DICE has yet to tell us when we will officially be able to get our hands on the Battlefield: Bad Company 2 beta but GameStop has once again stepped in to fill the void.

While it has since been pulled Cinemablend reports that the GameStop listing for the Battlefield: Bad Company 2 limited edition stated that we would be seeing the official demo dropping on November 19th at 11PM PST. Of course, DICE then commented through the official Bad Company 2 Twitter that you need to hold off on pre-ordering for a beta code until they officially announce a release date.

Infinity Ward recently announced that they would be shipping Modern Warfare 2 for the PC with no support for dedicated servers which had most of the community freaking out. Today, DICE, the guys behind Battlefield: Bad Company 2, have said that despite Infinty Ward’s move, they will stay with dedicated servers.

DICE’s Gordon Van Dyke comments:

Since Battlefield 1942 DICE has used dedicated servers for all platforms. This formula has worked well, and still works well, for us and for the gaming community. We have stayed true to this practice and will continue this tradition into the upcoming title Battlefield Bad Company 2. With dedicated servers everyone gets non-stop action with no connection penalties based on some other player and their internet.  This makes dedicated servers the best solution for online PC gaming hands down!”

Read

Dedicated servers FTW. What ever secures a better online experience is a given for us

Yep, we agree: dedicated servers are always FTW. You can follow K.M. Troedsson twitter page here.

It seems that the guy who founded DICE, Fredrik Liljengren has moved onto bigger and better things with his latest game studio, Antic Entertainment. You may be familiar with DICE as the studio behind Battlefield: Bad Company and Battlefield: 1943.

Anyways, Antic Entertainment is to be a studio that specializes in free-to-play games with their first title being Junk: Battles. This browser based RTS will let players create their own ship and then duke it out against other players as they collect parts to upgrade said ship.

If you want to read more about Junk: Battles and Antic Entertainment, head over to the game’s official website here.

via gamasutra

Producer of the game, Gordon Van Dyke, speaks of the success below:

“We are honoured by the reception that the game has received so far. Watching and participating in this non-stop multiplayer action has been a real treat for us and we can’t believe how fast our fans reached 43 million kills. We can now truly say that we have set a new standard for what can be done in the downloadable games category and gamers recognize the endless value that Battlefield 1943 provides for just $15.”

Now that Battlefield 1943 has proven its worth I think its safe to say that EA will pull an Activision and release countless titles that mimic its gameplay.

via Kotaku

Yes, according to the official Battlefield 1943 twitter, you will in fact be able to use the weapons featured in said game in EA’s upcoming Battlefield: Bad Company 2. Below is said tweet:

Think you’re a Bad Ass with BF1943 weapons? What if I said you’ll be able to use your Semi-Auto Rifle, Sniper Rifle, or SMG in BFBC2!

I don’t know exactly who will opt for Battlefield 1943 weapons over Bad Company 2’s but at least it’s a cool feature to have, right?

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 will be out for the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC in Q1 of next year.

“When I get back into the office next week there will be some last minute checks (no more fixes (unless something is broken that I didn’t expect) or changes) and all being well the update 1.50 will be finalized and released officially.” Tingle said.

Changes since the beta started include a black cross hair on the TV guided missles and widescreen FoV on widescreen resolutions.

Read (Electronic Arts UK Community)

Battlefield Heroes was only recently unleashed onto the public and already EA and DICE are announcing that the game officially has over 1 million players. The game’s success could probably in part be attributed to the fact that it’s free to play. Of course, if you want to customize your characters in any way you’ll have to fork over some cash as the game’s business model is completely based around micro-transactions.

General Manager of the Battlefield Heroes team, Ben Cousins, commented on the  game’s early success:

“The team is really proud to have hit 1 million registrations at this early stage. Creating a character and gameplay experience that is totally yours is what sets this game apart – your hero can be anything from a bazooka-toting pirate, a grenade-throwing ninja or even a mime assassin!”

If you haven’t already checked out the game yourself be sure to take a glance at our Battlefield Heroes review to see what we thought of it.

via Kotaku

Electronic Arts has supplied us with a nice trailer for their new first-person-shooter Battlefield 1943. The game launched yesterday for the Xbox 360 and today for the PS3 for a reasonable $15 or 1200 MS Points.

