Battlefield 4 Multiplayer Review.
Recently a few friends and I decided to re-download Battlefield 4, we have played this game for years already and Battlefield One really wasn't to our liking so we rejoined the craziness of the modern Battlefield and we couldn't be happier, one of the most perfect multiplayer military shooters of all time is still alive and active and we've been playing nearly every night for the past week, so lets dive into the review of Battlefield 4.
True warfare
Battlefield has always prided itself on large scale war and battlefield 4 is no different, large scale warfare of every kind of massive maps with individual objectives and dynamic environments are what make this game a masterpiece in its own right, nearly every map will have a different play style for different players, from tank crews to sniping the levels are built around these ideas to give a tactical but extremely fast paced play style in every map that keeps you on your toes at all times.
If you can think about something you'd like to do in a military game, Battlefield 4 probably has it, personally i'm a big fan of sniping and as such every map has different avenues to achieve this, one of my favorite maps, Operation Locker, is a largely indoor map, however the outside is perched on a cliff with wide open views for sniping where you can park yourself and protect your teams from flanks.
Alternatively there are wide open maps like Gulf of Oman, where naval, armored and aerial combat come into the fray it's pretty standard to see helicopters and jets mowing down buildings and chasing after people on the ground or laying down the frame work for a tank rush into an area to capture an objective, there really is something for everyone in terms of your preferred play style, however it isn't what's in the game so much as how the game interacts with itself on a map to map basis so lets break that down below.
Pure destructive fun.
Battlefield acts like a real battlefield, maps won't look the same as they did when you spawned in, entire cities may be destroyed sometimes and individual buildings will be nothing more than piles of rubble, strongpoints you holed up in will now become open killing fields and vice versa, as the game shifts through time so does the game play itself, for example, Siege of Shanghai has a massive skyscraper in the middle of it that holds the C objective, and when i say massive, i mean massive, it's so high in the sky that the only way to fight in it is to take an elevator up or fly in, that is until enough damage has been done.
Eventually the skyscraper will take so much damage it'll collapse and change the entire landscape and suddenly the most defensive structure becomes the hardest to take and control, it's like this on numerous maps on Flood Zone street to street combat is the norm, however once the dam finally gives way the streets will be flooded and you'll be forced onto the roof tops in close quarters combat to take points.
This really is the essence of what makes battlefield 4 amazing, environmental factors can change the game play completely, from massive sand storms that reduce visibility to ocean swells and storms that can make flying and boating almost impossible the game's environment is a massive talking point as it will always be a part of the games play style regardless of what you play and can turn the tide of battle in an instant if you aren't paying attention.
Combat
Combat is the name of the game and as such i can't really just talk about one type of combat so instead i'm going to individually break them down and give you an idea about the different types of combat in battlefield 4.
Ground
Ground combat is the main combat in the game soldiers with weapons spreading out all over the battlefield, these range widely from Assault Rifles to Sniper rifles and everything in between, there are 4 classes in BF4.
- Assault, A front line infantry medic,
- Support, another front line infantry unit however with a myriad of support devices such as ammo or individual things
designed to help the team - Recon, a sniper that can get behind enemy lines and help the team out by putting down beacons for easier spawning or can provide over watch on objectives.
- Engineer, another front soldier however the engineer is meant to stick with tanks as they can repair them and offer Anti-Tank weaponry to help out.
For the most part these play basically the same in the sense of a FPS game, while their weapons and play styles may vary a bit it still acts as an FPS in the sense of point and shoot, just that some guns may have an edge on others depending on where you are in the map and what you're doing.
Aerial
Aerial combat is a big part of Battlefield, this ranges from transport and attack helicopters to Jets and map specific things like AC-130 Gunships, people who play mainly as pilots in the game can completely control the battlefield depending on their skill of controlling their aircraft and what they do with it, my friends and I sometimes roam around in an apache and can take out entire squads of tanks or other air craft, on the flip side though they aren't without their downside, movement is hard and you'll be dodging not only the environment but the people on the ground.
