Battlefield V is full of a lot more content than people might be expecting. War Stories contains meaningful experiences in short spurts, the maps in the game are huge and well designed, the modes of play raise the entertainment bar when compared to Battlefield I, and the customization/progression system will keep people occupied for a while, as well as provide motivation to keep playing. This feels like a Battlefield game, which should tame concerns of lack of launch content.
This week, we’ve had the pleasure to do a deep dive into the world of Battlefield V. We were hands-on with everything that DICE had to offer up with the game, including playing War Stories, Conquests, Breakthrough, Frontlines, Grand Operations, and Tides of War (and a few other things — we shall discuss that later). The first thing I want to tell you is that this feels like a bigger package than most have been expecting. Sure, there is an additional War Story coming next month (December release), and sure the Battle Royale is hitting in March, and I know that people have been frothing at the mouth for that one, but what you get from launch is exactly what you would expect from a Battlefield V title. In spite of all the bitching and moaning about this not being a complete game, it’s a complete game with additional content coming. There’s enough content at launch to keep you satisfied, and at the very least meet your BF expectations.
Anyway, without further delay, let’s dig right into it.
Battlefield V continues with the tradition that Battlefield I started by bringing human elements into the campaign’s storytelling through War Stories. Each part of War Stories contains a different tale that unfolds with important characters in the game, or at least characters we’ve seen since E3. Each one is a multi-tiered gameplay experience that contains mini-chapters of a character’s life during the war that builds and builds with intensity until something gives at the end. You’re not going in during War Stories and just shooting people, rather you’re progressing through the levels and with each new chapter brings a new gameplay experience with it. For example, you may start out going to scope out a situation at an airfield in one story, but quickly have to change pace and course to plant bombs on planes. In addition, the stories are meaningful situations that shape the characters involved and show personal experiences from different World War II aspects that affected people involved, willingly or not. While they seem separate in notion, their meaning echoes some of the hardships that might have befallen certain people within Germany and outside of it. There’s a lot of thought that went into these stories, as well as respectfulness. DICE did a great job with this mode, and I’m really happy they kept campaigns a thing. The construction of War Stories allows for additional stories to be released in the future, which I was told is the plan. Why deliver one over-the-top story, when you can have many? It’s a smart way of doing things. Anyway, what you do get from War Stories at launch is enough to keep you satisfied.
The first story encountered in the game is that of Billy Bridger, a failed bank robber that is good with explosives. Jailed for the robbery attempt, Bridger is sprung from the pen by a British commander, who believes that Billy’s abilities to ‘blow things up’ is something the military could use on special ops missions. The story is something you’ve seen in Hollywood before (La Femme Nikita, anyone?), and one that is easy to accept in terms of believability and construction. The kid starts out as a loose cannon but comes around slowly to see what is at stake with the world at war.
As for the gameplay, as I mentioned above, it is multi-tiered structure, meaning that once you complete one chapter of it (15-20 min in total each), then you start a new objective with the same characters, which keeps the story rolling. For Bridger’s story, he starts with trying to infiltrate an airbase, attach explosives to German planes, then blow them up and exit. One done, and things don’t go well with the mission, then it’s onto the next mission with Bridger, which includes disrupting communication satellites. Bridger’s story ends with fighting enemy troops and facing tanks. The pace of the story, once you get into it, is dictated by you. You have to figure out exactly how you want to complete the mission, which is a nice value added. That doesn’t mean you have to ‘figure out’ how EA wants you to play it, rather it means you get to strategize how you want to achieve your goals. DICE purposely designed the stories mode to be sorta open world in one respect, though the end goals in the branched narrative design always end up in the same place. That being said, Bridger’s mission was to be stealthy, something I do not like doing when playing action games (and especially first-person shooters). The entire time in the first mission, I picked off every German soldier in the airfield. Did I have to? Nah, but I did. I could have gone the stealth route. I could have disabled all the alarms on the base (an option), and even could have done stealth kills over and over again, but I didn’t. I chose to go the ‘guns-a-blazing’ route in the game, and it was fun. How you play out a mission is up to you. Again, there are goals that have to be met, and they end the same way no matter the style of play, but you aren’t on a linear path to get to them. That makes the experience yours and it makes it fun. Anytime you can make a game fun generally equals out to a good game. That’s what games are supposed to be anyway.
