Battlefield Bad Company Update: 06/15/08

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OutpostGamez BF Bad Company

Battlefield: Bad Company (also known as BF:BC, or just Bad Company) is a first-person shooter currently under development at EA DICE, and scheduled for release on June 23, 2008 on both PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The game was hinted at just before the release of Battlefield 2, and then announced sixteen months later.

Bad Company applies some new features to the franchise, including an environment that can be almost entirely destroyed, and a single-player storyline.

The player takes on the role of Preston Marlowe, who is a rookie to 222nd Army battalion, B-Company, a squad of insubordinate soldiers who are risking everything by going AWOL on a personal quest for gold deep behind enemy lines. It has been stated that the movies Kelly’s Heroes and Three Kings have been strong influences for the story.

Destructible Environments

The Frostbite game engine allows 90% of the environment to be destroyed, including buildings, vegetation, vehicles, and more. Still, for gameplay purposes, the frames of buildings and other objects will remain indestructible, to prevent the environment from becoming completely flat. Additionally, the game will feature dynamic lighting to correlate with the changing environment.

Classes

In a move similar to Battlefield 2142, the number of soldier classes will be lowered, resulting in a combination of the classic soldier classes. The classes in this game will be: Assault, Demolitions, Recon, Specialist, and Support.

Weapons

The Battlefield Bad Company Beta has a total of 38 available infantry firearms, including three handguns. The M9 for the U.S., a .45 cal for the Russians and a high powered revolver for the Mid Eastern force. These three handguns are only available for the Recon class.

Several pieces of equipment are available to infantry, including anti-tank mines, remote charges, mortar attack designators, laser guided missile, anti-vehicle missile launchers and grenade launchers such as the M203 and GP-25.

The Battlefield Bad Company Beta contains 20 locked guns, 10 can be unlocked through playing the game, while 5 of the other 10 will be unlocked in free promotions before and after release. The remaining 5 unlockable weapons will only be made available through purchase of the Gold Edition of the game or by achieving the final rank (level 25) in the game. A full list of weapons is available at the following website

Vehicles

Available vehicles aren’t confirmed, but gameplay and screenshots have revealed several vehicles, including AH-64 Apache, UH-60 Black Hawk, Mil Mi-24 Hind MK III, Ka-52 Alligator, M1A2 Abrams, M2 Bradley and HMMWV.

Single Player

The only known mission so far is a campaign mission called Acta Non Verba. In this mission the goal is take out Russian supply lines by destroying a weapons depot and fuel dump.

Each mission in the game is said to last between 1-2 hours. Throughout each mission are hidden gold bars that can be discovered (similar to Halo 3’s skulls), but this is not a required task. At this time no information about what they do is known

Upon the player’s death, they are able to respawn without penalty.

Multiplayer

Multiplayer will support up to 24 players, and will run on PC-dedicated servers. Gold Rush is one of the game modes in Battlefield: Bad Company. The setup of the game is an Attackers vs. Defenders scenario, in which one team must defend two crates filled with gold while the other team attempts to destroy the crates. Once the crates are destroyed, more of the map is available to fight on with new crates appearing, along with added reinforcement numbers. The attacking team has a limited amount of respawns to achieve their goal of capturing the 2-3 gold stashes. The defending team has an unlimited amount of respawns available, but their goal is to exhaust the attacking teams tickets (respawns).

The Conquest game mode will be returning in Bad Company. This will not be included when the game is released, instead it will be available as a free download post-launch, however there is currently no date announced

It has been confirmed that jets will not be available in multiplayer and also singleplayer because they will be too difficult for players to destroy, but DICE has assured that vehicles will still be a major part of the multiplayer gameplay. Parachutes and the ability of the character to go prone have also been confirmed as not being in the game.

Beta

A multiplayer beta for the Xbox 360 was released on March 25, 2008. To play the multiplayer beta, users had to subscribe to IGN’s FilePlanet or preorder the game at Gamestop. Two maps are playable in the beta, Ascension and Oasis and one multiplayer mode, Gold Rush. The beta came to an end at April 28, 2008.

Demo

There has been an anouncement that the demo will be released on consoles on June 5th. The single-player portion of the demo puts you at the start of your ’B’ company career and introduces you to some of the game’s characters, while the multiplayer part includes the Gold Rush mode on the Oasis map. People who pre-order the game at participating retailers will receive the demo one week early on May 29th.

Maps

Ascension

A multiplayer map set in a Eastern European moutain village with infantry and light vehicle combat, only one Humvee was available in the beta. One of the smaller maps at 1km x 1km wide. Ascension includes lots of shrubbery and trees for destruction as well as scattered houses throughout the terrain.

Harvest Day

A multiplayer map set in a large open field. This map contains several small villages scattered about, with a small river running through the middle.

Oasis

A large multiplayer map set in a Middle Eastern setting. It includes land, air, and sea vehicles.

Criticisms

There have been criticisms regarding the game’s development and downloadable extras. DICE has stated that five of the ten weapons will be available instantly with the Gold Edition of the game, or by ranking up to level 25 in in the regular game.

Find All Five

Find All Five is a way for players to unlock specific weapons. They are codes that enable free downloadable weapons via 5 promotional programs. The website FindAllFive.com will act as the hub for information on obtaining these unlocks and how to redeem unlock codes. These "Find All Five" weapons are the; F2000 assault rifle, USAS12 automatic shotgun, M-60 LMG, QBU88 sniper rifle and the UZI SMG.