The game is filled with Anti Air weapons and you'll need to take evasive actions and use things like flares and strategy to out maneuver around the battlefield without getting shot down, you'll also have to watch the skies above as extremely fast jets can get a lock on you before you have time to react.
On jets, they serve as fast moving surgical strikers that can bombard areas and enemies on passes before circling back to have another run, as a jet pilot your biggest threat is other jet pilots as the dog fighting in the game is pretty amazing you'll have to use the same things as the helicopters to outflank and out think your opponent which can sometimes leads to amazing results and awesome game play as you use everything at your disposal to take the other player out.
Armored
Armored combat is mainly front line, Tanks and BTR's are all over the battlefield landscape and require crews and infantry to be effective some tank players are so good they can go entire maps without being destroyed and can rack on the kills faster than anyone else can they also have the ability to support infantry through different devices on the tanks depending on your class or what you have installed on your specific tank.
The armored combat ranges widely from small infantry class vehicles to armored tank destroyers and everything has it's place, for the most part though the armored tanks are what people usually focus on, as this is battlefield and the environment can be destroyed one tank can clear out a strong point of an enemy simply by crashing through the wall into them and opening up a new avenue for your infantry team mates to advance.
There are numerous other things that make up Battlefield 4's play style but these are the big three and the ones you'll be mostly focusing on as you play from map to map, but there are other things that make up Battlefield 4.
In-depth customization and upgrading.
Battlefield 4 offers a massive amount of weapons, attachments and devices and as such the more you play the more you will unlock, nearly every thing in the game has a progression path from a small pistol to an armored tank you'll continuously upgrade your kit with new things to alter your play style to your liking and give you a real sense of progression that other games never did, for example.
Sniping is a big part of the game however you don't just pick up a sniper and go hunting, numerous things go into this the first rifle you unlock will come stock standard with a scope and that's about it however the more you play with it the more you'll unlock, different scopes and attachments that make the gun easier to use for example variable zoom on your scopes to see further, straight pull bolts so you don't have to manually eject a bullet and auxiliary things like a bipod that increases stability.
And this is for every single gun in the game and there are well over 70+ weapons there all with unique upgrades waiting to be unlocked, however it's not just the weapons it's also your vehicles and aircraft, tanks start out a standard as the sniper rifle but can eventually be upgraded to outfit your tank with things like smoke canisters, surface to surface missiles or even the ability to shoot down projectiles before they hit your tank, alternatively air craft will also gain this ability to survive for longer but also upgrade your killing power as you jam enemy weapons from locking on to you or gain a guided missile you can control to hit specific targets.
The main point is, there is an upgrade path for literally everything in the game and that's what makes repeat plays so much fun.
Graphics
Graphically BF4 is amazing, played on ultra it's extremely easy to immerse yourself inside the game as your chosen class and as it relies heavily on the environment this also adds to your immersion small often unnoticed things in the game like debris or nature often play a role in the game and how it pans out, it's also amazing how the graphics never seem to lose their edge even as the map becomes more and more destroyed as i said above some maps can be unrecognizable by the end but graphically they still look amazing even if there's destruction all around.
Critical Review
It's impossible to fully summarize all the things that go into BF4 and i would probably fail if I did try but the main points of this game are pretty well laid out, this is a game even though you're technically doing the same thing over and over you never get bored of as nearly everything in the game is satisfying to either do, see or interact with, the community is still incredibly active and the game itself has an amazing amount of content to be played.
It also caters to both sides the casual and the elite and the in-between, it's very rare that a game in a series that has just had a new release is enjoyed more than the current version however BF4 is one of those timeless games like Counter-Strike they you can keep going back to and still feels fresh every time you play it and only gets better with a squad of friends, also it doesn't really have much to do with the game play itself however the asking price is extremely reasonable, specifically with Origin Access which gives around 25gb of content in the form of maps and weapons for just 6.99.
Overall Battlefield 4 is a game that continues to deliver even though the development cycle is over and still continues to be fresh, exciting and incredibly fun even to this day and I personally couldn't recommend this game more.