Each War Story is constructed like Billy Bridger’s with regard to its openness. The game sets up a story for you, throws out some goals to meet, then hands you the keys to the car. How you get from point A to point B is your business. How you do things will also dictate how easy or difficult the game can be, so write that down, as Van Wilder would say (yes, you just read a review that quoted Van Wilder). Anytime you can break from a typical campaign mold, while a risk sometimes, is probably a good thing. That might be the reason why Treyarch did what they did with Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, and the gamble somewhat paid off — that’s really a gamble that was counting on the long game, as their campaigns (the entire CoD set of campaigns) were getting long in the tooth with structure. They were also seeing more and more people play multiplayer, especially after Fortnite took off in the gaming world.
Anyway, DICE’s War Story missions are different than the usual campaign structure, they’re more open, meaningful, and less over-the-top with content. It’s a war, not an action movie. I suspect that you’ll probably get a good chunk of hours out of them, probably totaling what you would get out of a single campaign, though the idea that more is coming will keep this part of the game alive for months. Speaking of which, the one coming out in December, The Last Tiger, looks like it could be a damn good emotional journey about the last Panzer Tiger tank left in its squad, and how those men react to the destruction around them. I think DICE is shooting for Das Boot with this one. Das Boot ended up working out well.
On the multiplayer side of the tracks, DICE brings its ‘A’ game. The biggest and brightest of the bunch is called Grand Operations, which are just as grand as the name implies. Before we get into that part of the game, we need to discuss the smaller ones because GO uses them all in a multi-day MP campaign. Multi-day in the game, not in your life — although, having a multi-day campaign in real life would be epic. Write that down, DICE. You’re welcome. (EDITOR’S NOTE: I think they call those raids)
The first MP mode we should dig into is Breakthrough. Breakthrough is an ambitious idea that I’m still trying to wrap my head around a little bit. Essentially, you have one team playing defenders, while the other plays offense. The team going on the offensive and has to break through enemy defenses, capture the checkpoints, and push the enemy back. Every push sets up new checkpoints. The defenders have an incredible advantage from the get-go. First, the offensive players must jump out of planes onto the map, which sounds easier than it is when playing. If you don’t jump out in time, you have the potential to die with the plane (defenders can shoot anti-aircraft guns while you’re flying in). Even if you jump out of the plane, you have a real chance of getting killed right when you hit the ground. To say this mode is a challenge would be an incredible understatement. That said, it’s a challenge because it’s war, and it’s a game. If it all was easy, then people would probably hate this mode. Anyway, taking each point as you progress only reinforces one of the key elements that make the Battlefield franchise special for a little people — teamwork. You have to depend on your squad to help you out, and you have to depend on communicating with your squad. Our team was constantly talking back and forth about strategic design to overtake particular points. Breakthrough requires you to chat it up and to take things slowly, as taking one point draws enemy after enemy your way. I think the first checkpoint we took had us spend around 20 minutes trying to acquire it. Once you get the groove of it, you understand Breakthrough’s construction, but you simply cannot go ‘run and gun’ during this mode, as you’ll become incredibly frustrated. That’s the genius of the Breakthrough’s design, though, as you have to take what your team is trying to do seriously, or you’re going to end up being pissed off/piss your team off quickly. This mode was new, and it was good, but, again, it’s a challenge, so don’t go into it feeling like you’re going to be victorious immediately because more than like you won’t be.
