I distinctly remember drooling over Red Faction when computer gaming world did a nice preview of the game a long time ago. The game’s tag line geometry modification (Geo Mod) literally made this franchise into a catabolic carnivore’s darling bastard child.
This game had it all! It had atmosphere aliens, humans and mars, Doom seemed light years away. The game got pretty neat reviews and was succeeded by mediocre sequel which essentially did more of the same and carried forward the same flaws from its earlier iteration.
That was the end of the franchise and ultimate destructibility for quite some time to come. Games were built on the snazziest of engines with tanks of blood and gore but ultimate destruction eluded even the most prolific programmer. Crysis began to show its colors of a demolition’s expertise, but required to be patched a million times before it ran rather smoothly without a continuous barrage of hiccups.
Along came a spider with its deadly “bite” that turned mega structures into “frost” aiding its fight. EA Digital Illusions CE built a game and an engine that would not only rival the legacy that was left behind by the erstwhile Red Faction but also provide a key turning point in the genre of first person design and gameplay.
Battlefield: Bad Company arms players with a certain Private Preston Marlowe, recently assigned to the 222nd Battalion, also known as B-company, who are basically a cross between mercenaries and the U.S. army, the point of difference being these guys are dropped first in the line of fire so that minimum number of casualties are ensued when the G.I. Joes on the official payroll enter into the field of combat.
Players are capsulated in a 4 man team comprising of a veteran on the verge of retirement, a tech geek and a demolitions expert, this B-squad traverses in a war against the Russians and accidentally bumps into a payload of mercenary gold bars and starts hunting for their Latin slogan “Acta Non Verba”, or “Action Not Words”.
The story is surprisingly well written and scripted a bit of a far cry from what I usually expect from Electronic Arts. The sequential chatter amongst your squadmates keeps the player entertained even in the midst of a blood curdling firefight.
The gameplay of the Battlefield series has seen a major overhaul, it has usually been about capturing strategic points on a map against an the opposition, the introduction of a pure single player campaign is certainly a welcome change although it is hard to admit not to see a lot of similarities between its closest competitor Call of Duty 4 which packs an equivalent punch in terms of gameplay both online and offline.
The seven missions will take the player through a wide consortium of tasks and will require a lot of strategic random fire to blow up structures to smithereens, and this is where the game shines. The frostbite engine used for the game allows for 90% destructibility, thus letting the player lose his carnal demolition desires, where “Fatman” (MGS2) fails Private Preston succeeds.
The visuals in the game are adept given the chaotic gameplay the player is subsumed most of the time. Blowing up buildings is the most effective way of combating the barrage of enemy troops that are thrown at you from all points of the map. Although the player may not find the A.I challenging at all, the sheer number of enemies from different directions makes each victory in a pitched battle a worthy success.
As with almost all Battlefield games, this iteration also allows the players to take control of vehicles strewn across the B-Field. In addition to which he also gets an impressive mob of weapons that complement the utter speed of chaos and destruction. He can also hunt across a given area for specific secret weapons and gold bars that serve as collectible items in the map.
Maps are filled with what the Joker aptly calls agents of destruction, oil barrels lay strewn all across the map allowing players to partake in the anarchy of sand metal and dust. Trees can be mowed down using a grenade launcher or your vehicles often giving players access to hidden positions in the map. Bridges can be blown up with the aid of air strikes or rocket launchers to stop enemy offensives, this game allows the works. This may be the perfect game the unnamed crusader.
The online mode is truly the golden child of the entire battlefield experience, although Gold Rush (Attackers Vs Defenders) was the only multiplayer mode included in the release of Battlefield: Bad Company, on August 7 due to popular request EA released a downloadable pack where the players returned to the previous versions of Battlefield where capturing strategically placed flags across the map.
Battlefield: Bad Company does however have its myriad range of flaws, the destructibility system although seemingly fun is not quite perfect. There have been numerous instances when I’ve called in for a massive air strike to obliterate a building with a bunch load of soldiers holed up inside only to find all the soldiers are standing tall with their guns aimed at my army of four.
The other flummoxing point in Battlefield: Bad Company is when the fact that even though the engine can handle oodles of destruction at any given point of time, it somehow does not recognize strategic shooting that allows players to shoot through walls to kill an enemy on the other side.
The gameplay of Battlefield: Bad Company is also made easy with the inclusion of a needle plunger which brings Private Preston back on the B-field, the player will not shy away from using this each time he is put amongst a healthy wave of enemies. This becomes a bit complicated when the player cannot see most of his foes that are placed on a panoptic point that allows then to shoot rounds and rounds without enduring a single hit.
The weapons are a tad bit unbalanced in the game, I found using the standard issue assault rifle the most productive most of the times occasionally waltzing through a shotgun or a hand grenade, the quick kill option a la Call of Duty 4 has somehow not been implemented in its purest form, the weapon is probably the slowest killing mechanism in a close quarters combat, by the time you actually take you weapon to pull off a quick kill the player will already been decapitated by a string of enemy bullets.
Final Word: Battlefield Bad Company takes the best element of shooters and implements it in way that has been previously unseen. The huge map allows most players to satiate themselves with the destructive metabolism that they have been craving for quite some time, however minor issues still plague Battlefield: Bad Company in what can be aptly called a battlefield of epic destruction.
Graphics: 8
Gameplay: 7.5
Sound: 9
Budget pocket: 9
Overall: 8/10
- By Neelesh Mukherjee