Battlefield 4

The Battlefield series has always been about the spectacle and sheer scale of warfare that the 20th and 21st century can provide. From planes, tanks,s and automobiles in 1942 to Jets, choppers, and better tanks in Battlefields 2 and 3 the name of the game is action. If large scale action is what you want then action is what you get, just be patient.

I decided to hold off on a review for the game because I wanted some online issues to resolve and also to see if the game could hold my attention after the passage of time. The technical issues are persistant but I still feel like I can come back and have a great time with the game even with it's issues. But lets not dwell on issues that have so publicized to death.

If you played 2011's BF3 then you will be automatically familiar with the pace and style of BF4. Action moves at the pace of a Queen song with you never really knowing when things are going to jump off, but when they do its truly unique. One wise addition to the BF formula was the inclusion of the suppression system and the sound design which makes weapons sound and feel like what ever it is there shooting at is getting messed up in the worst way. I truly fear the sound of incoming bullets as they wiz by and make me flinch a little as I try to duck along with those around me. the pure rush of blood you get when taking on enemies, AI or human, is second to none.

BF4 has 2 core game options upon loading, Campaign, and Multiplayer. I could spend time on the campaign but frankly its not deserving of any particular note. Some how DICE managed to craft a story worse than COD: Ghosts's. the story has you playing a force recon marine named Recker with your comrades in Tomb Stone squad. The first mission makes a hell of a first impression but the creativity that they put into that one level never resurfaces in any way for the rest of the 4 hour experience. The story events lack impact and only serve to let you go to good looking places and shoot Russian and Chinese soldiers that fight like extras in bad action movies. Enemies can't use cover properly and often just hide from you and shoot in your direction, even if that means shooting through 3 walls to do it. At the end of the story I was faced with a decision that felt like it had only one logical answer and I felt like I could've written a tighter narrative. But the Campaign isn't supposed to be pushing narrative forward when all it needed to be was inservice of technical marvels like exsploding dams and other stuff, but we all know why BF3 kept spinning in the disc drive; Multiplayer.

Straight up, BF4 multiplayer is heart pounding, intense, and exhilerating. You start out with 4 basic archetypes; assault, engineer, support, and recon. All of them have strengths and weaknesses and all rely on the help of others to get the most out of. all classes have two gadget slots that are class specific. the gadgets feel appropriate for each class and also promote the team work aspect of the game. For example, the recon class has the view finder that has a laser desination feature, in Bad Company that would've been your queue to summon a mortar strike from nowhere but in this game you need to have an engineer with a rocket launcher with laser desination or a competent pilot who can land a j-dam missile. This example is just one of many that show the truly good balance of classes among players. Engineers can kill most vehicles which makes them valuable in evening out fights and covering assault and recon classes who have almost no anti-vehicle option, but where is the engineer if he doesn't have the other class thinning out the herd and covering him so he can cover his squad mates?

The onfoot game is on point but the vehicle game play is where Battlefield sets itself even further from the pack in the FPS genre. Jets are fast and take skill to maneuver in maps like Dawnbreaker and helicopters are slower but have just as much of a skill requirement if you want to help your team. the on ground vehicles have similar tropes of small and fast, big, slow, and powerful. Tanks are highest predator on the food chain but, if you have a good engineer, who can utilize the trap method of mines and rockets in quick order, you save quiet a few of your comrades in the process. The Vehicle to dude balance is all skill based but at the end of the day a good pilot in any vehicle has an inherent edge over an on-foot soldier , it just depends if that soldier has a good head on his shoulders.

Before we conclude there is one glaring issue that many of you will have grapple with at some point; Premium. The Battlefield Premium service was something I was apprehensive of buying as I wasn't sure if 50 bucks was a good value with what I was getting. I took a chance and immediately saw the benefit that others had said was worth it. The map packs they have out at the writing of this review, China Rising and Second Assault, feel like excellent additions to the already great map variety and the extra battlepacks and XP boosters are much needed to keep the flow of attachments and weapons coming through. So if your on the fence about Premium take a chance.

Overall Battlefield 4 is a game that has its demons but is a worthy addition to any next-gen library and offers the same great core experience that Battlefield 3 had but is improved up in meaningful ways. While this should be a 5-star game the technical misfortunes that that game has are too glaring and publicly maligned to just ignore. But the fact that I was still able to have a great time even given these issues speaks to the game that is there.