Battlefield 2042

Available on: PC, Xbox Series X | S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4

Developer: DICE | Publisher: Electronic Arts

Release: Nov. 19, 2021, Early Access begins Nov. 12.

This is a review in progress, and will be updated.

“Battlefield 2042” is brimming with all of the experiences fans of the war sim series have enjoyed since its debut nearly 20 years ago. Infantry hurling themselves at objectives while tanks blast away buildings and fighter jets and helicopters rain fire from above. The series has always offered some of the most immersive experiences in gaming, but in packaging up this latest installment, it’s clear there was a shortage of one key component: time.

That holds for both the game’s developers at DICE, but also reviewers. If you’re looking for a comprehensive review of “Battlefield 2042,” you won’t find it here. For that matter, you probably won’t find it anywhere on Nov. 11, a day before the game releases to the public for an early access window. To date, the game has been available to reviewers only through curated experiences: First, via a beta that showcased just one mode on just one map and then this week, across three several-hour long sessions for reviewers. During those windows, participants could only play the mode and map served up by the game’s developers, and only on PC, in part to ensure full servers for a game that can host up to 128 players in a given match. But while it was useful to get a glimpse of the live “Battlefield 2042” experience, the sessions produced more questions than answers. And the biggest question for me is, “Why wasn’t this game delayed again?”

That may come across more negatively than I intend; the foundation of the game is very good. But after a review window marred by bugs and glitches, it’s clear the current version of the game will not debut in all its intended splendor. Most of the issues could be classified as nuisances more than fundamental problems with the game, and all of them seem like they could be easily solved with more time. So again, why not give it to the developers and let them deliver the product they intended?

The intrigue of “Battlefield 2042” has always stemmed from its potential. The game’s development positively dripped with ambition. There was the introduction of a new squad-based mode, billed as a twist on the battle royale genre. There was the sandbox mode, Portal, that puts the tools of creation for original Battlefield experiences directly into the hands of players. That mode also delivers remastered versions of beloved previous entries “Battlefield 1942,” “Bad Company 2” and “Battlefield 3” by including two maps from each title. Heck, the new content even included a tornado and a robot dog. This wasn’t just a blue-sky vision from the developers. They were shooting for the moon.

From what we’ve seen though, at launch, DICE is going to fall short. At present, there are a litany of issues that sap the game’s immersive fantasy, limiting the enjoyment of a game that, at its core, is quite good. But the most vexing issue of all is a design decision that undercuts a full third of “Battlefield 2042.”

Battlefield games revolve around players coordinating closely with their squadmates. But when the game goes live on Nov. 12 for early access, it will do so without in-game voice chat. Yes, you read that correctly: “Battlefield 2042″ will launch lacking an industry-standard feature for multiplayer first-person shooter titles. During a media Q&A this week, the developers said they found most people use party chat via Discord or through Xbox and PlayStation party making and that it would be looking to add voice chat “shortly after launch to help with this.” Later, through a spokesperson, the company said in-game voice chat is “on the road map” and could be introduced as early as “Day 25.″

That’s a shame, since the game’s new mode, Hazard Zone, is practically unplayable without comms. Hazard Zone relies heavily on relaying information to your teammates and coordinating so that their characters’ loadouts and special abilities can complement one another. Unless you’re in a party via another VOIP platform though, it’s nearly impossible. There is a ping wheel and in-game text chat (good luck using that during a gunfight) but neither is a true substitute for a feature that is a staple in squad-based games.

During the review period, I was unable to join my squadmates’ party so I had to solo queue, where I was paired with three EA staffers. Our squad never made it more than 3 minutes into the mode. No one could communicate which way to go, no one could call out threats. We died in short order. And that will be the experience for anyone not playing in a previously assembled party.

The mode itself is interesting. I just wish I’d gotten to experience it properly. The goal is to deploy on a map in search of hard drives in fallen satellites. Both player-led enemy teams and AI forces are present to stop you, and an incoming storm limits your time to achieve your objective before you have to exfiltrate. If your team doesn’t make it to the extraction point, you get nothing. Succeed and you can swap those hard drives for “dark market credits” which you can use in a buy phase to upgrade your loadout — a la “Valorant” or “Call of Duty: Vanguard’s” Champion Hill mode — before deploying on another quest for more hard drives.

Hazard Zone features a one-life-to-live format like other modern battle royales, which makes it all the more frustrating when you’re eliminated early when an enemy team ambushes you without warning. Or maybe there was a warning; I just couldn’t hear it, because there’s no voice chat.

One of the aspects that makes the game different from various battle royales, though, is that you’re not trying to eliminate the other players. You just want to get in, get the drives, and get out. To that end, teams can opt for an extraction at the midpoint of the round if they feel like they’ve gathered enough drives. In theory, you could play a whole round without seeing another human-controlled player. While fighting over the two extraction vehicles could be intense, it’s going to take some time to see whether this holds the same appeal as the adrenaline rush of winning a final gunfight at the center of a shrinking circle. Certainly, it will take more than the time allotted to reviewers, even the ones who got to play the experience as intended.

