Heavily criticized since its release, Battlefield 2042 even rose among the most poorly rated games on Steam, with nearly 70% negative opinions out of a hundred thousand collected. Six months later, it could be that DICE’s game is finally beginning its first transformation towards redemption. Two weeks ago, its creators already announced the official withdrawal of Hazard Zonehis cooperative mode of survival.
This morning, the studio posted, for its version “1.0.0” (we will appreciate the irony), a series of patches (which can be found here). These adjustments aim as much at improving the behavior of infantrymen on the battlefield (retouched animations and movements), rebalancing their most problematic weapons (better aiming on shotgunsfaster projectiles on machine guns), new types of XP gain (revenge on an enemy who killed our teammates, damage a vehicle), a larger number of vehicles usable in All Out Warfare.
But the real “novelty” therefore came from the formalization of Season 1 of the game, called H-hourwhose additions have just been presented to us in several trailers. First of all, the game will have a new card: Exposure. Located in the Canadian Rockies, this new map takes the form of a base embedded in a cliff, of which we could quickly glimpse a veranda, a heliport or even a tunnel ripped into the rock, and puts verticality and ground-air combat in the spotlight. Playable at 128 in mode Conquest (on PC and consoles new gen only), it will also be passable at 64 in mode Breakthrough. A new Specialist, Ewelina Lis, will also make an appearance. Nicknamed “Vehicle Killer Expert”, the latter will be equipped with a rocket launcher whose projectiles can be directed in on-board view, and the line “Armor Hunter”, a skill which, according to Dice, will make it possible to display “valuable information about damaged vehicles.” On the arsenal side, we can count on two new stealth helicopters: the RAH-68 Huron on the American side, and the YG-99 Hannibal on the Russian side. For the soldiers, a crossbow grenade launcher makes its appearance, as well as the BSV-M, a sniper rifle designed for close and distant combat, without forgetting the possibility of using a smoke grenade launcher to create zones cover.
Finally, this Season 1 will be accompanied by a Battlepass, split across two tiers of content: Free and Premium. The former will be able to benefit from new weapons, vehicles and some cosmetic elements. Premiums (whose transaction is valued at 100 Battlefield Coins, or the equivalent of $10) will benefit from a wide range of cosmetic elements. DICE is also committed to the fact that this Premium content will in no way affect the gameplay itself.
See you on June 9 to check if Battlefield 2042 is well on its way to getting out of the mess.