I remember the first time I played Battlefield: Bad Company 2 multiplayer. I was in my college dorm room and looking for something to rip me from the clutches of Team Fortress 2. I’d never played a traditional FPS before, but I had nothing but optimism for my chances after three years of TF2. Surely, I thought, the transition won’t be so bad. I loaded into a Squad Deathmatch server, picked the default Assault loadout, and got to shooting…
…Is what I would say if I hadn’t had my face kicked in by every other player on the server. It was a bloodbath. I don’t think my K/D that match would have even registered if you tried to measure it with a high-powered detector. What’s worse? The more I played, the more I got kicked in the teeth, the lower my stats went, and the more frustrated I became.
Then I switched to the Rush game mode and, to my shame, picked Recon. I can bet you know what happens next. I became that most hated of creatures: the bush wookie. Over the next two years, I slowly crawled my way out of my personal pit until I could consistently get the top score and kill count at the end of a match. I relished hunting the bush wookies I once was, and in taking every objective I could, especially when my team was content to do nothing else.
When December of this year comes around, my story will no longer be possible. EA is shuttering the online services of both Battlefield: Bad Company 1 and 2, as well as Battlefield 1943. They’ve already pulled them from every digital storefront, removing the ability for anyone who didn’t already own them to play the single-player campaign. And while EA can’t rescind the purchase of a physical copy, there’s no more to do on console, either.
I have two enormous problems with how Battlefield: Bad Company 2’s sunsetting happened. First, while there weren’t many servers still active on PC, the last time I checked, those that still existed were popping at all hours of the day. At least a thousand people probably still played the game on a regular basis, if not all at the same time. There was even a slow but consistent flow of new players if all the low-levels coming in were any indication.
The second issue I have is archival from a personal and historical perspective. I think Battlefield: Bad Company 2 is the best Battlefield we’ve been able to play in the last 15 years. Everything that followed has been fundamentally worse in some way. BC2’s maps, its gunplay, its refocus on more infantry gameplay with the help of vehicles — everything about its design worked together to create the most enjoyable Battlefield experience I have ever played.
Historically, I think removing Battlefield: Bad Company 2 from the market hurts players’ appreciation for classic map and class design and what can happen when a developer steps out of their comfort zone and does something new. Having played every Battlefield since BC2, I can say unequivocally that its maps were the best in the series. Every one had character, multiple ways to play, fantastic balance for every mode, and more. I could play Arica Harbor, Isla Inocentes, and Valparaiso until the day I die. I can’t say the same about any subsequent Battlefield game.
The fact that two of those maps (Arica and Valparaiso) came back in 2042’s Portal mode speaks to their quality and consistency of play. They are, unsurprisingly, some of the best maps in that game as well. Keeping younger players, or players newer to the series, from experiencing these iconic spaces in their natural habitat does them a disservice that now can’t be rectified.
That isn’t to say that Battlefield: Bad Company 2 didn’t have faults. It lacked some basic gameplay mechanics like sprint strafing, its weapon selection was small, and most damning was its incredibly poor netcode. There were videos published back in the day of bullets registering a full meter behind the player model.
The thing is, everything else was of such a high quality that neither I nor BC2’s massive community cared (much). And when Battlefield 3 eventually came along, many BC2 veterans were more than disappointed with the new offering. DICE themselves went on to say that they couldn’t figure out what Battlefield: Bad Company 2 players liked so much and that if they could replicate some of its magic, they would.
Part of the answer wrote itself: longer time to kill. Battlefield games after BC2 tremendously shortened how long it took to get a kill at all ranges. Second was class balance.
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With BF3 and beyond, the Assault class became the go-to for almost any situation thanks to having the best weapons in the game and effectively infinite access to healing. Recons lost their fantastic motion sensor balls in favor of an (initially) completely broken spawn beacon. Support still had its LMGs, sure, but giving them ammo boxes changed how the average player used them: shooting prone with a bipod down a hallway, ammo box at their side. And while the Engineer class was still important, especially at keeping attack choppers alive, it was a more niche role than before.
Suddenly, it felt like there was only one real choice if you wanted to play aggressively. And sure, plenty of balance patches brought other classes up to snuff, but the core gameplay of the Battlefield series wouldn’t recover — for me — until BF1. It wasn’t until then that the maps approached the level of quality, gameplay-wise, that BC2 could boast.
It doesn’t help that big-name FPS games are now more commodity than experience, more costly than fun. I truly believe that if more newcomers to the genre could play Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and other games from its era, we could stand on more solid footing when critiquing a game we don’t enjoy.
Don’t get me wrong. I know that developers in today’s market work as hard and with as much passion as they ever have. I am saying the environment in which games are made has shifted so drastically that I think having games like Battlefield: Bad Company 2 around to offer perspective, if nothing else, is valuable. That platform holders and publishers can remove access to entire generations of games at a whim is ultimately antithetical to the health of our industry, but I am glad the games existed at all.
