Sign in to follow this  
clyde

Battlefield 1

Recommended Posts

3 hours ago, clyde said:

I figure I'll write up my initial impressions while I wait to go home so I can play my remainng 7 hours of the trial.

I don't know why this game feels fresh to me, but it does. It's got the same pacing as other Battlefield games in that you can spawn near to or far from the fighting, and the playable areas are wide and varied. I tried the new mode where it's a combination between Rush and Conquest. It was pretty neat. Having only two Conquest-objectives does a good job of forming a front-line. The attackers got an airship in order to retry when they failed to push the line all the way across the map. Not knowing how to fight back against that thing is frustrating, but also kinda interesting. I assume it won't be a problem when everyone knows how to deal with in, but in the meantime, it's kinda novel to have to run between cover (that is above you) as you try and defend objectives. I also discovered that I could snipe dudes who are manning the blimp-guns and that was unsurprisingly satisfying. 

I played four maps and they felt vastly different from one another. The smoke and fog effects are both very pretty and mechanically significant. There were multiple occasions where I became disoriented while shooting through a cloud at an enemy 100 feet away and losing visibility of them (where the cloud was seemingly created by large munitions). I love that type of thing. 

I'm completely unfamiliar with the maps, so I'm sure I'll develop paths that make them seem smaller eventually, but right now they feel like rich, dynamic spaces. 

There are UI annoyances though such as not being able to customize your loadouts unless you are currently in an ongoing match; I have no menu option to quit the game directly after a match; the new mode's (not the pigeon one) start-menu seems intially confusing and also seems to kick everyone from the game at the end of it.

I'm really enjoying it.

I might have to join you in Battlefield shenanigans...

 

Welp, GMG has it for $45 so I'm in. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
18 hours ago, YoThatLimp said:

I might have to join you in Battlefield shenanigans...

 

Welp, GMG has it for $45 so I'm in. 

 

I had a lot of fun with you during the beta. Looking forward to it!

 

--------

It seems kinda obtuse to use a mobile app for customizing loadouts, but that's what I'm currently doing. I save up warbonds and then shop while I'm at my job. 

I discovered the medal-thing yesterday. I just picked the first one to see what it was. So yesterday I ended up playing as a medic regardless of whether or not it was a good idea to do so. I did horribly. I still think the medal system is kinda neat though, I like having a 4-day challenge for extra xp available. I just need to be more wiling to switch out of the class when it is necessary to do so. 

I'm happy that I still have 4 hours of the trial left and it unlocks at midnight. I doubt I will have to go without at all!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

So I've earned two medals now. I'm not sure if they give you the xp-boost immediately upon finishing them or when the deadline is up.

I don't know if these were in previous versions of BF, but I'm glad I've discovered them. It seems like you can switch between any medal available to you, so if I want to play as a medic for a while I can pick a medic-centric medal to work on. The reason I think it's cool is that I typically pick my class based on whatever killed me last round. But this slows the pace of those changes a bit. I feel like I'm just chilling with the game and working on my dailies. It can get kinda absurd though. I just spent my second to last match following around my squadies, throwing ammo at them every time they paused at a crossroad (I needed to resupply my squad 20 times for the medal). It can incentive orthogonal play, but in actuality I found myself attaching to my  squad more broadly (which I don't typically do). I think it is a neat direction for variated, personal play.

I like these maps a lot btw. Some of them could just exist as high-fidelity simulated dioramas and I would be impressed.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
11 hours ago, clyde said:

So I've earned two medals now. I'm not sure if they give you the xp-boost immediately upon finishing them or when the deadline is up.

I don't know if these were in previous versions of BF, but I'm glad I've discovered them. It seems like you can switch between any medal available to you, so if I want to play as a medic for a while I can pick a medic-centric medal to work on. The reason I think it's cool is that I typically pick my class based on whatever killed me last round. But this slows the pace of those changes a bit. I feel like I'm just chilling with the game and working on my dailies. It can get kinda absurd though. I just spent my second to last match following around my squadies, throwing ammo at them every time they paused at a crossroad (I needed to resupply my squad 20 times for the medal). It can incentive orthogonal play, but in actuality I found myself attaching to my  squad more broadly (which I don't typically do). I think it is a neat direction for variated, personal play.

I like these maps a lot btw. Some of them could just exist as high-fidelity simulated dioramas and I would be impressed.

 

That sounds like a neat system! I've been pretty set on not following anything about the game leading up to it, so excited to hop in and discover the surrounding mechanics of those kinds of systems.

 

Excited to hear that about the maps, have you done any of the new modes? The operations mode sounds really cool in theory, kind of similar to Red Orchrestra 2's 'campaign' mode. Looking forward to cracing this open tonight.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

From what I've played Operations, it feels like a long game of Rush with capture points instead of things you arm and disarm. In addition to that, there are the over-powered vehicles that seem to always help the attackers. I like it because it focuses on a few points of the maps and I prefer flag-filling over arming and disarming. The multiple-level aspect doesn't add much for me accept longer matches which is fine.

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
34 minutes ago, clyde said:

From what I've played Operations, it feels like a long game of Rush with capture points instead of things you arm and disarm. In addition to that, there are the over-powered vehicles that seem to always help the attackers. I like it because it focuses on a few points of the maps and I prefer flag-filling over arming and disarming. The multiple-level aspect doesn't add much for me accept longer matches which is fine.

 

 

Interesting, looking forward to trying some out tonight.

