[Achillion]

True, it's not perfect, but where I play people use it a lot. The incentive the points give makes it worthwhile even if you're a jackass who wants to play it lone gunman.

I think the squad spawning mechanism makes the most difference though. Since I play hardcore mostly where spotting doesn't help much (well it shouts out and gives points on kill, but doesn't appear anywhere), spawning on your squadmates who are behind enemy lines sort of forces you to work together. I think that alone I think is a big game changer and the points incentive will help people realise you can't go around playing alone. It might take a while for new players to realise that you level twice as fast if you play nice, but I think a couple of months after it hits retail it'll feel more like BF and less like CoD.

EDIT: For some unknown reason, I thought the beta was a pre-order only thing. I just noticed now on Origin that it's completely open. Installing now.

[Al-Rik]

Well, the Squad Spawn is a nice feature, but many times in BF2 and in Bad Company your Squadmates only spawn at your position, only to run in different directions instead of supporting you.
( And in worst cases they reveal your position )

For me are other functions more important. Like to communicate with my teammates.


The Hardcore BF2 Mod Project Reality has removed the spotting almost total ( only Recons can spot, and only with googles ) and they also removed the Squadspawn.
No Chance to spawn behind enemy lines by slipping with one player through them (or jumping out of a jet, using it as taxi).
No Crosshairs, headshoot is almost every time a kill, and if you don't get killed by the bullet you will quickly bleed to death if a medic isn't near.
But they keep the Comroses and even expand them.

Some hints for the beta:
The game launcher of BF3 gives you the option to create a party. To create a Party you have to invite players from your buddy list.
It's a group of players connected by voip. You can join as party, in that case the server try to put you at least on the same side. but still you have to be lucky to be in the same squad.

Disconnect your joystick before starting BF3, or it's possible that you spin around with out a chance to stop after spawning

Gamesettings and Keybindings can only be changed In Game and spwaned.

[Achillion]

Yeah I heard about not being able to change settings when not spawned or playing. I guess with retail BF3 you'll be able to change settings in the single player menus before launching MP mode, but it's still a bit lame that they didn't think of that for the Beta.

[Achillion]

As a long time BFBC2 player, here are my positive impressions on differences in BF3 beta:

- Nothing is hidden. You had health in BC2, but no value, so you had to guess from the blood on the screen. Now you get a proper old school % meter on the hud. You also get the number of times you've killed each player and vice versa (displayed during kill cam). It's a nice touch for keeping track of "nemesis" type stats. I know they probably hid stuff like HP points in BC2 for "realism", but it's just plain jumping on the CoD bandwagon really.

- Kill assist points depending on the amount of damage you did. So, if you do 99 damage to an enemy and another person gets the kill, you'll get your 99 points out of 100 for the kill.

- Weapon attachments, gadgets and specs are different things. In BC2, they were all the same and if you chose something like lightweight gear to sprint faster, you couldn't get a rifle scope because they belonged to the same slot.

- Firing modes (semi or full auto). Just a nice detail that's often useful for sniping with an assault rifle.

- Prone. Self-explanatory I believe.

- Suppressive fire. Blurs an enemy's vision when being fired upon. Even if you can't see him, you can suppress an enemy by shooting near his cover while friendlies advance. Another nice feature, IMO.


As for the negative impressions, they've all been said:

- Settings, key bindings etc are inaccessible when dead.

- No full map. You can't see the full level at any given time, but you can enlarge the minimap during combat for details.


Also a neutral comment:

- Assault now drops medkits and support (was medic in BF2) drops ammo. I don't know how it was in older BF games, but in BC2 it was reversed. I can't say which one makes more sense though, to be honest.

[Al-Rik]

- Assault now drops medkits and support (was medic in BF2) drops ammo. I don't know how it was in older BF games, but in BC2 it was reversed. I can't say which one makes more sense though, to be honest.

In BF 2142 the Assault was also Medic.
In BF2 the Medic was armed with the same Weapon as the Assault + hand grenades.  + medkit + defib.
The Assault was armed with assault rifle, a nadelauchner (less useful in CQB as the granates) and no hand grenades.
most BF2 Players preferred the medic in close combat, because of the Defib, so Dice deicide to combine Assault and Medic in BF 2142.

[MR_T3D]

After playing the whole series over the last 10 years, I must say that I much prefer the LMG guy having ammo kits, because his main weapon is just better suited to being less mobile, "digging in" (C4+terrain deformation=trenches and foxholes) and providing suppressing fire.

[Achillion]

I accept that logic.
From what I've seen so far, I think classes share unlockable weapons, so they're only defined based on their secondary items and explosives.

Also, I don't know how it was in BF2, but here you have to unlock every attachment for each weapon separately. In BC2, unlocks were class based and were applied to all weapons of that class.

EDIT: Actually I was wrong. They don't share most unlockable weapons. I guess it is the same as BC2, where classes only share weapons unlocked through leveling.

[MR_T3D]

I accept that logic.
From what I've seen so far, I think classes share unlockable weapons, so they're only defined based on their secondary items and explosives.

Also, I don't know how it was in BF2, but here you have to unlock every attachment for each weapon separately. In BC2, unlocks were class based and were applied to all weapons of that class.

EDIT: Actually I was wrong. They don't share most unlockable weapons. I guess it is the same as BC2, where classes only share weapons unlocked through leveling.

All classes do share shotguns and PDWs (IE SMGs, PDR) and AS-VAL though
In BF2, the unlocks were limited to 2 extra weapons for each class. nothing more, nothing less.
Every class had full equipment, and I prefer things that way.

