See the Sunny Skies in Battlefield 1943!

Back in July, on yet another night when I was treading the next-gen gray and brown war fields of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare blat blatting, I got a game invite from Jedah Doma inviting me to play some game called Battlefield 1943. Seeing as how I didn’t have the game I politely declined and went back to laying trip mines and giggling, but the next day Jango called me up and asked why I hadn’t downloaded Battlefield 1943 as it was ‘my kind of game’. It gave me some pause for thought wondering if I was missing something, even though I’m not the biggest fan of World War II murder simulators. Jack Thompson has made me afraid of them you see, all that fear that by playing I’ll adopt a grizzled beard and start making references to the Big One. You know, bullshit.

Shit. I derailed my own self. Well, after getting Jango’s call I decided to download the demo at least and give it a whirl, as you get the whole game in the demo, but only are allowed 30 minutes to play. I think this gives it some disservice as the game isn’t very beginner friendly. Rarely are games based on semi-realistic physics ever beginner friendly in my opinion, especially if they are FPS games. And even more so when every gun in the game is affected by recoil, if not distance, and this means that you have to quickly get used to kneeling and firing accurately to land a kill in the first place. To say I was off handed when playing at first is a bit of an understatement. I couldn’t do crap for the first 20 minutes I played. Maybe I should have played that tutorial level right? My bad. And flying the planes? Whoo! I got very used to watching myself spiral uncontrollably into mountains, flags, trees and one very surprised guy in a jeep. Which is one game mechanic that DICE has kept in: difficult fucking flying vehicles. So there I am, crashing, shooting wildly, sniping poorly, and cursing repeatedly at this game, but still having a spot of fun. That ended when in the last 11 minutes of my online demo Jedah stopped in and decided to mercilessly school me, both over the mic and in the game; my blood level and his shrill, taunting voice rising into levels of which angels dream of until, defeated I sat back and just listened, gasping, Jedah’s utterances devolving into nothing more than, “EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeEEeEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” Thankfully my torture ended as the demo kindly informed me it was over, though the embarrassment was forever. The ribbing from Jedah continued however. I told him the game was worth getting, rubbing my hands with thoughts of revenge. Later, weeping into my stained pillow, I cursed him unto the seventh generation and promised myself I would be the BEST BATTLEFIELD 1943 PLAYER EVAH! or at least slightly better than Jedah, and that I wouldn’t let it die until I saw his son weeping and gnashing his teeth over his father’s gamer score, face covered in the ashes of war. Sunny, online war.

Which basically meant I downloaded the game and got trounced again. Seems I was playing this game all wrong. See, this article isn’t just about a friendly ribbing online, nor is it about a simplistic shooter; in large this article is a tale, a tale of redemption and hope. You can join me if you like, and my job (poorly done of course) is to convince you that this game, while daunting at first, will soon become a treasured download, something to look forward too. You to can learn how to fly those fucking death machines planes with a grace and artistry that would rival the very aces the game embodies and you to can… this article is getting long isn’t it? Next paragraph please!

Battlefield 1943 is going to take some getting used to, but after about a week of on and off play the mechanics click and ratcheting off a head shot and then dropping a tank with a cluster of det becomes easy. Like the rest of the series, Battlefield 1943 is more about capturing assets and denying them to your enemies. Your job isn’t to get the most kills (though it helps) but to work with your team to capture 5 points on each map. Capturing points and killing enemies takes tickets off the opposing teams spawn score with the first team to lose all their tickets… uh… losing.

Capturing an area enables your team to spawn there, and if your team hasn’t captured any areas you can always spawn at your base, which will normally have some vehicles: tanks, jeeps and airplanes, enabling you to get to another area quickly if needed. And every level is huge, so running or swimming takes forever. A quick note on bases: while you can go to the other teams base and sabotage to your hearts delight or spawn kill, you don’t earn points for doing so; however, you can sit on a mountain top and plink away to your hearts content and earn points that way, but it means your a dick. A better dick move is to plant explosives on a airplane, wait for them to take off then press the plunger with child-like glee. It is a delicious feeling.

