Battlefield 2042 has a lot going for it. It’s set in the future, it works with both single player and multiplayer modes, and is one of the most ambitious games EA has ever made. But will this release be enough to get us excited about battle again?
Battlefield 2042 is a game set in the future where scientists have created an alternative to natural life. Players must battle for control of this new world, whether they are fighting on behalf of humanity or against it. The gameplay feels very similar to Battlefield 1, but with some improvements that make this sequel worth purchasing
Battlefield 2042 is the latest installment in Electronic Arts’ Battlefield series. The game has been released on PC, PS4 and Xbox One. It’s a good time to be a gamer, but it’s a bad time to be a Battlefield fan.
Battlefield 2042 is a complete disaster. It may be a fun mess or a comical one at times, but it’s not so much about the rough edges as it is about the rough everything. Underneath it all, there’s a decent shooter whose principles are an excellent place to start for a full-featured next-gen shooter.
But it isn’t what we have. Instead, Battlefield 2042 is a jumble of unrelated concepts, some of which work, some of which don’t, and others of which serve no particular function at the moment. It’s also uneven, unstable, and PC-optimized, and it tries to follow trends rather than forge new paths.
I can’t seem to get away from it. No other show produces the cinematic “Battlefield moments” on such a grand scale or with such regularity. There are better games to play in Shooter Season 2021. There’s a backlog that has to be cleared. Skyrims may be modified.
Despite this, I find myself stepping into 2042 every night.
Review of Battlefield 2042: The Fight for Relevance
In isolation, the gameplay in Battlefield 2042 is excellent. When hit detection and bloom are on your side, the gunplay is enjoyable. The trend, too, is more than just a “sprint in the right direction.” Care and expertise are required to understand how to approach a certain section of a map. While not as series-defining as having distinct classes, the Specialist system gives you greater flexibility while still enabling you to play a specific role in a battle.
I’m ready to overlook the limited amount of weapons available as long as they’re all enjoyable to use. I don’t mind if there’s a gun imbalance if it gives me the impression of beating the odds – quality over quantity.
The difficulty is that only a few firearms are truly enjoyable to use. The ones that are enjoyable to use are either hilariously broken or really balanced, allowing them to be brilliant at nearly nothing while being terrible at even less. It’s also not fun to win with the inferior weaponry. To achieve half of what a good gun can do, you must work far more with a weaker rifle.
Aside from the enjoyment element and balance, the weapons in Battlefield 2042 are extremely great to fire mechanically. When you shoot, there’s a lot of punch, a lot of recoil, and only a few firearms seem hard to manage. When you score a kill and reload for the following encounter, the crunchy sensation is addicting. Whether you’ve done it once or a hundred times, taking down a car releases endorphins.
Then you have the potential to feel like a god once you’re in a car. Helicopters, tanks, hovercraft, and LAVs can all annihilate dozens of opposing soldiers in a matter of minutes. I believe the automobiles in 2042 are the most powerful they’ve ever been. As infantry, you might evade or even juke a tank or a chopper in prior games.
That is not the case here. If you have the misfortune of being on foot as a car approaches, you will almost certainly die. This is true for both air and ground vehicles. Helicopters have a huge arsenal of missiles, and their machine guns can shred you in the blink of an eye.
That isn’t to imply that a footsoldier can’t deal with automobiles. Every expert can carry bombs, although there aren’t many of them, and vehicles seem to be more durable in 2042 than in prior games. It doesn’t help that they can replenish armor as a soldier regenerates health.
Vehicle dominance was previously moderated by static spawns in earlier games. Light and heavy tanks, hovercrafts, and armored vehicles may be summoned anywhere on the map in 2042. The battlefields in Battlefield 2042 are larger than virtually any in the series’ history, yet vehicle domination is oppressive.
The maps aren’t that impressive, though. At the moment, there are only seven options, and half of them boil down to “large field with random objects strewn around.” The others have more verticality and interaction kinds, but their size makes it almost impossible for vehicles to get anywhere at any reasonable pace.
The lack of game modes just adds to the problem. Conquest and Breakthrough are two fundamental 2042 features. The first is straightforward: collect points, kill adversaries, and finish with the most tickets. Breakthrough is a progression of Battlefield 1’s Operations, in which a series of capture locations must be captured in order. If it weren’t for troop concentration, this would be a great concept.
Conquest is a map-based game with 128 players. Even if 30 players are on a point, they won’t be in a few minutes since objectives are widely dispersed and take a long time to capture. When there’s just one goal left to complete in Breakthrough, suddenly 128 individuals are battling for a little yard. It’s just as hectic and haphazard as it sounds.
There are 128 problems and just one player.
