I've put more hours into Battlefield 1 than any post-CoD: MW FPS, save the original Titanfall. I can't really explain why. There are things that I really like about the game (visuals, scale, variety), and several other things that I really don't. However, it's managed to grab my friends and I in ways multiplayer shooters rarely do these days. I had honestly almost given up on the genre entirely, and I feel like it may be giving the game too much credit for "revitalizing" it, but there's definitely something here. Still, this is becoming my DOTA, Destiny, et al., the kind of game to dump countless hours in pursuing some not-particularly-rewarding grind while only sometimes enjoying myself in the process. I swore I'd never fall in this trap; that I'd stop playing a game when I felt like I was beating my fists against an intentionally constructed wall purposed only with gating me. And yet, here we are.
Complaint paragraph: EA has made some frankly baffling choices with the menus and progression that I absolutely despise, much of which disappointingly hasn't improved from Battlefront. That you can't adjust your loadout during the LONG load times is fucking insane. You get a few moments on the second load screen, but not typically enough to do anything meaningful. Quitting from a game lobby seems to somehow take even longer. Also, don't even try to open a battlepack to pass the time. If the game actually loads mid-opening of the battlepack, you can very well lose your battlepack to the ether. And honestly, the battlepacks are shit anyway. It's virtually always a weapon skin, and it's usually a shitty one for a shitty gun you don't use. My personal "highlight" of using this system was scrapping a duplicate lame skin for enough scraps to exchange for a new battlepack, only to receive the exact same skin I scrapped. Fuck you, too, game. Furthermore, the progression moves at a seemingly glacial pace. That goes for both the random battlepacks (which are so infrequent that I'm legitimately surprised every time I get one) and the leveling up, which gives a paltry amount of war bonds that will buy you roughly one weapon. Which brings me to another point. There is no way (at least that I've found) to really try out a gun other than to buy it. I've got a pile of shit I'll never use after finding out the hard way that it's not my style. Also, all of the melee is somewhere between bad and awful. Finally on my shit list, the tanks are OP as fuck. Conquest is basically a "where's the tank" mode, which is some awful balance. I'm not at all excited that the first DLC contains an even beefier tank.
That said, there are some real highlights. Gameplay-wise, sniping is appropriately difficult and easy enough to spot that it discourages camping. Sniping can be effective, but you have to earn it, and I'm good with that, because it otherwise would have broken the whole game. The machine guns are mostly awkward pea-shooters. Pistols are well-done. Medic class is dope (Team Selbstlader Optical for life). The shotguns seem a bit too rangy, but aren't overly useful outside of a select few maps, so that's cool. The gas and incendiary grenades are great crowd control. Visually, the game is a marvel, with some terrific environments and animations, and those rare "Battlefield moments" when a plane crashes into the map and levels a building or some shit really are awesome. I think there's one thing that keeps me coming back, though, and it's War Pigeons. I've long been a team deathmatch guy with the occasional domination/CTF in there, but War Pigeons is typically an absolute blast. I love how dumb the name is, I love the anarchy/intensity of it, I love the teamwork it requires as everyone tries to build a perimeter around the pigeon, and I love that you can blast the pigeon out of the fucking sky to kill the hopes and dreams of the opposition as feathers rain from the heavens. It's fantastic. (Cool move: Toss an incendiary grenade when they're about to release it and roast that birdie.) I still excitedly yell "GOOOO PIGEON!!!" every fucking time we're releasing one because I'm an idiot, but let me have my fun. Finally, spectating games is more fun than it reasonably should be, and makes for a nice break sometimes.
Given the love/hate relationship I have with this game, I was recently put to a decision. Buy the DLC and go all-in on this thing, warts and all, or stay strong. I am weak. I bought the whole damn premium pass thing, partially so I could play the new shit now instead of in two weeks (again, another practice I don't really like supporting). In truth, they mostly reeled me in with the upcoming "In the Name of the Tsar" expansion, because I have a Scanlon-esque fascination with old Russia. FWIW, I like most of the new maps, with the exception of Verdun Heights. While perhaps the coolest-looking map yet because it's on fucking fire, it seems to be a sniper's paradise, as several areas force you to head through a trench into a hail of bullets from waiting enemies permanently aimed down that very trench, which isn't great. Overall, though, it's pretty good as far as DLC goes. $50 good? Well, we'll have to wait and see on that one. So now, I'm "Destiny guy" with this game. I'll say things like "the gameplay is mostly really good!" or "look how pretty it is!" to defend my questionable decision. I refuse to purchase battlepacks, though. That's the point where I'll know that they've truly broken me. Until then, I'll continue burning pigeons and wrestling with whether it's hate or love that blooms on the battlefield.
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