[Scourge of Ages]

Prone! Whoooot!
I can recon again!
I liked doing that in 2142, hitting the cloak and sneaking up on jerks. Didn't work at all in BC2, because obviously you can't cloak, but you can't even go prone to try to blend in with the ground.

[JGZinv]

You're forgetting scope glare has been added here..... looks like you're shining a flashlight at someone whenever you go to snipe
and stay still for a few seconds. You'll get 3-4 kills at best before you need to move, or you'll get a batch of people after you soon
as they respawn.

There's no wookie suits either...

[Achillion]

You're forgetting scope glare has been added here..... looks like you're shining a flashlight at someone whenever you go to snipe
and stay still for a few seconds. You'll get 3-4 kills at best before you need to move, or you'll get a batch of people after you soon
as they respawn.

There's no wookie suits either...

I did forget that. It's good for keeping snipers on their toes, but a bit overdone at times I think.
Also, you can blind people with flashlights, so it's a nice balance between lighting up dark areas and blinding at close range against revealing your position.
You can also semi-blind people with laser sights, but if you got a laser sight in someone's eye it probably means you're one click away from a headshot.

[IceFire]

Been playing the beta the last few days. It's pretty good but pretty buggy as well. I'd like to see more teamwork elements come back in. Battlefield 2 was fantastic at that. Bad Company 2 was alright and had some. The beta has very little but I'm expecting to see more in the final product.

Gameplay is definitely not CoD. It's very tactical and fairly difficult to succeed at. No running and gunning at all.

[Unknown Target]

Apparently you can only access squads via Origin, that might explain why some of the team play has gone away.

Went from definitely going to buy it to probably not, over the course of playing the game and experiencing Origin as well.

[Hades]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xRs7pYI1vo

[Achillion]

Apparently you can only access squads via Origin, that might explain why some of the team play has gone away.

What do you mean? I know you can leave and enter a squad at any time during a game, but the difference with BC2 is that you can't choose which squad to join and there's no way to see the squads laid out (see who's with who).

Also, they did remove most of the contextual Q commands. The only thing I've managed to do with Q is spot an enemy (no orders, call for help, or anything).

I doubt they left these kind of features out of the beta but plan to include them in the final. You'd think they would want people to try them out and get used to them as well as advertise certain parts of it. I also doubt that if they were to be included that they weren't implemented before the beta went live.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xRs7pYI1vo

Funny vid, but I can't help thinking "OH NOES! A BETA WITH BUGS" while watching it.

[Al-Rik]

Well, Origin is not more a no go than Steam . If Origin also handles the patching of the game and Download-Contents I'm not mad about it.
In fact, a good tool to patch the game and to get new Maps was always a thing BF2 and BF 2142 lacked.
I also don't mind to pay for new multiplayer maps. Making models and texturing them is a lot of work ( as anyone who browses at hard light should know ) and so its only fair to pay for Maps with new models.

But actually joining and starting the game is handled by the Battleblog, a normal website.
The funny thing about it: It's the best Serverbrowser that a BF Game has
Some functions - like the Battlereport ( the stats of the last rounds you have played ), the Platoons and the List of Friends are real good.

At the moment the Squadmanagment its broken. You can't play with your friends in the same Squad, and you can't communicate with the other players in the squad.
But you need to communicate to be successful in the game.

Maybe Dice has it f'cked up to integrate the CommRoses in the Beta Build because it's buggy (that's the official version).
Maybe they decided first to make the game without and later they decided to integrate them after the Battlefield 2 Fans demanded it (that's a theory of many players).

But in fact the Beta Squadmismanagment shows how they CommRoses are missing.
I'm not quit sure if a casual player has a lot of fun, if he plays in a scrambled squad without friends in VOIP an no chance to communicate otherwise.

Comparison:
PC Version vs PS 3 Version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGbo50Ar420

[IceFire]

There was some rumors circulating in the last day or so that Steam support would be back. I can say, without a doubt, that Steam has the slicker implementation at this point. You can change your account nickname, the software doesn't pop up when it starts as a service on my system (Origin has been announcing it's presence), it uses a fraction of the memory required, etc. Origin isn't as bad as everyone is saying... it's just not great either.

I did also read that squad support is going to be back and fully implemented at release. Due to the certification process the beta was already a month old code by the time we started playing it. By release date it will be 2 months old code. I'm expecting good things from the initial launch and a fully functioning and near flawless game by early next year if other Battlefield releases are any indication

[Mongoose]

To be completely fair, Steam was also widely-maligned when Valve first launched it; it took a couple of years before it became what it is now, and it may take EA a bit of time to iron out the kinks.  That being said, considering that Steam is the elephant in the market, you'd think that approaching its level of service as much as possible would be a big development priority.

[Ravenholme]

To be completely fair, Steam was also widely-maligned when Valve first launched it; it took a couple of years before it became what it is now, and it may take EA a bit of time to iron out the kinks.  That being said, considering that Steam is the elephant in the market, you'd think that approaching its level of service as much as possible would be a big development priority.

Aye, Valve broke ground with Steam. Origin should not have these programs launching into a mature DD service market.

[Gortef]

So far the Beta has been more or less something I expected. Even though I would have preferred a real Battlefield map (like Caspian Border) all the new infantry elements (scope lense glare, flashlight, suppression etc.) are much more apparent on this Metro map. And they really do make quite a big difference.

But oh boy it still feels to be far from a finished product. The fellas will have to push really had to get this in release condition on this time frame.