Since its debut back in 2002, the Battlefield series has delivered an impressive lineup of successful games that any game publisher would be proud to support. But with such a varied history that includes World War II games, modern combat, future warfare, and even the cops vs. robbers motif introduced in Hardline, not everyone has the same favorite game in the series.
We polled the Game Informer staff to create some order to this chaos and rank the Battlefield games from worst to best, offering justification for each placement. Not a fan of our order? Make your feelings known in the comments below.
13. Battlefield Play4Free
PC – 2011
This awkward free-to-play hybrid is generally considered the weakest entry in the series. Combining the maps from Battlefield 2 with the classes and weaponry from Bad Company 2 sounds like a good idea on paper, but this execution left much to be desired. Given the microtransaction based economic model, players must pay for guns, gadgets, and cosmetic enhancements. Battlefield works best as a team-centric game where players switch classes on the fly to respond to the situation at hand. If a tank arrives on the scene, someone needs to respawn with an engineer kit to counter. For some reason, DICE did not allow players to switch classes in mid-match at launch. They also forgot to develop a ranking system to give players some sense of progression. These shortcomings hamstrung the experience and sent us back to the more well-rounded, full price offerings.
12. Battlefield Heroes
PC – 2009
Like Play4Free, Battlefield Heroes tried to retrofit a free-to-play economic model onto the classic Battlefield gameplay. The cartoony graphics gave the game a unique feel compared to its predecessors, which EA hoped would open the game up to a wider audience. Developer Easy Studios made other changes to further streamline the experience as well, removing the ability to squad up, reducing the number of classes to three, and preventing players from switching classes mid-match. The latter decision once again harmed the competitive balance of the game, and the serious lack of map variety made our journey into the Heroes alternate universe a short one.
11. Battlefield 2: Modern Combat
360, PS2, Xbox – 2005
The opening salvo in Battlefield's conquest of consoles, Modern Combat had some rough edges. DICE took its first stab at creating a proper single-player campaign, and the results were lacking (a problem that still persists for the majority of entries) outside of the hot-swapping feature that let you jump around the battlefield. It only shipped with two multiplayer modes, conquest and capture the flag, and network issues plagued the early launch (sound familiar?). The graphics also left something to be desired and the scoring system didn't reward teamplay, which are both rarities for Battlefield games.