Years ago, while at the cousin of one of my friends’ house, we spent the whole day checking out his games waiting for our parents to come back. We came across a game called Battlefield 1942. The first map I played on this game was Omaha Beach, as I had been completely psyched to after seeing Saving Private Ryan a short time before. I thought that this game would generally just have been Call of Duty and that I would simply spawn on the beach and there would be a deathmatch type setting, where one just finds and kills the enemy players and then respawns. What I found was completely different. What I found was that you actually spawn on your boat, a boat which you can enter and provide artilery support, or drive. From this boat, you must get into a landing craft, which requires a gunner, a driver, and passengers. Then from there, you land on the beach and it’s nearly everyman for himself. I later played some more maps and found that this game was special. In this game, you can go from an infantryman who jumps into a tank, recks havoc on an enemy airfield, steals a plane and becomes a pilot, bombs a few other locations, shoots down some enemy planes, and then parachutes out onto and enemy boat and sabatoges it with explosives. What other game can you literally be part of every aspect of the battlefield?

Now it’s five years later and I’ve recently purchased the newest release of the series for my Xbox 360, Battlefield: Bad Company. I have got to say, I really do not understand the reasoning of why others do not get this game. For the love of all things good, get this game, you will not regret it.

I’d have to start off with what I think the most entertaining aspect of the game is; and I assure you there are a lot. The game features a completely new engine developed by DiCE called Frostbite. Now the special thing about this engine is because somehow, beyond the laws of physics, DiCE has managed to make up to 90% of the environment of the game destructable. What does this mean? EVERYTHING! You can blow %^!$ up! If you’re a sniper and you’re trying to tag a tank with your targeting laser for the jets to take it out, well buddy, if the tank sees the reflection of your scope, the wall you’re hiding behind will be gone, and you’ll be standing there with remnant pieces of drywall floating around wondering what the hell just happened.

If you’re in the tank on the other hand, well just take a nice stroll along the road, and if there is no road in your path, make one. Trees, buildings and bunkers can all be either blown out or ploughed over with your tank.

If you’re an infantryman now and you got some guy popping in and out of cover from a house between you and him, well just save some time, blow a few holes in the walls of the house, go around and get some good knifing done for today.

Aside from this largely entertaining feature, the game still features the class system from other Battlefield games, this time limiting to about 5. The play can also still command the roles of various different vehicles and battlefield duties, like artilery, medic, sniper, tank driver, etc, but the ability to pilot jets has been removed from the game, for what I assume are lag and space-related reasons. But helicopters are still available in the game.

Battlefield: Bad Company also features a storyline, which is a first for the series. This single player mode is based on your experience as Preston Marlowe, and the storyline generally follows that of the 1999 movie Three Kings. If you haven’t seen the movie, well the game’s story is about 4 army misfits, part of the US Army’s Bad Company, who come across gold on one of their ill-conceived missions, and hence because you’re in some random Eastern-European and African countries with no real idea of why you’re there or if you’re making a difference; you just want to get paid.
 More relavent in the storyline, but also present in other aspects of the game are the small comedic things you get to do. During the storyline, you will find your other squad mates always caught up in some trivial, and yet amusing chatter during the course of some extremity of battle, which is something I find very comforting and relaxing while playing FPS games. I actually think that I play some games based on the amount of voice-over chatter I hear going on in the background. And with all the novelties included within Battlefield: Bad Company, well why wouldn’t you want a game that not only is fun to play, but also will make you laugh while playing.

I found that the reason why a lot of people haven’t picked up this game is because they give the over-used line of “I can just play Call of Duty!” Well no…no, you can’t. Unless in Call of Duty, you can drive a tank through a house, to stick your barrel right up to a sniper’s face and then blow him out of the undemolished wall on the opposite side, well then no…this is not the same as Call of Duty. Pick up this game, I will guarantee, you will have hours amoung hours of fun.

Now if you already do have this game, if you’re a fan of the series, or you’re considering picking this up based on my review alone, well then I have great news for you; the sequel is planned for later this year .

Oh but not only that, if you miss the WWII-setting from Battlefield 1942, well I have even more good news for you, Battlefield 1943 is coming out this May. So be on the look out for Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and Battlefield 1943  this year. You can blow up people, you can blow up vehicles, you can blow up buildings, you can blow holes in the ground, but at the end of the day it call comes down to the fact that you will have fun.

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