what? Yes, campaign.

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TheManWithNoPlan

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Viva La Levolution

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Spitznock

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It looks very pretty. I'm looking forward to never having a pc powerful enough to run it properly.
If they make the multiplayer on the console versions 64 players, then I'll be interested.
But even then it's pretty difficult to get excited for another military shooter, even if it does look very pretty.

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shaggydude

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Edited By shaggydude

@andromedius: I don't know if it's no sale for me, but it's pretty stupid how DICE loves to talk about how powerful the Frostbite engine is and how easy it is for them to use, yet they haven't let modders make a single fucking map for battlefield SINCE they started using Frostbite. Modding is part of why 1942 became popular in the first place and I've heard that they hired people straight out of that mod community. Yet whenever it's brought up in an interview they give some bullshit answer like, "We'll look into it." It just makes them look greedy selling us maps when plenty of people would like nothing more than step up and make hundreds of battlefields for people to play for free.

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MormonWarrior

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As someone who's going to build a nice PC, but doesn't yet own Battlefield 3, should I just wait and pick this one up to show off the power of my machine? Or what?

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Klager

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@themangalist: The other factions are Ruskie hunks and 'Murican jocks.

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Dextar

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Just got back in to BF3, it was on sale for super cheap. Didn't want to buy it again (switched from ps3 to pc), but 20 bucks total I had the premium package and damn it's fun with 64 players.

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Andromedius

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No modding = no sale. Period.

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Blastroid

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@jcali said:

Battlefield > COD

I would say

Battlefield <> COD

or

Battlefield != COD

(Depending on your language of choice)

COD = Fast paced. Die and get back in the fight.

BF = Walk 15 minutes because you got left with no vehicles and then get sniped in the head and have to walk it again.

Both are fun in their own ways.

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deactivated-5f9398c1300c7

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With Frostbite 3 we're no longer pressing X to Jason, we're pressing X to cut off Jason's leg.

3deep5me

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themangalist

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@klager said:

You're in luck. One of the new factions in multiplayer is actually Chinese cute guys.

Wait is the other team hot american chicks?

.... cuz if you shoot them you are SEXIST!!!

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mrGREEK360

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Cant wait to play this on PC, depending on the ports I might pick a copy up for ps4 or Xbox one depending on if they hold up to the PC version if not then il just get it for PC.

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Regular_Kirk

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With Frostbite 3 we're no longer pressing X to Jason, we're pressing X to cut off Jason's leg.

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Klager

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@themangalist: You're in luck. One of the new factions in multiplayer is actually Chinese cute guys.

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themangalist

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@wuddel said:

Cute asian military ladies in BF?

CUTE ASIAN LADIES HAVE BECOME A TROPE!!! SEXISM!!!

... why not, you know, cute asian guys for once.

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MeatSim

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Why would you wanna use a engine that gives you frostbite?

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mrcraggle

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Look at those trees!

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porjos

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Edited By porjos

So this engine will be the engine the next Mass Effect stated it will run. Hmmm

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MichaelBach

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I am ready for the levelution!

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reisz

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Edited By reisz

@elwoodan said:

I like how the battlefield music has gone from this awesome orchestral piece to pulsating static.

and as pretty as this engine is (and it is PRETTY) I actually found that I couldn't play BF3 because of all the visual noise.

I'm glad I'm not the only one. The first E3 demo they showed, at the Microsoft conference utterly confused me, I was able to visually acquire maybe four out of the twenty five or so enemies that he shot at. It was ridiculous, all you're shooting at is lens flares and flashlights. Maybe that's what "real combat" looks like but it's not interesting to play.

The engine looks superb though, I was glad to see that the sky scraper collapse was a scripted, animated event in that multiplayer level. It would have been too much if they had managed the procedural generation for that stuff to be dynamic.

Also just license the damn Terminator music already. you guys are on the razor's edge of copyright violation.

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Klager

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@commonreason: Agreed. Guns feel, look, sound and handle better than in most games. But the infantry on infantry gunplay still needs work. This might in part be related to the shoddy netcode in BF3 though.

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JasonLeeson

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All the better for Mirror's Edge 2. Couldn't care less about BF4.

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Wuddel

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I prefer to play shooters with a gamepad, because I suck with M&K, so a Battlefield that actually looks good and allows 64 players.

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subyman

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I may be a dork, but I like checking out the engine stuff.

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darkdragonmage99

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Edited By darkdragonmage99

and we are spending 50 million to use this tech so everyone please buy our game because the budget is so high we need to sell a copy to every gamer not just battlefield fans.

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Elwoodan

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I like how the battlefield music has gone from this awesome orchestral piece to pulsating static.

and as pretty as this engine is (and it is PRETTY) I actually found that I couldn't play BF3 because of all the visual noise.

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JamesJeux007

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Mad toolsets, son !

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Lazyaza

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I look forward to all the unrealistic non-fps games this engine is used for. Hopefully the next CnC won't suck.