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You may have been following the messy launch of Battlefield 2042 in recent months. The game from EA’s DICE hasn’t really captured the hearts of players as was expected. Although the game is visually stunning, as you can read in our review, it has lacked a certain umph fans of the series have been looking for. Now, well known insider Tom Henderson has released a video explaining at least some of the issues that the game face during the development process which resulted in this lacklustre release.
As reported by TweakTown, Tom Henderson’s “Development Timeline & The Future of Battlefield” video explains the timeline of events for the game’s production and release. This means breaking down its influences, the pandemic and even giving us an idea of when the game actually began production. And though starting pre-production all the way back in November 2018, Battlefield 2042 was only in active development from August 2020 to November 2021 - 15 months.
Here are some of the best wins and fails in Battlefield 2042...
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A year and three months is a really short amount of time for a game on the scale of Battlefield 2042 to come out in. And that’s doubly the case in a global pandemic where junior developers didn’t have more superior developers on hand to help, a lack of equipment in certain dev’s homes, and many experienced developers with long histories at DICE leaving the company even before active development began.
If what Henderson says is accurate, the game’s vision changed several times during development. Originally, the game was going to be battle royale focused, but Apex Legends’ release, and Warzone’s success made EA want to stick to a traditional Battlefield game. The remnants of that game are now in the Hazard Zone mode, which in itself was going to be a free-to-play game on its own at one point.
Additionally the changes to the class system was a symptom of being influenced by character driven games like Warzone and Apex Legends where personality of operators and legends was joined with weapon customisation.
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Post-release of this video from Tom Henderson, EA made a comment. It says: “We are serious about Battlefield. EA is investing significant time and resources into Battlefield 2042 and the long-term success of the franchise. We have a strong new leadership group overseeing Battlefield led by Vince Zampella, Founder of Respawn and Group General Manager, and Byron Beede, General Manager of Battlefield.
“Rebecka Coutaz, will take over as the General Manager of DICE, and work closely with Christian Grass at Ripple Effect Studios and Marcus Lehto who is building a new studio in the Seattle area focused on Battlefield. Also, Alex Seropian and his team at Industrial Toys continue their work on Battlefield Mobile.
“We will continue to grow and improve Battlefield 2042, as it is the foundation for the future of this franchise. We have the right leaders in place and we’re investing in the teams and resources to capture Battlefield’s massive potential.”
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Well at least that confirms that EA isn’t giving up on Battlefield anytime soon. There are cases of massive games like 2042 releasing to mediocre reviews and then reinventing themselves down the line to become a success. I mean normally I might try and use an example like Ubisoft’s continued efforts on Ghost Recon: Breakpoint here… but it’s just added NFTs to the game.
Featured Image Credit: EA / DiceTopics: Battlefield 2042, EA, Dice, Battlefield