Another mode for Battlefield V MP is called Airborne, which involves jumping out of a plane onto a map, landing, locating bombs strategically placed on the map for you by your allies, and then trying to blow up enemy artillery with said bombs. If you thought Breakthrough was challenging, this is even more so. While jumping out of a plane seems fun, you have to consider that the enemies are firing at you during the process. If you are in a plane when it blows up, and if you ever used anti-aircraft guns in a BF game, then you know how easy it is to take down a plane, then your player is going to go down with the aircraft. What’s even more of a challenge here is that if squads don’t blow up anti-aircraft guns, then you have to re-jump out of the plane until they do (if you don’t spawn on your squad members). There’s a lot of lopsidedness to this mode, but, like Breakthrough, it’s meant to be a challenge.
Grand Operations is ambitious as it is big for Battlefield V. Voiced over by Mark Black, Grand Operations puts two teams against each other in a multi-day battle that spans different maps and MP modes. One part of Grand Operations might feature capture the flag, then day two of it might shift over to Breakthrough, then finally pulling back to capture the flag, before conceding to Final Stand. Each battle lasts around 20-25 minutes a piece, so you’re pushing close to an hour by the end of it all. The end battle is a Fortnite like footnote called Final Stand that forces teams to eliminate each other with no chance of respawning. That last part really separates the weak links on teams, as you are forced into a smaller and smaller circle throughout the match on an already limited area of a map. It’s brutal, but beautiful and fun at the same time. The only downer to Final Stand is that it’s short. I think after about four matches Grand Operations, the total of all our Final Stand minutes came out to be around 20 minutes combined. Of course, it’s the very end of a nearly 60-minute match on Grand Operations, so it’s literally the finish line to the mode. When you get there, you’re as exhausted as emulated by your squad of axis and allies. Overall, Grand Operations is an epic way of playing Battlefield V, and probably one of the best reasons to purchase the game when it comes out.
Other things to note in the multiplayer section is that old reliable MP modes are back. Conquest is there and waiting for you on multiple maps, as is Frontlines and Domination. You won’t get a shortage of MP options to play in the game, and what you do get is pretty beefy in scale.
Speaking of beefy, the maps in BFV have been gorgeously designed to keep you engaged with these MP experiences. DICE did a superb job of making the maps feel huge and girth-y. They also did a great job of making the surroundings accessible to the player’s strategy, meaning that you will find ways to use your soldier class in each map, though some maps might cater to specific classes a little more than others. That is to be expected in the game, as it has always worked this way in the Battlefield series. On that note, let’s break down some maps:
Hamada — Certainly one of my favorites of the bunch. It’s a hilly desert that has broken down structures in it. It’s a sniper’s paradise, but also a good map to take down warbirds. It’s surprisingly one of the few maps that doesn’t have much tank advantage in its construction. The map contains a lot of hills, lots of space that dips down and raises up. It’s an interesting design that works well. Again, it caters to snipers really well.
Aerodrome — This is a great map, probably the best. It sprawls out far, features three hangers in the main part of the map, and also sports two guard towers, one water tower (that can used as a guard tower) and wonderful places to place a tank from far away to absolutely wreck the place. The girth-y flatness of the map also caters to snipers. My squad during the review event had one helluva time with this one, and probably were most successful taking down enemies from afar.
Arras — Arras is an interesting map. It’s a French countryside featuring multiple villages, a church (with a sniper’s nest), and land/fields (tall fields) where snipers and whomever can sprawl out to kill unsuspecting enemies. What’s also interesting about Arras’ design is the trenches and drainage pipes that people can hide in during battle. I can’t tell you how many times I was killed by a drainage pipe soldier. It’s sad, but at the same time an option. Anyway, it’s a very colorful map that gives players plenty of strategic options to choose from with regard to its landscape.
Narvik — It’s a port town that is covered in snow. It features a lot of buildings and plenty of places to hide. It isn’t a sniper’s paradise, but it’s a medium size map that is slightly hilly enough to hide in here and there. For games like Breakthrough, this map works phenomenally. Tanks and vehicles can disrupt the scene on this map as well. We had a tank that was stuck on one side of the map just absolutely wrecking us in a match. Because there are so many places for enemies to hide, it was difficult getting to said tank on this map. It was a challenge, but a fun one.
