Space Invader’s shields were prosaic forms of the walls we hide behind in today’s games in order to take cover from enemy fire, but as plain as they appeared they still had one thing above most of the pieces of shelter we see today, their destructibility. This had a huge influence on how the game was played. Walls in first person shooters, unless placed there for the sole purpose of being brought down by a well place explosion, tend to be impenetrable to even the largest of payloads. That is until now. Battlefield: Bad Company has changed all that, and although the rest of the game offers up some fantastic gameplay, its lasting imprint upon the videogame landscape will be the way in which cover is almost never permanent and its destruction can be used as a tactic by either side.
Crysis had an environment that was incredibly destructible which created a great playground for the player to tear apart. And although its technical prowess was, to be fair, much greater than Bad Company’s in terms of the way in which this devastation was reaped, the player’s connectedness to the gameworld falls short of Battlefield’s, feeling slightly more surgical. In Bad Company, when you take out a cinderblock wall, the cloud of dust left behind obscuring your view, the sound of crumbling bricks and the way that the battlefield is metamorphisised into something new, makes the action feel a great deal more satisfying. The effect you can have on your environmental and tactical benefits of this all go to show that rather than be included as a gimmick this destruction is key to the gameplay of the game.
Hey guy, someone lives there you know. Well, they used to.
Bad Company’s Frostbite Engine not only allows for some great explosions and deformation but has also allowed its developers to create an incredibly visually impressive world in which to follow the exploits of its band of misfit soldiers. It truly is one of the best looking games on the Xbox 360 currently out there. From a hilltop you can peer out at the surrounding landscape, its wooded areas cradling scattered enemy outposts in hills and valleys which all rendered beautifully and distant objectives can be seen regardless of how far away they are.
The narrative of Bad Company’s campaign never really meets the lofty heights set by some other First Person Shooters, and although it isn’t truly great it’s never offensively bad either. The game follows the exploits of a group of soldiers whose misdemeanors, which could have landed them with a court marshal, have instead led them to be placed within a division whose members are handpicked for some of the worst jobs the army has to offer. Veritable human shields, a chance discovery of enemy gold leads them on a treasure hunt akin to that of the movie Three Kings or The Dirty Dozen. The dialogue is reasonably well written, with your other three wise cracking teammates allowing for a snicker or two, and at least it’s a change from the overly official, or steroided up characters we usually have to endure. Bad Company feels as though it would be perfect source material for one of those over the top, comedic action movies from the 80’s such as Tango and Cash.
Besides the tactical destruction there’s a few other ways in which Bad Company makes its niche within the FPS genre. The first that will probably be noticed by players is the way in which health is regenerated. Instead of fossicking through enemy corpses to find stimpacks or sitting around for your mutant healing factor to kick in, Bad Company has the player stab themselves in the chest with a giant syringe to regain health. It’s a novel, if not slightly odd, way to approach regeneration, but there are times when you do feel a bit foolish ripping out a syringe to plunge in your chest every 10 seconds, especially during the most heated of battles.
Pointing to its developer’s background in multiplayer FPS design, player death within Bad Company is dealt with using a respawn style re-entry into the game’s world. When you die, rather than start you from a checkpoint with all the damage you’ve done to your opposition reset, the game takes you and your squad back to a spawn point ready to continue where you left off – although in two or three key areas there are ‘hard’ checkpoints that will reset your progress. This is a godsend as there are areas that are devilishly difficult. Along with the huge explosions and over the top battles this adds to the fact that the game progresses somewhat like an old arcade shooter, just without the machine’s constant demands for more credits. Whether this lack of consequences for death works well is another question. Progression through the game is made with a certain amount detachment as a result, because no matter how daft your strategies, brute force will eventually snuff out the life of each enemy even if only one is killed per life.
Preston insisted on taking his Ben Heck created portable 360 wherever his squad went, claiming that Bad Company multiplayer took his mind off the depressing fact that he was in a real war.
Enemy AI is a weak point of Bad Company. There are times when your foes seem to know exactly where you are regardless of cover, and their aim is impeccable to boot. This means that you’ll often find yourself switching between gun and giant syringe filled with health juice in quick succession, which slightly detracts from the fun of simulated warfare. Your squad must be in cahoots with the enemy because they never seem be fired upon and rarely assist you in any meaningful way. The feeling is often still that you’re the classic videogame one man army, although this time, with some impervious comedians along for the ride.
DICE has a long heritage in multiplayer gaming, and although Battlefield’s public face has been its single player, it’s clear that the game’s real strength shines through in its competitive online mode. If you’ve played a Battlefield game before you’ll be well aware of the fact that these developers have the ability to create some of the best multiplayer experiences available, and Bad Company is no exception. Here nearly all of the issues of the single player campaign melt away, AI isn’t an issue, and as a result neither is the constant need to heal. Along with these things the destructible environments that the single player’s enemies rarely, if ever, use to their tactical advantage are perfect for human players to make the best of creating some interesting results. Blow up a nearby wall to uncover an enemy or distract someone close by and the action will undoubtedly heat up keeping the battle from becoming static. The structure of the battlefields also allows for some great firefights, and all are a good size and offer just the right amount of choke points and cover positions.
Bad Company’s multiplayer uses a similar unlocking weapon system to other Battlefield titles and Call of Duty 4 where kills earn you new ranks to access fresh weapons. However unlike the huge advantages that the latter’s unlocked weapons provided to those who had played for longer, here each weapon feels as if it’s on far more equal footing, feeling different yet relatively equal.
Whilst it’s not quite perfect, Bad Company’s legacy will most definitely be its satisfying use of tactical destruction. In no other FPS does changing environment factor so heavily into combat, or in such a fun way. Its single player could have used a little polish but the game’s multiplayer shines as one of the best available on console to date.
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