Yesterday, things over on the Battlefield subreddit looked downright idyllic—or at least as idyllic as something can look when it’s packed full of footage of tanks toppling buildings and helicopters getting shot out of the sky. Thanks to a tidal wave of leaked Battlefield 6 footage, players were sharing their excitement about the series seemingly returning to its roots. Long-suffering Battlefield diehards were, at long last, willing to hope again.
But then DICE announced how class weapons are going to work, and now everything is awful again.
In an X article published yesterday by the official Battlefield account, DICE explained that the next Battlefield entry would abandon the specialists of 2042 and return fully to its traditional multiplayer classes. But there’s a catch: While class choice will determine signature gadgets, passive traits, and default weapon attachment packages, DICE said that all weapon types will be available to all classes.
Each class will get a bonus when using its signature weapon type—a Recon player will be able to hold their breath for longer while aiming down a sniper scope, for example—but otherwise, it’s a free for all. Engineers with sniper rifles. Ghillie-suited Recon troops with LMGs.
“We envision the future of Battlefield classes to be a series of interconnected systems and fundamentals that shape your role on the field, while granting you the freedom to customize how you execute that role,” DICE said.
For many Battlefield fundamentalists, however, this news was equivalent to a national tragedy.
Sentiment on the Battlefield subreddit immediately soured. Scrolling down the front page, you’ll find dozens of threads posted by players accusing DICE of dismantling class identity, ignoring the playerbase, and generally disrespecting Battlefield’s history. The atmosphere is one of a community experiencing a generational insult, a collective grieving process, and a communal swearing of vengeful oaths all at once.
One player called the news “disgusting,” asking “why they keep on ruining eveything [sic] on purpose???” Another insists that, because “mistakes to the scale of Battlefield 2042 cannot repeat itself EVER,” it’s the subreddit’s “duty as a community to supervise their work on the new game.”
Elsewhere, serving as the crowning screed in this maelstrom of angst, is a self-described “unhinged rant,” penned by a luminary who asserts that Battlefield players “are not MLG quickscoper montage 420 intervention mom get the camera kids who you can finesse Dad”s credit card out of. We have our own credit cards and we are not going to buy your dogshit fucking game if you take it down the same path as 2042.”
By continuing the unrestricted weapon anarchy of Battlefield 2042, the writer says, “it’s the definition of insanity here.”
Full disclosure here: I prefer class weapon restrictions in Battlefield myself. I think the game is more interesting, as most games tend to be, when the player doesn’t have complete freedom. Constraints lead players to make decisions and compromises, giving their choices more significance. The more a class determines how I’ll play, the more I care about which class I choose.
It is worth remembering, though, that the last decade of Battlefields have had some class-agnostic guns, and the current Battlefield Labs playtests are, after all, alpha playtests. Whatever Battlefield 6 will be called when it arrives, it’s fair to say it’s a long way off, and DICE has a history of being willing to make substantial class system reworks, like it did for Battlefield 2042 after launch.
So while I might agree with the incensed masses in principle, I can’t look at the subreddit without a certain Clickhole headline coming to mind. If I’m saluting anyone, it’s the single, brave soul who posted a thread titled “Please calm down.”
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