The latest chapter in the long-running Battlefield series has arrived with the release of Battlefield V. The game looks to follow up the success of Battlefield 1 with a World War 2 based game that puts players directly into the action with large and highly-detailed maps.
The solo portion of the game has players battle in some diverse locales and focuses on situations form history where the participants were not well known and did not receive much glory or attention for their deeds.
After the introduction, players have the following options as described by E.A.
Nordlys
This story involves a young resistance fighter who carries a weight greater than her weapons and ammo. Her story centers on not only her fight for her country’s liberation from occupying forces but her family’s survival.
Under No Flag
Tasked with blowing up German air bases in the scorching North African desert, a young British criminal with poor judgment causes mayhem – but learns valuable lessons.
Tirailleur
It’s high-intensity all-out infantry warfare, where Senegalese units of the French Colonial Forces fight to liberate the French “homeland” that they’ve never even seen before.
The stories were very enjoyable and thought provoking though I did get a few bugs while playing like a cut-scene lock up and some clipping issues where enemy characters were lodged in walls. Thankfully issues like this were few and I was able to complete the missions as they were engrossing and kept me riveted throughout.
I especially liked the Nordlys mission where I was able to don Skis and made my way around the frozen landscapes to complete my mission.
The missions were a mix of stealth, surviving waves of enemies, and capturing objectives which is what you would expect for a game of this type. The game does allow players to have a more diverse approach to completing missions as you can use vehicles and other objects found in the game to be creative. I was able to “borrow” a plane in Under No Flag to strafe the enemy locales. When my piloting skills were not up to snuff and I crashed in a lake; I redid the mission from a direct assault approach and things went much better for me.
The game uses a regenerative health system so should you take too much damage, simply take cover until you heal up and battle on. There is also an option to heal from time to time when battling online. Players will be able to pick up new weapons and ammunition off fallen enemies as well as at various points throughout the game.
Visually the game is very appealing from the open desert to the raging blizzard in the campaigns; there is plenty of eye candy to enjoy along with the action.
The online modes were very enjoyable as there were a variety of modes for players to enjoy.
There are eight maps which cover four geographic areas and E.A. lists the online modes as follows…
Conquest
You and your squad must fight point-to-point in 64-player Conquest mode, working to gain control of key locations on a massive multiplayer map.
Conquest Assault
Every inch of ground becomes precious as a line of capture points focuses the battle into all-out firefights in Conquest Assault mode, reworked and improved from Battlefield 1. In a twist on Conquest, using a classic majority rule set, your strategic choices are brought to the forefront as attacking and defending forces are drawn to a single objective at a time.
Frontlines
A mix of Conquest, Rush, and Battlefield™ 4’s Obliteration mode. Frontlines pits teams in a fight for chained control points in a tug-of-war. Both teams fight for one flag at a time, and once this objective is captured, the action moves on to the next. Conquering the last flag opens the enemy base, and then certain objectives suddenly become vulnerable to planted explosives– a new addition in Frontlines for Battlefield V.
Domination
A scaled-down version of Conquest, this packs in just as much infantry-focused action. Two teams battle over ownership of multiple objectives. Owning at least half of these flags will cause the enemy team to start losing respawns. Control more than half, and your enemy team will bleed respawns even faster.
Team Deathmatch
This is Battlefield pure and simple. Work closely with your squad to dispatch the most enemies of the two infantry teams and victory is yours. Use the new Fortifications to change the face of the battle.
Airborne
Spearhead a Grand Operation by replicating the feats of WW2 airborne soldiers. Brave a storm of fire and steel as you parachute down and mount an offensive. Each team gets a set number of tickets that represent a player’s respawn, where each death drains the total number of tickets until there is a winner.
Breakthrough
One side will push to seize all control points in a sector, and to force the enemy to retreat. Each engagement in Breakthrough is a frantic fight to capture sectors as an attacker and, for the defense, on-the-fly planning to keep the opposition at bay.
Final Stand
A nail-biting, tie-breaking mode, Final Stand appears depending on how well your team performed in the first three days of a Grand Operation. If the two factions are evenly-matched after days of fighting, you’ll find yourself armed with depleted ammo and no respawns, in this mode to determine the winner.
The multiplay was good and what impressed me was how fair the hit detection was. You did not have to empty an entire clip into an enemy to take them down nor did glancing shots also produce a fatal result. The maps were large and highly detailed which allowed players to try a mixture of gameplay styles to best suit their needs.
It should be noted that additional content for the game will be coming as the menus made mention of solo missions and other features that were listed as “coming soon” and we know that the Battle Royale mode for the game is not due until 2019 as an example.
It should also be noted that I did not see the Female fighter with the prosthetic arm that was featured in the announcement trailers for the game and caused division amongst fans upon the reveal for the game. If she was edited out, planned for a later date, or simply included for demonstration purposes remains to be seen. What is clear is that although fans may expect more content and be disappointed in having to wait for parts of the game to release at a later date, the game is enjoyable for fans of the series and after my experiences with the Beta; even better than expected. I look forward to seeing what the game will look like in the future once the coming updates and patches are applied, but for now; Battlefield V is a solid WW2 game with solid visuals and sound and is a worthy entry into the series.
4 stars out of 5
E.A. provided us with PC version of the game prior to release in order to do this review.