As far as weapons, vehicles and classes go, both teams are even down the line. You can be either a Scout (sniper rifle, explosives), Infantry (sub-machine gun, rockets) or Rifleman (rifle, grenade mount). Scouts are the only class that carries explosives, while the other two classes get grenades. Rifleman have anti-infantry grenade launchers on their rifles, while Infantry carry a rocket launcher for tank and jeep killing. All classes carry a sword and pistol. The Japanese team looks bad ass if you run with the sword equipped in fact. Think ninjas. Both teams have planes, jeeps and tanks, plus two kinds of mounted guns for mowing down soldiers or flak killing planes. Both teams can call in bomber raids by activating an on-level radar station which is also a control point. You can change your class at any time by picking up a dead person’s gear and since ammo is infinite on every weapon, you can have fun with whatever class you like with no worries.

The levels -of which there are only 4 and one of those is planes only- are all huge islands, and look pretty good, if somewhat dated. Aside from certain buildings that have to be, the majority of the terrain is destructible, with trees and bamboo exploding into splinters as your tank churns through them, bombing runs leaving dust spewing into the sky and black craters from grenade explosions. Buildings erupt into rubble as you plow into them and of course, pretty pretty oceans.

The sound in the game is superb, if a bit glitchy at times, with vehicles coughing into life wonderfully, fences making a metallic clatter as they shake, etc. Nearby explosions shake the camera and vibrate the controller as your visions darkens.

The biggest complaint I heard about the game was with the sniper rifle actually, and my first experience using it was really frustrating as it seemed to take 3 or more hits to kill someone. Most people are used to a sniper rifle being a one hit kill and the rifle you use in this game is definitely no AWP. But, practice and time bears fruit. The sniper is actually now my favorite class as it is  accurate as hell, but getting a  kill is tough, way tougher than any game I ever played. But there is no bullet drop, so you can actually fire from base to base if want. The sniper is actually best used to soften up a capture point or for base defense as even nicking an enemy enables your team to take them down quickly with you earning half points based on the damage you did. Also great for taking out mounted gunners thinking themselves invincible sitting pretty on tanks. HEADSHOT! The sniper also enjoys what is to me, the best ability in the game: with the longest vision of any character, you can ‘paint’ enemy soldiers from afar, marking them out for your team to take down, even if you can’t. If you spot a enemy in the game long enough, a red symbol appears over their head that your entire team can see, which makes it much easier to find enemy vehicles and troops, as well as marking them on your on-screen radar. Your character will also yell out what you’ve seen for your team members and that helps you to know if you’ve been spotted as you can hear the enemy team (if they are close enough) yelling that they see you. Which is usually right before a sword takes you out. This symbol gradually fades if they stay out of sight long enough.

The other two classes excel at middle and short range carnage respectfully, with their grenades and rockets. Splash damage seems perfect with grenades, though rockets are useless except against vehicles. Maybe my aim just sucks. Spray and pray, etc.

Vehicles are a blast once you get used to them, with tanks requiring some finesse, jeeps hilariously squirrely and planes (which you can dive bomb troops with, then jump out to parachute to safety with and capture a base) fun once you develop the handling to fly, though I still barely get any kills with. Shooting planes down with AA guns is particulrily rewarding as you get bonus points for vehicle, enemy and defense damage.

It’s not a jump in an’ kick ass game, but shooter that rewards patience, team work and control. Even after all this, I’m having a tough time simplfying how deep this game actually is once you scrape the initial reaction to it’s game play off your plate. Explosives send wreckage flying into the sky, tanks shudder into position to take down a camping sniper, soldiers in jeeps rocket down hills to explode into carnage. It’s fun. Bare and real.

I’ll summarize some of my favorite things that have happened so far: I flew my plane  and got shot down right as my plane cannoned into another, as we both bailed out and parachuted to safety I un-slung my sniper rifle to take the other guy out, landed, captured a base, sworded another sniper from behind, set explosives, took out the tank that rolled in to re-capture, ran to an AA gun to take out a low flying bomber, jumped into a plane, zoomed into another area, got shot down again and parachuted onto a tank, which I also took out. That was just 5 minutes of play. Multi-tasking has never been so fun.

This game takes patience, but if you can be happy with just 3 levels to play on so far, with a 4th for plane practice, it’s worth downloading, especially if you have some friends to play with online in a squad.

Now I just need to see if Jedah is up to a rematch…

- Tenno