Cover Image Credits: Berduu
There’s a cynical precision to modern combat that somewhat nullifies the natural horror of historic warfare. Speciality tools trade a dull chop for a clean cut – the unmanned drone is feared in a greatly different way to the rickety bomber thundering after its own shadow. And there’s a certain efficiency in execution that the holographically-sighted modern carbine holds proudly over the antiquated and inelegant wooden rifle. Battlefield 4 – the truest predecessor to Battlefield 1 – overcame initial technical problems to make its stand upon steady footing. It was a solid shooter, but one blunted by an emphasis upon indirect combat over more ferocious, in-your-face skirmishes. ‘Levolution’ brought with it spectacle, but not substance. For as jaw-dropping as it was seeing the collapsing Shanghai Tower coat the city streets below with a thick layer of ash, at no point struck the pangs of panic or nervousness found in Battlefield titles beyond the digital age. And in being heavily weighted on the side of hyperbolic action sequences, the series instead veered more in the direction of its arcade-like approachability than it did its grounded foundations.
Battlefield 1 is proof that the modern Battlefield title can live in contentment despite its grandest contradiction. That the accessibility of the series isn’t a detraction from its semi-realism, or, in the case of Battlefield 1, its unfamiliar setting. And the game retains its broad appeal through a refinement of the principles that have long defined the series. The tonal shift at the fore is more than just a regression of time period. It represents the outlining of a shooter dictated from a new perspective, and one that revels in the uniqueness of the experience that it provides. And though Battlefield’s truisms largely remain intact, the warfare at your fingertips has never felt so whole, nor so vividly palpable.
As ever, your Battlefield journey begins with an allied charge into the fray. And before the landscape ahead of you becomes engulfed in a blackened smog billowed by the mouths of a legion of rifles, the fields on which you fight are immaculate pictures of untouched beauty, frozen in a time of pre-war stillness. Visually staggering is the level of detail plied to the jagged, jutting edges of Mont Grappa’s precarious passes, or the gilded marble arches of the Meuse River as represented by the map Ballroom Blitz. And greater so are the damning colours of war painted across them as every multiplayer match gradually reaches its peak. Naturalised weather effects and heavy-set tank treads can quickly turn a sun-touched farmland into an unrecognisable bog. And small townships remain at the mercy of the aggressive tank helmsman or the bomber pilot. There’s little reservation in the destructive chaos of war within Battlefield 1, but it is at least a little more intelligently utilised.
Of course, there exists little subtlety in a weaponised blimp falling to earth aflame and crushing the countryside below it, but the atmospheric weight of your typical multiplayer encounter is never dependant solely on a marquee moment of destruction. Behemoths – the games grand equalisers that take the form of a warship, armoured train or zeppelin – are never the lynchpin of every multiplayer match. Instead it’s the coming of the rain, the rolling in of the fog and the more explicit elements of destruction that characterise the war at the games heart. You needn’t fear the occurrence of a single game-changing event when just the impact of a sole enemy tank upon an objective could be enough to swing momentum in an entirely different direction. And as an infantryman, the presence of that tank alone is enough to reiterate the feeling of dread the permeates every moment with gun in hand.
Both ceasefire and conflict in Battlefield 1 are equally terrifying. Moments free of combat dull the senses – the crackling of rifle fire in the distance is carried on the wind before the engines of a lurking bomber rumble overhead. Without pause, the ring of a protective helmet being struck by a lone bullet is enough to have you instinctively move beyond view of any windows. In combat though, Battlefield 1 conveys a such an overawing level of intensity that it’s distinctively jarring when paralleled with the ascension of your score and a scrolling list of fellow players that you’ve just killed. The screams of the dying are irrepressible.
NO GADGETS REQUIRED – YOU’RE ONLY AS DEPENDABLE AS YOUR RIFLE
The suppressive effect of incoming fire is ferocious. The Battlefield series has always been dependable in its implementation of sound design to evoke the reality of the fight you’re a part of. It has just never felt more seamlessly melded into its surroundings than it does in Battlefield 1. There’s no sense of an overplaying of dramatic tones to compensate for a lacking atmosphere. The direction of sound simply works in harmony with every environment, together creating an immaculate audible recounting of a bleak and harrowing fight for survival.
As ever, combat in Battlefield 1 is contested across the dimensions of land, sea and air, with the scale of every map being broad enough to easily accommodate several simultaneous battles across all fronts. The ethos of the series’ map design however is appropriately adjusted in order to compensate for a faster-paced and aggressively charged blend of warfare. The more open lands of Battlefield 4 were a stark contrast to the labyrinthian city blocks better suited to its particular stylisation of infantry-centric gameplay. Maps in Battlefield 1 are instead neatly tailored to suit the appeal of both claustrophobic firing ranges and vehicular jousts with little friction between the individual elements. Each environment is different from the last, both in terms of its contours and shape to the colours of its horizon. But each environment is ultimately principled upon maintaining a semblance of balance between every facet of the game’s makeup. The maps of Battlefield 1 channel the fight more perfectly than ever, and in doing so they ensure that every successive multiplayer match is consistent in its unshakeable brutality.
Along with many of its contemporaries, the Battlefield series has rarely been able to harness the potential of its accompanying single-player narrative. Many past titles have managed to buck the trend – the stories of Bad Company gave us a loveable foursome of unwitting heroes to root for. The darker tale told within Battlefield 4 was unreserved action portrayed in spectacular fashion. Battlefield 1 offers a more unconventional approach to its telling of a story by covering the breadth of its World War theme with five shorter, more personal tales of victory and sacrifice spread across the warfront. And all of them reiterate the same the damning message of a terrifying reality. The success of the game’s narrative direction is in its easily digestible form, but more so for its evocation of sadness and anger at the situation before a glorification of battle. The characters are individuals one and all, fighting the same war in different ways, and it’s through their unique yet paralleled interpretations of the conflict that Battlefield 1 excellently services its context.
The legacy of this game’s predecessor was its failure to capitalise on a spectacular opportunity for success. The release of Battlefield 4 was a picture of disaster that stemmed from an unfathomable level of technical breakage. The game delivered on its promise of grand destruction, but seemingly at the expense of fundamental function. And even after its resurrection some months later courtesy of a new development team, the aspirations that surrounded it began to dissipate as its community cursed a lack of foresight.
The legacy of Battlefield 1 though isn’t likely to be one of contentiousness. A fine poise and purposeful execution lends to an FPS package rooted in self-control. Just as this is the loudest, most savage Battlefield title to date, it’s also the most comfortable in its delivery. With such an assurance in both the style of warfare that it depicts as well as a fresh confidence in the solidity of its foundations, DICE have ensured that the archaisms of Battlefield 1 are no detraction from its modernised ideals.