Here at the Procrastinators we decided to try something crazy, or perhaps wacky, and split DICE’es newest endeavor (the Xbox 360 version) into two reviews: single player and multiplayer.  I’ll be tackling the single player campaign while another fellow Procrastinator hits the multiplayer.  So without further a due let’s get right to it.

My exposure to the Battlefieldseries of videogames is about a month’s worth of playing Battlefield 2142, and while I had fun; I didn’t get into it as much as a few of the other fellow Procrastinators did.  From what I’ve gathered from friends, websites, random people walking down street corners; the Battlefield series isn’t much on single player campaigns.  Either they are A: Pointless; B: A tutorial (at best), C: practically non-existent, or D: all of the above.  So, it was with great interest for me to hear DICE trying something different(?) with their latest money printing series.

Story.  Bad Company throws you into the boots of one Mr. Preston Marlowe; a soldier with family in the military dating all the way back to WW2.  He screws something up, and gets thrown into “Bad Company”(not the band) which according to the game is the worst squad a soldier can to be placed into.  There’s really not much else to him.  Thankfully he isn’t annoying, but instead of trying something new, DICE took the safe route and went with the actions speak louder than wordskind of “hero”(don’t get me wrong he does talk).  I have no problem with this mainly due to the fact that the three supporting characters that make up the rest of Bad Company are in my view “pretty freakin awesome”.  There’s a non stereotypical African American (thank you DICE) Sergeant named Sarge…well he has a real name, but they all call him Sarge…so yeah.  Next up we have Sweetwater the LMG tot’ in resident “Smart guy”.  He’s not your typical nerd (did I mention the LMG?), but definitely put his highest stat roll in intelligence.  Finally we have Haggard who fits the demolition side of the team.  To put it simply he likes to see things “blow up”.  They gave him sort of a southern accent, but it’s not overdone which is nice.  So there you have it; this motley crew makes up “Bad Company”.  What makes this group work for me is how far DICE went with these guys.  This crew could have easily fallen into the stereotypical trap, but instead they found a way to work nicely with what you’d expect from characters of this caliber.  Sure Haggard likes to blow stuff up, but his actual intelligence doesn’t suffer because of this trait.  He has some great dialogue.  Sweetwater gets the same treatment as well.  He may be the smart one, but he can still go toe to toe with Haggard’s jive talking.  The Sarge’s personality might be the stalest of the three, but his authoritative attitude helps maintain not only the balance of each personality but also keeping Sweetwater and Haggard in check.  The important thing is you can tell despite some name calling that these guys ultimately respect each other.  After meeting all the crew you’ll soon be thrown into the main story line after the first mission.  Without going into major detail, you and the gang end up chasing after a major mercenary’s gold.  The “main” bad guy is practically nonexistent, and only mentioned through dialogue.  When I did finally confront him I wondered if DICE was doing this just so he can play a bigger role in any potential sequels.  If you’re the kind of player that needs a prominent bad guy leader then you’ll be disappointed.  Otherwise you’ll have enough enemies to shoot at to keep your mind occupied.  The weakest supporting character you’ll meet down the road is the President of a particular country you’re in.  He’s kinda funny, but he’s pretty much a drunk version of Roman from GTA 4.  Mainly if you expect a rich engaging story then look else where.  It’s B movie grade, but the squad kept me interested.

Story cont. Something I did find a little odd actually has to do with ”Bad Company’s” history.  According to the game it’s the worst squad to be in because they do all the crap missions, and have the highest death rate.  Sarge actually volunteers to lead the squad so he can cut his tour of duty time.  This would mean only Sweetwater and Haggard are true members of Bad Company.  Here’s what I’m trying to get at.  In the game the three other guys are “invincible”.  As in like say Call of Duty 4 your squad can take point blank anything and still live.  I’m glad I don’t have to run over and heal my teammates a la Rainbow Six Vegas, but I never really got the sense that this squad was so bad.  I mean if you think about it don’t players have to go and do the dangerous missions in practically every FPS game anyway?  Plus, the squad gets screwed over multiple times, sometimes because of something they screwed up.  While other times it just seems like the game is just being mean for means sake.  These aren’t major things that will ruin the game, but just observations I’ve made while watching the in game cut scenes, and completing objectives.

