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Battlefield: Bad Company

Score: 9.0 / 10

Taking the successful Battlefield 1942 game into the modern age, Battlefield 2: Modern Combat was one of the more popular first-person shooting games when it came first to Xbox then ported to the Xbox 360. The standout feature of the Battlefield franchise was the ability to use wartime vehicles in combat.

That again is the best feature of the newest Battlefield title, Battlefield: Bad Company, which brings the same great Battlefield gameplay in a modern setting with an excellent upgrading of the graphics engine (complete with a now-destructible environment), an actual single-player mode gamers will want to play to the end and more of the same great Xbox Live gameplay that was found in Battlefield 2: Modern Combat, although the excellent Conquest mode is missing 

 

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(replaced with the Gold Rush mode that ties into Battlefield: Bad Company’s single-player storyline; Conquest has been promised by Electronic Arts as free downloadable content in the future).

What gamers that played Battlefield 2: Modern Combat will notice first with Battlefield: Bad Company is that the new title actually has a

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single-player game worth not only playing to get used to using the game’s various weapons and vehicles, but because it’s actually an enjoyable single-player mode (the only really missed feature here being the Hotswap from Battlefield 2: Modern Combat, where gamers could literally swap places with other soldiers during hot battle), with a story that has a dark sense of humor. The gamer takes the role of the newest “recruit” into Bad Company, a band of miscreants that the army has nowhere else stash. So they’re a cast of future casualties, as far as the military is concerned, given high-risk missions that the military is hoping will eliminate them, as they take out a few bad guys along the way. What Bad Company discovers is that there is a mercenary army at war with the U.S. military – and they get paid in gold bars.

Once Bad Company unearths this secret they become soldiers of fortune (or misfortune at times) themselves, abandoned by the military, but on the path of the gold to capture for their own private jackpot (without ruining it, the last cut-scene is really funny, too, worth the effort of playing the 6-10 hours it takes to get through the entire story).

Yes, gamers will basically be learning the intricacies of the game during the single-player campaign, with the handling of both weapons and vehicles a primary “mission” for the real jackpot of Battlefield: Bad Company – the game’s online play. Once more, Battlefield is at its best online, with larger environments and up to 24 players competing together. One big bonus in Battlefield: Bad Company is the widespread destructibility of the game’s environment, where multiple structures can be blown to smithereens. This destructive nature of Battlefield: Bad Company wasn’t just added gratuitously, either, because both in single-player and multiplayer it becomes part of the in-game strategy.

Regrettably, the fantastic Conquest multiplayer mode from Battlefield 2: Modern Combat has been replaced by Battlefield: Bad Company’s Gold Rush. In Gold Rush, one team defends while the other team attacks gold crates in the defensive camp. Gold Rush certainly isn’t totally without its merits, but doesn’t quite measure up to Conquest, which thankfully has been promised as a downloadable addition later by EA.

Another glaring issue is any kind of intelligence from the single-player’s enemies. These seem to be the worst of the worst soldiers without any sense of fighting intellect. Many times, if you take a certain route to certain soldiers, they literally won’t even react. Gamers could walk right up to them without expecting any type of reaction, as if they have some sort of death wish. Gamers can just walk right up and kill them at their leisure.

Then there are the “phantom” soldiers, which seemingly appear out of nowhere to take shots at the gamer from unseen locales. Many times, just when it seems there’s nobody left to eliminate, a few bullets will begin to fly toward gamers, and if they don’t react in time can eliminate them rather quickly. That is, or course, if the gamer can’t get to their life replenisher in the form of an injection that refills their entire life totally. This can be used over and over, too, so there’s not much trouble progressing through the single-player game.

With improved visuals, a larger and gleefully-fun-to-destroy destructive gaming environment, still-great online play and a single-player mode that gamers will want to fight through to the end (although Hotswapping from Battlefield 2: Modern Combat is gone), this new Battlefield is in good company with the previous Battlefield titles. It may not surpass the game-of-the-year quality of Call of Duty 4, but certainly is a very good alternative, especially for those looking to fight the online battle with vehicular manslaughter as part of their killing repertoire.

‑ Lee Cieniawa

lcieniawa@armchairempire.com

(July 10, 2008)

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