The Portal mode provides the other big advancement for the latest iteration of Battlefield. It serves as both an archive for fan favorite modes (like Rush) and maps (including Al Alamein, Arica Harbor and Caspian Border). It’s also a workshop for creators who want to mold their own experiences from Battlefield’s ample materials. For reviewers, the DICE developers showcased a trio of examples, including a VIP mode in which both sides attempted to take out a randomly assigned VIP target on the other team, a fast-paced free-for-all and a tweaked version of FFA that gave every player a rocket launcher and one rocket. The catch in that last version? To get another rocket to load, players had to jump five times, a rule placed into the mode by its creator.

Reviewers then played in three remastered classic modes from past games, Conquest on the included maps of “Battlefield 1942,” Rush on those of “Bad Company 2” and another Conquest game on “Battlefield 3′s” battlegrounds. True to the description, they all played like the original versions of those games, with the same behaviors. For example, players could not go prone while using the classic build of “Bad Company 2” and only defib paddles could revive fallen players in “Battlefield 3.”

This just scratches the surface of what the mode could ultimately deliver. And it’s a virtual guarantee that the best mode we’ll see from Portal hasn’t been made yet. The details creators can adjust via the Portal website, which anyone with an Origin account can visit and check out for themselves, are staggering. This may be the ultimate sandbox for “Battlefield” fans. But again, we’ll need more than four hours of curated experiences to know for sure.

The third core pillar of “Battlefield 2042” is All Out Warfare, the home to Conquest and Breakthrough modes, two Battlefield standards that require players to secure or defend various objectives. Reviewers played through six of the seven new maps on those settings, which offered a mix of the familiar (massive scale, vehicles firing frantically while infantry scrambled for cover) and the new. The latter elements included the awe-inspiring tornado weather effect, as well as operators with unique traits and gadgets, like a grapple gun, a sentry turret, defensive fortifications or the ability to hack enemy vehicles and equipment. One operator even features a wing suit that allows her to ride the outskirts of that twister.

But dotting it all were a number of blemishes you wouldn’t expect from a beauty about to make its public debut. At the start of the review event, in fact, EA’s media relations team circulated a document of known issues that spanned four pages. Some were rather innocuous (body parts clipping through walls) while others were more troublesome (sniper scopes losing their magnification). Even with all those instances already reported, reviewers found more throughout the week. One mouse-and-keyboard user’s weapon kept firing even when they weren’t pressing the left mouse button. Others reported their mouse and keyboards completely stopped working at random. Another player reported driving a tank into the water only to have their character launched into the sky. One member of my squad kept crashing out of the game.

My own experience included a number of oddities as well. A tank I called in with an airdrop disappeared under the map. A helicopter I piloted appeared to simply disappear midflight, with the game informing me and my deceased squad mate that we’d been “terminated.” Most problematic of all, after being swept into the tornado and killed, it locked me into the game’s revive state — I couldn’t return to play without closing the game entirely or waiting for the round to end. None of that, however, frustrated me more than not being able to communicate with my teammates via game chat.

What also makes a true review of this game nigh impossible as it stands is that I can’t confidently tell you if these problems will dissipate by launch day. It seems highly unlikely. This is particularly troubling to me, since the preview I participated in was played only on PC. I have no idea what the experience will be like on current-gen consoles, much less on a PS4 or Xbox One.

Put it all together and you have to wonder why on Earth an event like this, which felt very much like a beta test, wasn’t actually a beta test and the game’s release wasn’t pushed back another month or so. I have to imagine this is frustrating for the developers, as there are glimpses of greatness in “Battlefield 2042.” In one instance during the review window, a gunman appeared atop a concrete wall, firing down on me and my teammate. Suddenly, he rocketed skyward. An allied tank had obliterated both our assailant and the wall he was standing on. Moments like that definitely triggered memories of the Battlefield I remember. But it’s likely those instances will be overshadowed by the issues, known and unknown, that seem certain to plague its launch. If reviewers are aware of all these unbecoming hiccups, I have to assume EA and DICE know as well. So again, why launch like this?

I asked through a press relations contact how DICE and EA arrived at picking the Nov. 12 launch date. They declined to comment, pointing to the statement issued when the game was initially delayed in September. It read in part “we feel it is important to take the extra time to deliver on the vision of ‘Battlefield 2042’ to our players.” Personally, I wish they’d taken a little more.

Rather than developing new content and iterating on a finished product with the upcoming live service portion of the game, it feels like DICE will instead be playing catch-up. Hopefully when the game gets patched, the developers — and Battlefield players — will get to realize the ambitious initial vision for “Battlefield 2042.”