@colourful_hippie: I didn't expect but I at least had hoped that they would approach the subject more respectfully.

@dudeglove: They're idiots sure and also risk averse. I doubt they want to risk sales by catering to the Russian market that is still plagued by the ruble fluctuations (even though they aren't as extreme as the past two years) and then attempt having something historically accurate as to not piss off French players who may not like playing something arcadey in something that is supposed to recreate a troubling period of time for them.

But yeah they're most likely idiots for not digging in further to be sure instead of relying on the anecdotes I just provided but why bother when you can make a safe bet with a large game on the larger U.S. market?

Honestly, I was surprised EA was attempting WWI in the first place because of its complexity. I'm not shocked to see them hedge bets by dumbing down the conflict to appeal to a broad base as possible who's only reference to what that war was is the Lusitania sinking, trenches, and spiked helmets.

@colourful_hippie: You do realize it is not a limited resource, is it? The effort of having 6 or 20 countries being represented is pretty much the same. Since they are not likely to distinguish the factions from a gameplay perspective, including them would account to little more than a uniform skin and a flag.

Heck, they could include all the allies and central members in there and it would cost them next to nothing, while being scarce about it risks some glaring omissions.

Wouldn't want things like Verdun or Tannenberg in your WWI game would ya? How can you leave France and Russia out?

If they can only put so many nations in the game at launch for some dumb reason including the USA and Italy in DLC would be a great way to boost the player base a few months after release.

@hayt: If they're gurkha's, thats fine.

If those are AIF troops, we didn't wear union jack insignia, period. Still dubious though.

The Americans are the obvious group that could and probably should be excluded, but, let's be real. We know how marketing works.

While lack of Russian and French perspectives is notable, I find it very interesting that the Ottomans, Astro-Hungarians and Italians will be playable in SP; having Russia and France in MP may well be good enough.

All of the above said, it's weird to me that everyone seems to expect X or Y nation in a WWI game. Many countries fought, and there are many perspectives to tell. It is entirely conceivable that an interesting WWI game is made without France, believe it or not. The game does not have to be about France to have a chance at being interesting. The fact that they are the historical focal point seems really irrelevant. There's other interesting things happening too.

Plus, there's always DLC.

@hermes: 3D modeling takes time and money even if you're only generating a handful of unique assets per faction. They could include all allied and central powers except for one thing. They already have all the central powers in there. The number of allied powers greatly outnumbered the number of central powers.

In a timeline sense I'm thinking that the multiplayer would be taking place around 1918 because that's when the concept of combined arms (tanks and infantry together) really started taking off. By that point the Russians were already well out of the war. From a visual perspective there's something iconic about the flat helmets worn by the Americans and British that always comes to mind when thinking of the war. WWI is flat helmets vs. Spiky helmets and that's what people want.

The French should be in there but I can see a logical path on how they made this decision. Also it's the multiplayer of a battlefield game let's not pretend like they've ever been historically accurate

@geraltitude: It might have been a typo, but the Otttomans, Austro-Hungarians and Italians will be playable in MP while France and Russia will not. They might still feature in the SP though.

As to your point about not needing the France to tell a WWI story you are totally right, but since they have both the British and Americans they are telling a western front story (in adittion to other fronts). And at that point not having the French is a major oversight.

Russia sure i get it by the and of the war they where fighting there own commisars getting ready for the Bolshevik revolution. But a WWI game with out France is mind boggling. I visited Verdun for the first time a month ago, And the sacrifice the French made is not something you can explain in a single word its really sad and its offensive to not include France in this game. Also Where's Belgium !

Goes to show how little I know about Battlefield, I thought it was always only two factions with only cosmetic differences.

It's all cause that dumbass Kaiser Wilhelm didn't pay for the Season Pass.

War in a nutshell.

It just doesn't make any sense when most of the biggest battles/battlefields in WWI took place in or were fought by France or Russia.

@odinsmana: Belgium barely made it a solid 3 months resisting Germany (brave though, Germany expected them to roll over). I don't think not including Belgium is a big deal. Leaving out France, which was involved in the conflict for a solid 4 years and was consumed by 1000s of miles of trenches is ridiculous.

France should be there. Russia was there, but their role was to be proven a paper tiger that was repeatedly crushed until their government collapsed and they surrendered... I kinda don't think they're a good choice for evenly matched maps? I guess we're talking alternate history, though, so maybe they actually have bullets in this one.

Oh come now, Dice is Swedish, we take any opportunity we have to poke fun at Russia's expense because we have a latent fear of invasion. And we all kind of think French are annoying because they refuse to learn English, which makes vacationing there a real hassle if you don't know French.

I jest. But to be honest I don't really care what factions are in multiplayer, because unless the weaponry will be faction specific and there's a distinct difference to them, it's just a flag and a skin and that's the last thing I'll pay attention to while playing.

In MP: British, German, Austro-Hungarian, Italian, Ottoman, and American

Y'all are complaining about one-half of the game in which gameplay take place on pre-determined levels designed for repeated and balanced play, not to represent the goings of an actual battle in WWI. While it doesn't really compute why the French of all were not included in these skin and voice combo packs we call "teams", that does not mean they are not included in single-player which would likely take shape around actual battles in the war. It would be quite difficult if even following the most general histories of the conflict to avoid the French. Who knows? Maybe we'll be in the boots of a French soldier at one point? We only have the vague blurs of a trailer to base the singleplayer experience on thus far, so let's just wait and see until we lose our shit over this?

Also, I'm surprised they gave any look to the Italians and Ottomans, even in multiplayer. I'm also surprised that Canadians aren't bitching about their inclusion since the war takes up one of the largest chunks of their military history (and a highly celebrated one at that).