FJELL 652 — This was the smallest map in the bunch, at least it felt like it was during MP. It did have some lengthy layers to it, but it mainly consisted of a snowy mountain top that had huge slopes around it, which were accessible for the most part. Beyond the slopes, there were 300-esque (the movie) chokepoints for players to run through. Those chokepoints were rocky, as they were dangerous. If enemies caught you in them, then you’re more than likely toast. They’re great shortcuts between points, though. Anyway, the mountain contained small camps, a well-placed anti-aircraft gun, as well as some opportunities to do some building (we’ll talk about that later). The best part of this map was the end game for Grand Operations called Final Stand. The top of the mountain changes to a blizzard and you go shooting your way through everything, as your ring of war gets smaller and smaller. The map’s use during this mode was breathtaking.
Rotterdam — You played this in the beta. It’s a cityscape that offers a lot of opportunities to duck/cover. You have a lot of neat structures to hide in, especially if you’re a sniper, and should specifically take note of the subway system above the city. That was a fan favorite at the review event. It was punishing to say the least, but damn good with the right mode. Breakthrough worked well with this map, as battles certainly had a good chunk of intensity to them.
Devastation — While this map is literally titled what it is, the amount of destruction is absolutely stunning. How it’s graphically crafted, what levels of structures you can access in the destruction, it’s breathtaking to see the variety of class types that this particular map caters to when compared with the other maps. I loved playing on this map, as you will see in some video when I finally get it cut and compressed. There is good flexibility with how this map works and what you can do with it in the heat of battle. Also, as previously mentioned, it contains a lot of graphical eye candy.
Twisted Steel — Twisted Steel is a map that contains a destroyed-barely-hanging-on bridge in the middle of it with farm houses and checkpoints surrounding it. It’s a wide map, but the main action, at least the fun action, is located on the bridge itself. There were several times when we played this map that we ended up on that damn bridge in a huge firefight. It’s a great place to flank people as well. Sending a team behind another team to sandwich them is a good feeling. It was so intense, and so much fun. It’s a great map.
Panzerstorm (still in production) — We only played Panzerstorm once during the review event and it was a work in progress. The map was filled to the brim full of tanks and vehicles, and was probably the flattest map of the bunch, featuring farmhouses and faraway checkpoints. It was simply built for you to take out each other in vehicles, thus the name. The map did offer up a nice journey from point-to-point in the game we did play, and, more importantly, it was fun.
All in all, the maps definitely contained a good variety of design to them, which bodes well for all classes. I got the distinct feeling that snipers were favored just a bit in most of the maps, though, depending on skill, that could be said for a lot of MP experiences, regardless of game. Anyway, I think there are a few maps that stand out, depending on mode, but as a whole they were outstanding. DICE definitely did a solid job on them, which isn’t unexpected considering their resume of map making.
Shifting gears just slightly, let’s discuss this whole building thing. While Battlefield has always dabbled in players having the ability, depending on class, to help out other players through giving items or constructing things for players to acquire items, they haven’t gone the Fortnite route until now. The support class of characters can build up barriers, and other items of interest, to help keep enemies out, or at least delay their progress. I saw some of the most magnificent building jobs in the Aerodrome levels, where our squad built up walls to keep enemies out of the hanger, or at least create choke points where enemies had to go through specific areas to get through, and were usually met with gunfire. The building process in the game is simple, the support characters press down on the d-pad, and then they whip out a hammer to start building in certain areas. Items you can build include bags of sand for walls, barbwire, large metal pieces to prevent tanks from rolling through, as well as platforms to stand on. There are more items, but that is what I experienced during my review period with the game. The easy of use, as well as the usefulness of the constructed items makes this a neat addition to the BF series. While these constructions weren’t meant to keep people permanently out of an area, they make it an obstacle for people to get through to the area. Anytime you can make it tough for an enemy is a time where you can take them down easier. Of course, enemies can take these structures down with a well-armed attack, or even throwing down a mine on walls and shooting the mine (that was so much fun, especially when you do it directly to players). I will also caution that you should never build these things without seeing if your teammates are in a tank in the middle of a hanger because those tanks will knock that shit down quickly, and the support player will be incredibly sad. I’m not saying I did this on one video (I did), I’m just saying be aware of your surroundings before you start building structures.
