Fight your way through epic battles going from tight urban combat in a besieged French city to big open spaces in the Italian Alps or frantic combats in the deserts of Arabia, in large scale battles as infantry or piloting vehicles on land, air and sea, from the tanks and bikes on the ground, to biplanes and gigantic battleships.
Discover a new world at war through an adventure-filled campaign, or join in epic multiplayer battles with up to 64 players, and adapt your tactics and strategy to the earth-shattering, dynamic environments and destruction.
Review
Battlefield 1 has been one of the games that I have been looking forward too since it was announced and the main theme of the game was announced.
For several years I have been wanting a developer to grab the FPS genre by the balls and go back to some all-out war fare. None of this futuristic stuff that has been pumped out over the last however many years, so I guess you can imagine my excitement when EA Dice said that Battlefield 1 was going back to World War 1.
In terms of history, this is what I loved to study, it was my bread and butter, the different parts of the world in which the war was going on, and mainly for differing reasons. You had the Central Powers which included Austria-Hungary who declared War when there heir to the throne Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, this period also saw the downfall of the Ottoman Empire who had also joined forces with the Central Powers, although this had started to come into play before World War 1, the downfall was complete by the 1920’s.
There is a point to my little history story above, these different little stories that are a part of the War, are also how the games main story line is played out. Battlefield 1 doesn’t incorporate one big story line campaign, however this is broken up in 6 different story lines dotted around the war. From the blitz on London, to taking down the Ottoman Empire in the deserts.
As I played through the story I got more and more encapsulated with them, I found this an absolutely fantastic way to do the campaign. Sometimes one long campaign can drag along, breaking it up in this way meant that you could take a break from it without losing the flow for the stories, you can just do the one scenario and maybe go off to play some multiplayer or just leave it there.
What really stands out for me as well is how well the game replicates the scenarios of war, how intense it was, and even at the start of the game it says that you are not intended to survive the experience, and right from the off that is true. As you take on the first part of the stories in the campaign, as you are going through the fields, and trying to hold positions at churches with the British army, you find that the German army will be on you very quickly, and with the vast amount of space there is available in the game area, you will find that there are enemies on all sides of you, and yes, that warning at the beginning holds true. I found myself dying several times due to being overwhelmed by the enemy. What was brilliant, and a bit upsetting was that when you died, It brought up the name of the solider you were playing and how old they were, and there were some that were only 18-19 years of age, which was quite upsetting. Although again, later in loading screens it does mention that a soldier’s age can be determined in hours, due to how many died in the conflict.
One element that I did find annoying was the flying element, and I think this was mainly down to the controls. To steer and fly the plane, you used the right stick, while the left one was used for throttle to speed up or slow down. A lot of the time I would either get them mixed up or I would try and combine the two sticks and not get very far… I crashed a lot. I think these could have been simplified a little more by combining the 2 sticks and using the right trigger for throttle, the guns on the plane could then have been shifted to the shoulder buttons.
This was my only reserve from the campaign stories, in terms of graphics, I can’t complain. The game is absolutely stunning, the lighting and effects for the different areas, whether you’re in no man’s land or in the desert, each area has been captured in its own beauty and the atmosphere that has been placed to it is amazing. The cut scenes and animations are smooth and the AI seems well placed and doesn’t randomly run in stupid areas when alerted. They always seem to place themselves smartly to defend which ever base/area they are in.
The sounds within the game and the atmosphere that these create on the battlefield are wonderful, when I had my headset on, the realism that this created to help me get into the game. Especially when you are creeping through the trenches, trying to keep a low profile to get back to your own side of no man's land, how you have to creep through narrow trenches and open fields trying not to be spotted. Making sure that your footing when going down embankments is right, as the slightest wrong step could cause anything to fall and make a noise, alerting the enemy. Which I found when it happened to me wasn't to bad as not many seemed to be in the area that I was in, but I'm betting that there are worse areas I could have done that in.
The sound of the guns as well, which was something I noticed when I had my headset on, as there are so many people, there are literally hundreds of guns going off at the same time, flashes everywhere and grenades being thrown. These sounds for me were breathtaking, and because they were all around my headset replicated that, so I didn't know whether I was coming or going at times, and if there weren't markers on the screen, I wouldn't have know where I was getting shot from at times as there were so many sounds going off. Which by all means isn't a bad thing and I can only think that this is what soldiers at the time went through.
I haven't played enough of the multiplayer to review it yet, but I will hopefully get this done soon.
Overall the game is a very good one and for me the right step in the series, I love the setting and how the game has been played out and I would highly recommend it to anyone.
9/10
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