Yeah, super super weird; moreso France. Just... Huh....

@hassun: It sort've does make sense considering they've said several times they wanted to look at lesser known aspects of WW1.

To include the ottomans and not France is insane. At least Russia left the war early. I assume they're including the ottomans for Gallipoli alone?

Anyone who is flabbergasted about America's inclusion is a terrible business person. They had to do it.

Well, there's also the Arab Revolts (which is presumably going to be in at launch, what with the desert and horseback combat etc)

It's weird that there will probably be a map set in Gallipoli, and in the middle east where the arab revolts took place, but no real historical anything besides that.

If they had blurbs on all the weapons and loading screens about the actual war I'd appreciate that, give some context to the silly shooting game.

The single player campaign will probably be a good place to start if a new player is utterly clueless why people are fighting over certain locations... then again, the campaign might just suck.

There are honestly too many unknowns to be truly angry at DICE yet, which is why I give some of the raging in this thread a sad chuckle before moving on

@darkbeatdk: To be fair, Austria-Hungary started WWI.

I'm willing to bet Russia and France are going to be in there somewhere, you just can't see them since they are behind a DLC pay-wall.

@ivdamke: I would argue that if they really wanted that they would not have put the British or the Americans in the game and put in the French and the Russians instead. Especially the Russians.

E.g. I wonder how many people know about stuff like the Brusilov offensive.

@hassun: And that's definitely a valid point, I just find that expecting DICE to cover exactly what everyone wants individually as a bit unfair. Sure I will submit that leaving out the French and Russians is unfortunate but I also don't think that's a negative either, they simply chose to focus on something else instead. Whether that is a positive or not will determine whether the exclusion of the French and Russians is a negative.

It's also jarring to me how much people care about this stuff now when Battlefield has never been a franchise to respectfully represent the horrible events of war. But that's another discussion.

The Americans were pretty much only involved in the Western Front, same as France. If they're going to include the Americans but not the French, then they'll really have to stretch to make a scenario where the Americans themselves fight the Germans seem interesting and believable. I suppose it could be done, but I remain skeptical.

Also, since most people will just play the multiplayer over and over and over again, I bet it will eventually become jarring to not see two of the top tier countries involved in WWI. If enough people feel like France and Russia should be included, EA and DICE will hear their words, and it would be disappointing for them to not respond.

Battlefield: Origins of Warfare wouldve been a better name. Why would you even tie this to WW1 if you remove the most basic World War 1 characteristics? Sure you can point at zeppelins and early tanks as being 'WW1'-ish, but cmon. If you're not going to represent WW1 at all , why even worry about stuff like the historic knowledge of kids these days?

At this point, i sincerely hope that kids won't pay attention to the story told in BF1, because it will only paint an incredibly misguided picture. 'So uhh.. Europe was a mess, and then Americans jumped in the fight and killed these evil Germans and burned some Zeppelins and that was that'

@geraltitude said:

Dingdingdingdingding.

"To really do justice to the French army in multiplayer and, once again, to show a side that we're not used to seeing, we have chosen to dedicate an entire premium expansion with special treatment after the launch of the game."

I'll eat my hat if there's not a "Eastern Front of World War I" DLC pack as part of the Battlefield 1 Premium lineup.

That`s... almost worse.

@cav829: @odinsmana: EA, and the video games industry as a whole, can be so damn predictable.

When I was younger and games were more rudimentary, when something was left out of a game you would figure it was due to lack of resources or the technology necessary to bring it to fruition (and you might even be right). One unfortunate side-effect that comes with the advances of modern games, and the larger scope and cost of producing them, is that nowadays you can almost always be on the mark if you just assume missing content/features are due to some (some would argue, shitty) business practices or chance for further microtransaction revenue.

Canadians don't expect to have their country's history or culture featured in popular media, even when it makes sense. Why get upset? Now, it would be dumb if Ypres or Somme are maps and there is no Canadian option, but maybe the British forces will have a Canadian skin or something.

Putting aside the racist ramblings of the rest of the post, I don't think a historical retelling of WW1 would make for a great game (I'll acknowledge that Ubisoft one though). Everything about WW1 is pretty awful. Everything about WW2 is pretty awful too but we've had plenty of good historically inaccurate shooters about that.

France confirmed PREMIUM DLC: http://www.pcgamer.com/french-forces-will-be-premium-dlc-for-battlefield-1/

Lol...AAA game development....

Jesus christ. These forums sometimes.

Want to save Verdun?

That'll be a $20 season pass thanks.

@hassun:So exactly like Battlefield 1942 with the French and Italians. People this isn't new, the outrage about this is quite ridiculous.

We live in an age of manufactured outrage, and boy is it something to witness in motion

@bisonhero: The exclusions are obvious and you pointed them out. Feel free to inform yourself about the role of every country in the war though. If you want to climb up onto the throne of righteous indignation, be sure your ass can sit in it.

@norm: @godzilla_sushi: @giantstalker: @btrdeadthanred:@godzilla_sushi:

As an ardent hater of the outrage culture, I really don't want this aimed at this issue. I have already clearly explained the perfectly logical reasons why not including these factions makes no sense.

Please try to avoid personal insults as well.

@ivdamke: That's a terrible comparison to make. Both in terms of how Battlefield 1942 is a different game and also the war it covers and who the major players were.

They said the French are in the single player campaign and also part of DLC for multiplayer. Not sure if this was mentioned and don't care to read through with all the racism/bickering I quickly glanced at.

@hassun: wasn't aimed at you mate. There's far more ridiculous outrage in this thread.

@btrdeadthanred: Yeah I was just trying to prevent it from derailing or devolving into arguments. Not aimed at you in particular.