Staying with players, one of the bigger themes when reviewing this game was how much the progression system has grown in the game, as well as how much customization you could do to your player to make them yours. Starting with the former, the progression system is extensive. I’m not sure there is a Battlefield game to this point that has a progression system that focuses on weapons, players, player attributes, and a progression tree for vehicles. DICE did a deep dive into making nearly every aspect of player/gun/vehicles upgradable, and with a mix-match system of upgrades. There’s a lot going on in the progression of all aspects of BFV, and all of it seems impressive. For example, choosing what attributes your plane could contain (focus on speed, accuracy, etc.) before launching it off onto the battlefield was a unique time consuming process, though a fun one. Same for the weapons, as you get to mix-match what you feel would be the perfect set of attributes for your guns. In my squad’s downtime, we played around with this aspect of progression a lot. As you upgrade your classes, you also open up progression options, so it’s a balance of continuing playing, continuing leveling up, which equals out to more progression options. They made this game a lot more interesting than expected in terms of progression. It also helped with evolving one’s character.
Staying with characters, there is also a heavy amount of customization for everything in the game. This also consumed my squad’s time between matches, as we were able to customize outfits, characters, guns (all our guns were gold plated), as well as see the ability to customize vehicles (most of what we wanted to do was locked in this category). You can change a character’s hat/jacket/pants/face paint with a bevy of unlockables. We were able to try out most of those during the review event, and we all spent a heavy amount of time customizing our four character types for the axis and allies (eight total). I had more fun than expected with this aspect of the game.
Before we wrap up here, let’s discuss some presentation. I know you’ll be shocked with this one (/s), but Battlefield V was gorgeous. The textures were beautifully detailed, the lighting and shadows were well-placed, especially in maps like Arras. Visually, there wasn’t anything to complain about, as the game was simply stunning to watch in action. I especially want to point out how accurate the lighting was during the airplane battles. While I suck at airplane warfare, the lighting details from the cockpit were a thing of beauty. They set a nice bar for what should be expected when you tilt/pitch your plane from side to side, as shadows would be cast properly through your actions in the cockpit. It’s the little things that make you enjoy the presentation of the game, and it always makes me happy when developers get lighting right. It adds to the ambiance of the experience.
In terms of audio, the game I played was set to 3D stereo, which I highly recommend. I heard players everywhere in this audio mode, even heard their footsteps in houses, or when they slammed open doors. It provided a lot of audible detail to the experience that I hadn’t noticed before. Maybe DICE did a better job with BFV in this category than in previous, but regardless it was just as beautiful as the graphics. On the music side of things, I need to mention that you’ll get a nice remix of Battlefield 1942 on a map or two. Enjoy that, as it brought back some favorable memories of my PlayStation 3 time with that old game. Wish they would remaster some of those maps for BFV.
Presentation aside, as for the future of the game, there is certainly more that is going to be added to the experience. Like stated previously, the additional War Story coming out should add more drama to the campaign package. I’m a huge fan of stories when told well, I believe highly in a good three-act narrative, so I’m cautious in my excitement for The Last Tiger, though optimistic that it will be good (until proven otherwise). The Battle Royale game, Firestorm, hitting in March should also just be another cog in the Battlefield V machine when it is released. I’m not a huge fan of BR games, so it’s not on my list of ‘must-haves’, but I understand why people want it. It’s a huge undertaking, and one that hopefully pays off for DICE. On paper, the devs seem committed to expanding BFV in the coming months, so it will be interesting to see how all of this plays out. The future certainly looks bright for BFV.
As it stands, Battlefield V is full of a lot more content than people might be expecting. War Stories contains meaningful experiences in short spurts, the maps in the game are huge and well designed, the modes of play raise the entertainment bar when compared to Battlefield I, and the customization/progression system will keep people occupied for a while, as well as provide motivation to keep playing. This feels like a Battlefield game, which should tame concerns of lack of launch content.