If you’re like me and like your FPS served with a keyboard and mouse, the PC version is expected to come out sometime in September.

Check out our review of the game in case you’re wondering if it’s worth your time.

The game will be monetized by in-game purchases and advertising, but is otherwise free to play. You can check it out on the official site.

This is despite lackluster sales and rather disappointing reviews of Mirror’s Edge, which still managed to sell over a million copies. Developer DICE on the other hand, expected sales of over 3 million. Expect Mirror’s Edge 2 sometimes in 2010.

During the William Blair Growth Stock Conference, EA COO John Pleasants revealed that he saw the game at DICE, saying “I’ve had the luxury of looking at Battlefield 3 over at DICE in Sweden and was highly impressed by the way the team is working on that product. Pleasants also revealed that the game would not ship “this fiscal year”, which means the earliest release date would be Summer 2010. Battlefield 2 was released in Summer 2005.

The game was officialy confirmed back in February and if the visuals featured in above trailer are anything to go by it’s sure to be a hit. Then again, it’s not actual gameplay but instead a cinematic representation of what you will find if you decide to pick up Battlefield: Bad Company 2.

DICE says that Battlefield: Bad Company 2 will hit store shelves for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and PC sometime early next year. ]]> http://www.digitalbattle.com/2009/05/22/battlefield-bad-company-2s-multiplayer-caught-on-film/feed/ 0 http://www.digitalbattle.com/2009/05/13/battlefield-developer-underestimated-console-gamers/ http://www.digitalbattle.com/2009/05/13/battlefield-developer-underestimated-console-gamers/#comments Wed, 13 May 2009 20:28:31 +0000 James Hyde http://www.digitalbattle.com/?p=22811
Battlefield Bad Company was the first true Battlefield game released on the new generation of consoles, and the first one to feature a fully fledged single-player campaign.

Now developer DICE director Lars Gustavsson says in an interview with GamesIndustry, that they underestimated the console gamers, and thought that the hardcore FPS gamers always resided on the PC platform. Gustavsson said,

“I think one of our biggest mistakes with Battlefield: Bad Company.. was that when we started making it, laying out the plans, the view on the gamer was that it’s a console audience, and we need to treat them a bit more gently, since they’re less experienced,”

DICE will now take that knowledge and use it in the upcoming sequel, Bad Company 2, which will be released early next year on PC, PS3 and Xbox 360.

The new update includes:

FEATURES
- Additional support for Windows Vista.
- Added Highway Tampa as a required map.
- Added a new map called Operation Blue Pearl.

GAMEPLAY TWEAKS
- Changes made to both the J10 and F35B to make them more balanced. Please note that the J10 is a superior dogfighter to the F35B and as such these two aircraft will never be equally matched.
- AA targeting tweaked to make it more effective.
- Added checks to prevent “runway grieving”.
- Various changes made to prevent cheating.
- Tweaked the hit detection, hits will be more accurate to the model.
- Added support for the Novint Falcon controller.

Battlefield 1943, powered by the new Frostbite engine, will feature three of the most popular maps from Battlefield 1942, including the famous Wake Island.

Features
- Additional support for Windows Vista.
- Added Highway Tampa as a required map.
- Added a new map called Operation Blue Pearl.

Gameplay Tweaks
- Changes made to both the J10 and F35B to make them more balanced. Please note that the J10 is a superior dogfighter to the F35B and as such these two aircraft will never be equally matched.
- AA targeting tweaked to make it more effective.
- Added checks to prevent “runway grieving”.
- Various changes made to prevent cheating.
- Tweaked the hit detection, hits will be more accurate to the model.

EA also mentions that a beta of the patch will be available at the end of this month, but they also promised a beta at the end of November. Then it was December. And so on. Although now it seems that there is work being done on the patch.

Now however, they have detailed the new map which will be included in 1.5, called “Operation Blue Pearl”. In particular, DICE writes about the technical limitations of making a BF2 map;

When we make maps here at DICE we are constantly using programs that check draw-calls on our maps so that, wherever you position yourself on the map, the draw-calls never exceed the maximum limit. (A draw-call is when the game engine must call a texture image into the graphic card’s memory for it to be rendered on screen. The more draw-calls the game must make, the more it impacts computer performance so limiting these is one of the cornerstones of game production.)

The new update is expected to be released in the upcoming months.