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Battlefield 3 Beta:  My Experiences

Late last week the open multiplayer beta started for the upcoming mega-shooter Battlefield 3.  However, if you were awesome enough EA sent you an access code to play it early.  I was one of those awesome people so I thought I would do a little write up of my experience with the beta so far (also there wasn’t much interesting gaming news last week).

To start off, I’m primarily a Call of Duty player.  All my friends own Call of Duty games, all my friends’ love Call of Duty games so naturally I do too.  My only real experience with the Battlefield series was with the Bad Company games.  While still enjoyable, I felt the multiplayer was lacking something for my tastes.  Driving vehicles was fun and destructible environments were awesome but for some reason character animations and movement felt stiff to me and the inability to go prone was simply annoying… well not anymore.

To be clear, if you go into the Battlefield beta with a Call of Duty run-and-gun mindset you will die.  You will die a lot, your team will hate you and you will lose the match.  The game simply isn’t made for getting as many kills as you can.  It’s all about teamwork to complete an objective.  Run in solo, you will die.  Go in as a unit, you will survive.  While I have to admit, it took some time for me to get used to these tactics and lose the Call of Duty mentality.  Once I did, I really started to enjoy myself.

The controls, while taking a little while to get used to, feel very fluent.  Moving around, changing weapons etc. feel a lot less stiff than in the Bad Company games.  Also, the biggest addition: the ability to go prone is simply amazing! 

To do it is a simple double-tap on the right thumbpad (I was playing the Xbox 360 version) and your character seamlessly moves into the prone position.  While lying prone you can continuously look down your site and slowly crawl forward.  While this might not seem too important it’s a great tactic for either applying cover-fire to allow your squad to push forward or to simply be less of a target while slowly moving towards an enemy position.

Speaking of cover fire, the point system for the Battlefield multiplayer is far different than Call of Duty.  Forget kill/death ratios, they really don’t matter in the grand scheme of things.  While kills do net you 100 points for each kill, you can also get points by simply supporting your squad.  Laying cover fire, for example, nets you experience points.  Using your class of choice’s special ability also typically nets you around the same amount of points as a kill. So if you simply want to sit back, not get involved in the fighting and support your team you can still level your character up.

Weapon unlocking and upgrade progression is much of the same from past Battlefield games.  The more you use a certain class or weapon the more weapons you unlock for that class or the more upgrades you unlock for the weapon you’re using.  However, there’s a subtle-twist to the weapon upgrades which took me totally be surprise:   Upgrades are automatically attached to your weapon the moment they’re unlocked in battle.  Imagine my surprise while getting a kill looking down my iron-sighted assault rifle when all of a sudden I have an ACOG sight attached to it.  It’s a small addition which makes the experience that much better and instantly rewards you for leveling up your weapon of choice.

While we’re less than a month away from the game’s launch and I’m sure many people will try the open beta, but I’m much more pumped for Battlefield 3 then I previously was.  While it remains to be seen whether it will dethrone Call of Duty as the “shooter king” I can say this game, while fundamentally different from its competitor, it’s extremely fun to play and a great change of pace.  I think there’s room in the world for both shooter franchises.  Call of Duty for its faced-paced, more arcade-style action and Battlefield for its slower, more realistic team-based play.  I can tell you I’ll be playing both a lot this holiday season!

I Am Alive is…Well… Alive

Ubsoft’s I Am Alive, a game which sees an unnamed man trying to survive through a post-disaster Chicago, was announced way back in 2008.  Since then not much information has been released about it and the game’s been sitting in development limbo.  Three years later, it looks like the game is finally coming.

Ubisoft says I Am Alive will be available sometime this winter.  While it doesn’t really give us a definitive date it at least shows the game is pretty far along in development. 

However, the game won’t be getting a fiscal release which was originally proposed.  Instead the game will be available for download on Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation Network (seems the PC version’s been cancelled).  This is a bit surprising, but it could prove to be the most visually stunning game to come to those downloadable services.

More information will be coming for this game as we close in on the winter season so stay tuned for a definitive release date.

Sources:  http://www.joystiq.com/2011/09/29/i-am-alive-confirmed-by-ubisoft-as-an-xbla-psn-title/
http://ps3.ign.com/articles/119/1197282p1.html

L.A. Noire: Complete Edition Coming to PC

While it may be several months late, it looks like Team Bondi’s swan-song is finally coming to PC.

L.A. Noire, the Complete Edition will be available for purchase November 8^th in North America and November 11^th in Europe.  This edition will include all the extra downloadable cases and will also support 3D.

Here are the recommended PC specs to see if you can run it on your rig:

• Operating System: Windows 7 / Windows Vista Service Pack 1 / Windows XP Service Pack 3 / OnLive for PC or Mac
• Processor: Intel Dual Core 2.2GHz to Quad Core 3.2GHz / AMD Dual Core 2.4Ghz to Quad Core 3.2Ghz; · RAM: 2GB to 8GB
• Hard drive space: 16GB
• Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT 512MB to NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1536MB / Radeon HD 3000 512MB to Radeon HD 6850 1024MB
• Sound Card: 100% DirectX 9 Compatible
• DVD Drive

Sources:  http://www.joystiq.com/2011/09/28/la-noire-hits-pc-on-nov-8-in-us-nov-11-in-eu-specs-revealed/

Portal 2 DLC Coming This Week

 While it was originally suppose to come out in September, it seems Valve will be releasing its first piece of Portal 2 DLC, titled “Peer Review” this Tuesday (October 4^th).

The content will include more co-op story levels and challenge modes for both single player and co-op challenge maps.

Oh, in case you didn’t know, it will be free across all platforms.  This is why I love Valve.

Peer Review will be available for Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and PC via Steam.

Sources:  http://www.joystiq.com/2011/09/30/free-portal-2-peer-review-dlc-drops-on-october-4/