 

I didn't hop into to the EA Access early trial did they change anything about the revive icon for medics? I remember it being a little hard to see from just the mini-map, did they add any aditional on-screen indicator since the beta?

Edited by YoThatLimp
I'm a dummy

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Everyone else's icon shows up by default if you have a revive-kit in your loadout. It's a big skull that looks cool as fuck imo. There is additionally a way to call out for a revive which seems to put an exclamation point up on the hud, but I'm not sure how to make the call-out when you are dead.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
11 minutes ago, clyde said:

Everyone else's icon shows up by default if you have a revive-kit in your loadout. It's a big skull that looks cool as fuck imo. There is additionally a way to call out for a revive which seems to put an exclamation point up on the hud, but I'm not sure how to make the call-out when you are dead.

 

Dang-it Clyde, I'm jonesing for some Battlefield now and won't be home for another 7 hours, boo.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

So I'm having a ton of fun with this game, I really dig the way it feels and the map design! Haven't cracked into the single player yet, but excited to check it out.

 

I got my first battlepack drop after 4-5 hours and got a camo skin, which is weird. I love that they brought back the in game 'revive' icons, I love me some Medic. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm going to finish my 3rd medal today/tonight before the deadline runs out in 20 or so hours. Getting 20 rifle-grenade kills took a lot of spamming rifle-grenades. I often do damage with them, but I rarely get kills. 

I like how the medal system is encouraging me to do things like get 5 kills with in one life as a medic. I ended up playing this amazing survival-horror game, waiting for enemies to come into a three-story house and taking them out one at a time with a shovel.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm not sure if there are benefits beyond the xp-bonuses and the incentive to play in ways you wouldn't typically.

This will be the first deadline for medals I've seen and I think they cash in at the deadline, so I'll report back tommorow.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

The medals have to be completed in a single match, right? It seems like progress doesn't carry over. I bought the game yesterday and when I started it up I decided to track the "Support" medal because why not, but it quickly became clear that there was no way it was going to happen unless I focused on completing the medal rather than winning, and that's just honestly not a way that I'm capable of playing a team game. I know that 99% of my teammates don't give a flying fuck about anything other than filling up their XP bar or flying their airplane or earning their medals or whatever, but I just can't turn a multiplayer game into my own single player quest for achievements if that means hurting my team at all. That's just not something I find fun. I'm hoping the medals give you fuck all, because I can't really see a situation where I ever earn a medal. The closest I can come to this is (in BF4) using a gun I haven't used much and which I think might not be my favorite gun in order to unlock attachments, but even that's only because I want to make sure that the gun actually is one I don't prefer, especially once it's got the attachments I want, rather than because I just want to unlock things for the sake of unlocking things.

 

In general I really don't like it when competitive games add meta-objectives that distract people from the ostensible objective. I know the Battlefield games are in a large part about fucking around and having fun, but it's just kind of weird to me to have all these objectives you're supposed to be capturing or whatever and then instead of doing that I've got a teammate on voice chat being like "don't shoot that guy, I need one more headshot for my medal." I mean come on we gotta shoot that guy, he's on the flag!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I don't think that the medal-system will be your type of thing since they do sometimes conflict with being helpful to your squad (sometimes they do encourage team-play though).

But the tasks don't have to be completed in the same macth unless a pip says that it does. The medal does have to be activated (one at a time) and the tasks have to be completed in order.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
On 10/21/2016 at 8:55 AM, clyde said:

From what I've played Operations, it feels like a long game of Rush with capture points instead of things you arm and disarm. In addition to that, there are the over-powered vehicles that seem to always help the attackers. I like it because it focuses on a few points of the maps and I prefer flag-filling over arming and disarming. The multiple-level aspect doesn't add much for me accept longer matches which is fine.

 

 

Man, just played a bit of that and yeah, that is a weird mode. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

That's all I've played so far and it doesn't seem too weird to me. In some of the games I played the vehicles helped the defenders much more than the attackers. I also wouldn't call them over-powered, but maybe I need more experience.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

What I meant by "over-powered" was just that they are significantly more powerful than the typical vehicles, not that it is imbalanced. I misused the word. 

I like Operations, my only problem with it is the lack of a quickmatch option for it in the menu.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I think I probably need to spend some more time with it,  the match I played had us as the defenders being hammered over and over again by the attackers and their big mental train. 

 

Man, just played about 2 hours with Clyde and a few buddies and man,  that was awesome. This game really shines when your squad is working together. 

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Okay I figured out what was up with medals: you have to do each of the things in order. I thought most of them were resetting but in fact they weren't counting up. That makes not a lot of sense but at least now I understand why it didn't seem like I was making any progress.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
7 hours ago, TychoCelchuuu said:

Okay I figured out what was up with medals: you have to do each of the things in order. I thought most of them were resetting but in fact they weren't counting up. That makes not a lot of sense but at least now I understand why it didn't seem like I was making any progress.

 

Ah, okay, that makes more sense. I wish they had a better explanation in game about some of this stuff!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Apart from the interesting start, the campaign was meh. Very repetitive I found.

 

MP is great fun, which is all I care about really. I doubt I will put as much time as BF3 and 4 into it though.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
On 10/19/2016 at 2:07 PM, thenexus6 said:

Never change DICE

 

http://i.imgur.com/PElc4Rv.mp4

That's actually a real gun too...the world's smallest pistol produced in numbers I think.  I remember seeing a video of one years back and when I heard it was going to be in Battlefield it made me happy because it is the right level of hilariously impractical and historically real for the game.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this