I'm running up the plain through the snow, running, because I just saw on my Minimap that Silo Number 4 just changed from that friendly blue icon to a sinister red. Those pesky europeans are at it again. On the hill overhead pulls up the square lumbering shape of an EU tank, facing me. As a lone pedestrian of a soldier, I have a few options, the quickest and simplest lined up before my fingers. "Spotted Tank." I yell down the radio. The Tank fires off a shell that I luckily miss by virtue of strafing. Luckily, our team Commander, a godlike eye-in-the-sky is on the ball, as the ground reverberates in a blue shimmer around the tank, it electrically surges - telltale sign of an EMP blast from the level's weapons sattellite. The Tank is temporarily immobilised, giving me a moment of reprieve with which I run around the back of it toward Silo #4. The Tank isn't the only one guarding it. I spot the activity of 3 silhouetted soldiers, glints of orange catching the light as they move between shade. An EU squad. As I lob a deftly-flung grenade in their direction, the Tank beside me wakes up, its swivelling gun springs to life, rotating my way once again. Helpfully, cover is never far from a Silo, and I relocate around the base of a staircased-tower before the turret can face me. From a peep-hole I watch the Tank try to reverse but the Commander is still watching him on sattellite, and calls for an Orbital Artillery Strike. The whistlings through the air of bombs momentarily terrifies all soldiers in the vicinity, indescriminate of team, and everyone bolts for cover - anywhere that can put a roof over their head. The thuds are loud and jarring, relentless for 10 seconds. When silence finally falls, the area where the Tank once stood is a scorched, flaming hulk, but now soldiers begin swarming out from shelter, and the battle for Silo #4 really begins...
This is a segment of what life is like in Battlefield:2142, an online futuristic shooter in which up to 64 human players can join together (via the delights of the internet) and wage war over vast snowy terrains.
The key to developing multiplayer war sims like this is to have a system of balanced character 'Classes' that each have a rock-paper-scissors effect upon coming into contact with an opposing class. Every team of 30 or so soldiers can pick 1 of 4 character loadouts, Assault, Support, Engineer, and Recon, with the further option of 'applying' in each game to become Commander (until the game ends, or democratic mutiny occurs). The 4 classes all have different situational traits that help them exploit the flow of the battle, and a lack of too many of one kind is a weakness in the whole team.
For instance, you need en Engineer to repair vehicles and mechanical machines, as well as do damage to enemy vehicles. You need a Sniper(recon) to allow striking soldiers to advance, and whereas the Supportist can replenish ammo, the Assault class of soldier carries healthpacks and has the ability to effectively resurrect friendlies in the field, using the claw-like defibrillator.
The whole of Battlefield's gameplay revolves around not only your skill with witty strategy, but also this Balance of situational classes, and your adaptation to gizmos that can only outdo each other in certain ways.
It is this that makes BF2142's gameplay frantic, intelligent and exciting. Over time, you learn that when you pull a gadget out of your pocket, you have a certain role to play to benefit your allies pushing forward through hellish, hostile valleys of death. The only way to win is to be cunning, and apply everything you've got to the unusual ambushes that are thrown at you.
But BF2142 is so dense, and manages to boil down a lot of complexity into simple systems that it would be an injustice to say I could describe everything.
The Art & Sound design is breathtakingly well-done, with a world apparently turned to permanent Winter, with hard-hitting technological soundscapes lending it a rather 'Battle Of Hoth' feeling, which sells the the game as somewhere you exist in to do your harrowing military job. But in all honesty, you are often far too busy or having too much fun to pay attention to these wonderful aesthetics, in danger (as you are) from imminent death at every turn. Although surrounded by this solidly conceived world it is hard not to feel immersed.
Replayability in BF2142 is mostly offered to you in an RPG-style 'levelling-up' system, as you gain ever higher Ranks in answer to your increasing experience and cleverness in battle. These Ranks are not just a pretty label - as each one allows you to purchase a weapon or tool from a hidden technology tree. The more prestigious you get from your mad antics - the more varied are the contents of your backpack.
Some of the highlights of things you'll want to play with in the game include the 'Pilum', an enormous rifle that spits out vehicle-killing pellets but is slow to reload per shot, a deployable Sentry-turret (รก la Aliens) that you leave behind to mow down anyone walking in front of its rabid muzzle, Grenades that vacuum up all nearby mines, and toys like the hugely useful infantry-spotting radar - a sticky transmitter you can slap on a wall that will beam local life-signs to your map for easy location of hidden troops.
And no mass war sim would be complete without vehicles! The stand-out feature of the game are the 'Walkers', bipedal stomping machines much alike ones we're used to seeing in Return Of The Jedi, but chunkier. The air is guarded by Gunships (think helicopters combined with fighterjets) and slower weaker Dropships (the fat APCs of the sky) as well as Titans (enormous flying mobile bases, like the S.H.I.E.L.D. 'Helicarrier' of Marvel comics).
Back on the ground, the Walkers pale into insignificance compared to the standard Tanks, of which one, on the PAC side, is a very manouvreable strafing Hovertank.
In the end, Battlefield:2142 is such a vast and beautiful game that relies on Balance and nuances of play to lend it its feel, and that is something that really has to be experienced first-hand, but, for the fast-paced tactical gamer, it's fantastic long-lived fun.
Go forth and advance through the ranks! Wreak havoc!
-Des
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