Breakthrough, like so much of Battlefield 2042, looks better on paper than it does in reality. In general, the game has a lot of fascinating, or at least new, concepts. In practice, just a handful of them function. They may also work if they were given more thought and time.
Begin with the weapon’s balance. The SMGs are tremendously strong up close, and the PP-29 is ridiculously long, but they lose their effectiveness after they’ve gone beyond their designated range. Also keep in mind that the majority of the maps are large open landscapes with minimal shelter. Isn’t that where the sniper rifles come in? Nope. Snipers of any caliber can only kill with a single shot from the upper chest upwards, or with headshots only for the quicker shooting ones.
When you add in the SVK, a two-shot DMR with almost limitless range, it’s difficult to justify employing practically any other weapon in 2042. You may even change the sight to make it a close-quarters weapon. The SVK will carry you no matter where you play on the battlefield if your aim is strong enough.
Another concern is the idea of on-the-fly attachment. In prior installments, you were required to stick to a specified loadout. You may now position yourself to be viable at any distance and in any situation. The extra menu, as we discussed in our attachments guide, adds a lot of complexity to bigger loadout changes. The concept, like the others we’ll discuss later, is just half-baked.
The Battlefield Portal feature has gotten a lot of attention throughout Battlefield 2042’s Early Access era. For years, I’ve wished for the return of Bad Company 2 and Battlefield 3, but there are two issues with the present implementation.
For starters, game types are very limited, just as they are in the main game. You can only create a custom server using Rush, Conquest, and Conquest Large at the moment. The worst sin 2042 commits with Portal is reintroducing Noshar Canals while refusing to let us to play Team Deathmatch right away.
DICE also seems to have overlooked the fact that gamers would utilize whatever methods necessary to circumvent leveling systems. Within hours of the launch of 2042, Portal’s server browser was flooded with “Fast XP” servers where you could fast level up and get access to everything in the original game.
Opening a game on the same server browser now gives you no experience, weapon or otherwise. For no other reason than nostalgia, you’re playing on a small number of ancient maps. You can get XP by playing the matchmade playlists, but you won’t be able to level up any of the main game’s weapons, which takes away another incentive to play.
Of all, nostalgia is Portal’s raison d’être, but it suffers from many of the same flaws as 2042’s basic modes.
Worse still, none of the weaponry, maps, or animations have the same flair or personality as the prior games. The XM8 Prototype, maybe BC2’s greatest SMG, seems to be better in the original game than in 2042. It’s worth noting that Bad Company 2 was released in 2009. The Battlefield 3 assets are in the same boat. In Portal, the M16 and M4, the game’s hallmark guns, look, sound, and handle worse.
DICE, on the other hand, has never been known for its spectacular animations, but their sound design has always been top-notch. Not this time, at least not in Battlefield Portal. None of the classic remasters had the same punch and feedback as the original game. Tanks and choppers don’t sound threatening, and they couldn’t even make a reload seem convincing.
Don’t get me wrong: I think it’s great. I’m looking forward to returning to Arica Harbor, Valparaiso, the Caspian Border, and the Noshahr Canals. These are maps with a wide range of aesthetics, as well as a terrific flow. The maps in 2042, like those in so many AAA shooters in recent years, concentrate on rethinking and renewing the design philosophy that gave birth to the classics they now depend on for material.
Hazard Zone was created to shake things up, integrating elements from Escape from Tarkov, Warzone, and the year 2042 itself. I wish it had the same level of intrigue as its idea, but it lacks Tarkov’s pressure, Warzone’s looting experience, and Battlefield’s difficulties.
The Bottom Line in Battlefield 2042
Pros
- Excellent gunplay
- Classic maps make a comeback
Cons
- a scarcity of content
- Unbalanced, under-optimized, and flaky
- Much of it is pointless.
- There are just too many ideas that would be better on paper.
My biggest concern regarding Battlefield 2042 is that it will just take up space on people’s computers. With some players now at level 60 or above, there isn’t enough fresh stuff to keep them entertained for more than a few months. The first half of next year is already jam-packed, and unless 2042 receives some big improvements in the next 30 days, it will be demoted to a little blip on the radar. Another letdown, with excellent ideas wasted too fast.
If you can look beyond the unnecessary modifications and bad execution, it’s an entertaining game. Underneath a few of miles of smoking rubble, there lies the possibility for something magnificent.
To summarize, I do not suggest purchasing it right now. Return in three months. Alternatively, you might play Elden Ring. That also works.
[Note: The copy of Battlefield 2042 used for this review was given by EA.]
“Battlefield 2042 Review: Battling for Relevancy” is a review of the game Battlefield 2042. The reviewer gives the game a rating of 7 out 10 and says that it’s “a good attempt to keep the franchise relevant.” Reference: battlefield 2042 rating.
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