Graphics. Good all around.  DICE does a fantastic job with the after effects from explosions.  All kinds of smoke, dirt, debris fill the screen giving you pretty much zero visibility.  You learn very quickly not to be close to any kind of explosion.  Walls damaged from explosions look great, and vary depending upon where the impact first hit.  Scenery wise you’ll get a mix of forest, water, and desert type locals which helps throw some color into the pallet, but you’ll still feel like you’re playing a war type FPS.  The best details are probably visible on the weapons, vehicles, and when you rain down destruction.  The explosions actually feel like you’ve blown something up.  Trees and grass are good at distances, but once you get up close they lose their luster.  Definitely above average graphics, but this aspect of the game won’t be what people will be going gaga over.

Controls. Depending on what equipment you’ve picked up throughout the course of the game determines where it is on the control scheme.  It can be a little confusing at first, but the decision to split your equipment into two “piles” helps cut down on cycling time.  Aiming is also another smooth feat having gone the same route as Call of Duty 4.  You pull the left trigger to look down your gun’s iron site which gives you a slightly “zoomed in” effect.  It doesn’t replace an actual scope, but it’s not meant to.  Not all the guns allow you to look down their iron sites when you pull the left trigger.  I was fortunate enough to get into the beta, and when I stumbled upon this I just thought it might be a screw up.  Now having played the actual game, and seeing this still present continues to leave me puzzled.  You still get a partial zoom effect, but you don’t actually look down the sites.  Speaking of guns though I can’t help but notice that your character never has a pistol unless you pick up a sniper rifle.  This is something I’m not terribly fond of because on occasion I found myself out of rifle ammo, and not having at least a pistol backup seems kinda…oh what’s the right word?  Oh right, lame.  I guess they try to make up for it by placing ammo crates throughout the map, but it still doesn’t feel right not having a sidearm in a army FPS.  As an alternative like many FPS games you get a melee option in the form of a knife attack.  Bad Company lets you keep the knife out instead of just swiping with it then slipping it back into its sheath.  I wish you could run and swipe, but I can see how that could cause some uproar amongst gamers.  I’m not quite sold on the grenades in this game though.  The grenade launchers are fine(against structures, people that’s a whole other story), but plain frag grenades are a mixed bag.  They’re half grenades from Call of Duty 4 and half Rainbow Six Vegas 2.  They have a much more natural feel than Vegas, but I don’t have the confidence of where they’ll go like I do in Call of Duty 4.  I also wish there was a grenade indicater when you get near a grenade.  In regards to the overall control scheme itself you’re allowed some variety, but I’m still holding out for a game that allows the gamer to map whatever action he or she wants to whatever button he or she wants to use.

Mood/tone/style/fun.  This area will ultimately make or break your enjoyment of the single player campaign.  For me the missions were fun, but repetitive.  Having vehicle options during the course of the campaign definitely added some variety to things, and having all four guys hop into a golf cart was priceless.  What will keep things “fresh” throughout the missions is the fact that you have the decision on how to complete each objective.  Yeah you’ll still have to blow said thing up, but if you want to go in stealthy you have that option; if you want to rush in guns a blazing you have that option as well.  The ability to blow holes into walls changes how you approach missions.  Cover is still an issue, but with this feature you can get yourself out of what would have otherwise been hair pulling situations.  It’s why I’ll be playing through it again, not only to get achievements, but because I actually had fun.  Perhaps the best design choice with this game comes from the sound department.  From the pop of reloading your grenade launcher to the absence of noise when you’re caught next to an explosion; every detail big or small is handled with extreme care.  It’s just a tad lower than big budget movie quality sound as far as I’m concerned, and that’s pretty amazing for a videogame.

Battlefield Bad Company’s single player campaign is a solid gaming experience.  It won’t change anyone’s world, but the ability to take out a buildings structural integrity (you’ll begin to miss this option rather quickly once it’s not available, i.e. in other FPS games), a memorable squad, vehicles, and an amazing sound design should kept your average gamer entertained.  I wish the team helped you out  more instead of relying on you to do everything.  For instance Haggard has a rocket launcher, but it feels like it’s there just for ascetic purposes most of the time.  A nice thing though if you do remove an enemy’s cover at least your squad will take advantage (for the most part) of the situation.  If Battlefield Bad Company was only packaged with a single player campaign then I’d advise just renting it.  There’s a fair amount to play, but not worth the $60 price tag.  Thankfully it does come with a multiplayer experience that I’ll leave for my fellow Procrastinator to tell you all about.

82 out of 100

–Gamin

---

Fellow Procrastinators:
Cade: 82
The j suN: 86
Kuna: B

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 5th, 2008 at 5:06 pm and is filed under Games, Gamin. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.