One of the biggest questions that has been raised regarding EA‘s fourth numbered entry in the Battlefield series, is just how well the next generation versions of the game will turn out.
After fifteen minutes with the conquest multiplayer mode on Xbox One, prospective next-gen hardware owners should find relief; Battlefield 4 on Xbox One (and by likely extension, PlayStation 4) is the closest the console versions have ever gotten to replicating the full-bodied glory of the PC Battlefield experience. Though at this early stage at least, some aesthetic trade-offs appear evident.
Let’s start with the good stuff though eh?
Playing on a new conquest map titled Zavod 311, one of the main benefits brought by next-generation grunt to the console Battlefield experience is the framerate. No longer stuck at the 30 FPS ceiling, Battlefield 4 on Xbox One runs silkily smooth with an apparently locked 60 FPS update that gives console players the sort of responsiveness and smoothness that they previously have never been able to enjoy.
Battlefield has never, ever, ran this smoothly on console before; the framerate never wavering even when the screen is packed with vehicles, explosions, troops and fancy environmental effects.
In order to achieve this rock solid framerate, especially this early on in the developer’s learning curve of the console’s architecture, some trade-offs needed to happen.
Primarily, the main visual areas which have suffered some reduction in quality to fulfill this trade-off is the quality of the textures; the application of some much lower quality textures being seen on the grass and associated rural brush throughout the Zavod 311 game map. In all fairness however, I was much closer to the TV then I otherwise would have been (just over a foot away), so the drop in visual fidelity might not be as pronounced as if you were sitting six feet away from the screen like a normal person.
ersonally speaking however, having only experienced both the current-gen and PC versions of Battlefield 3, the return of a robust framerate for some visual fidelity is something definitely worth having; especially when the latter can affect the gameplay experience so considerably as Battlefield (and Call of Duty) veterans can attest to.
In other areas, the Xbox One still proved to be an effective showcase of the new tricks that the Frostbite 3 engine can lend to Battlefield 4′s peerless theater of open-world warfare. Chief among these is the destructibility and deformation of structures and the surrounding local environment.
Significantly more granular than the destruction seen in Battlefield 3, Battlefield 4 on Xbox One actually looks like its at last properly fulfilling the 2011 title’s “Destruction 2.0″ mandate. Such instances as bullet rounds striking a wooden fence, creating bespoke holes in their wake instead of the preset and scripted chasms seen previously, or rockets punching non-linear holes in buildings depending on the angle and impact of the explosion all add up to create a Battlefield title that enables the player far greater freedom when it comes to the destruction of objects in the world.
Disappointingly, the Zavod 311 map itself was a largely unspectacular setting for the sorts of large scale military conflicts that fans might expect. An unremarkable hodgepodge of wooded areas, paths and ruined structures, it certainly didn’t enthrall as confidently as the previously announced Paracel Storm and Siege of Shanghai maps did and moreover, did little to assuage worried fans that Battlefield 4 might just be a little too familiar for their tastes.
Quite frankly, the mind boggles why the latter of those two maps, only very recently just released in beta form a couple of days after the Eurogamer Expo had concluded, wasn’t the chosen to show off the game and its new shiny new falling buildings, collapsing city streets and more.
So in playing a 32-player multiplayer conquest game on a map that doesn’t appear terribly accommodating of the game’s new tricks, its quite difficult to make an informed judgement on just how different it is from its immediate predecessor. New tricks aside though, this is unmistakably Battlefield; the rush of wide-spread combat, vehicular carnage and the creative latitude to carve out your own story within its unparalleled militaristic canvas remains unsullied at this point.
Certainly, while potential next-generation console owners should feel buoyed by the competency of their versions of the game, it would have been nice to have a taste of something a little more substantial given that we are less than two months removed from Battlefield’s next-generation console debut.
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