Battlefield Tri-hard

[TeeKup]

Christ, somebody's passionate about a shotgun.

I love shotguns. To me, what can make or break a shooter is how well it incorporates a shotgun. I liked the M1014 from CoD4 and MW2 (one of the few things I enjoyed about it). The 870 Combat and the TOZ-194 in Medal of Honor were extremely fun too. The USAS-12 and the Neostead 2000 in bad company 2 were fun as well. All the shotguns in Blops are crap.

[Amit]

Alright, well I installed the game on my iMac (bootcamp) and played it. It runs at 30FPS on High settings at 1280x1024 (CPU: C2D E7600, GPU: Mobile HD 4670, 4GB RAM). I got some video, but I had it set at half resolution so the video game out cruddy looking, but the FPS is good. With Fraps recording, the 30FPS dropped to about 22-25. I'll record some footage again, but this time I'll keep it at full resolution. The iMac only has one hard drive in it so I can't eliminate or reduce the performance loss by recording it to another drive. Plenty of screen caps at 1980x1080 at high settings, though.

[Mr Buckshot]

Alright, well I installed the game on my iMac (bootcamp) and played it. It runs at 30FPS on High settings at 1280x1024 (CPU: C2D E7600, GPU: Mobile HD 4670, 4GB RAM). I got some video, but I had it set at half resolution so the video game out cruddy looking, but the FPS is good. With Fraps recording, the 30FPS dropped to about 22-25. I'll record some footage again, but this time I'll keep it at full resolution. The iMac only has one hard drive in it so I can't eliminate or reduce the performance loss by recording it to another drive. Plenty of screen caps at 1980x1080 at high settings, though.

Good to hear, I was afraid my laptop's Mobility HD 5850 might not be able to handle good settings. What settings exactly did you push for the higher widescreen resolutions?

[Amit]

Good to hear, I was afraid my laptop's Mobility HD 5850 might not be able to handle good settings. What settings exactly did you push for the higher widescreen resolutions?

Prepare yourself :

D: Only 3 graphics settings. Low, medium, and high. Config file is encrypted.

Since I have only played for a limited time due to a server bring down (they came back up hours ago), I have yet to find out more details. I spent most of my time just surfin the menus and testing graphics/resolution combinations for performance.

This is mostly what I've learned so far (pics to come later for certain bullet points) Part 1:

Squads - Squad leader is chosen randomly so everyone gets a chance to play it. I haven't been selected yet so I don't know the extent of their commands. NO COMMANDER

Destruction - Some of it was turned off by DICE due to performance reasons. From what I've seen, it's like BC2 right now, except you can't destroy whole buildings. The level design of Operation Metro doesn't really have the structure types of BC2 buildings, though, so it would look awkward trying to destroy a whole building. As far as I know, full destruction of buildings in the final game is not possible. I think they mentioned that last week.

M1014 Shotgun: Teek, you saw that video and it rapes. Be happy.

Class Customization - It's the same as BC2, but now you can can choose attachments for your weapon. You can add up to three attachments (e.g. heavier barrel, optics, flashlight/laserpointer, etc.) to a single weapon. In BC2 you had two class specializations and a class specific gadget (C4 available too). BF3 you get two gadgets and the three weapon options I said previously. I have no idea what the gadgets are yet since I haven't unlocked any yet.

Origin - You have to download and install Origin, then download the game on Origin. The game itself is launched from a server browser built into the Battlelog website. You have to installed an Origin plugin for your browser, then go to the multiplayer server browser, set your filters (if you want) and then use the browser as if it was a GameTracker server list. When you find one you want to play on, click on it, then hit join on the right corner. That'll take you straight into the match.

Menus - There is no startup videos or main menu to speak of. You get a pause menu ONLY after you deploy (spawn). You get your standard stuff: Resume, Scorboard, Squad, Suicide, Options, and Quit To Windows. I don't like how I have to spawn first. Maybe this will change by open beta time.

Options - Graphics options are limited to changing resolution, primary monitor, fullscreen mode (on or off), mouse vertical look (inverted or normal), and 4 basic graphics settings: Auto, Low, Medium, and High. Pretty disappointing. I'm sure this will change by Open Beta as well. The game is select of features even after selecting a preset. It'll turn AA on or off if it detects that your GFX card may or may not be able to run it. I noticed that when switching from my laptop to my iMac (AA off -> AA on). AA is turned off as far as I know at Low setting, though.

Audio - Holy fucking shit. Fuck BC2, this is the real stuff. Guns sound powerful. The depth of them is just ridiculous. It actually makes you think about if anyone will come after you after hearing those rounds being fired. Also, there's no stupid random mess of ambient sound this time. There is ambient sound, but it makes sense with what is happening in the environment. There's only explosions and gunfire if that is actually happening in the map. If you hear a plane flying overhead or something exploding, look around, you'll see it if your view isn't obstructed by objects.

There's no controls remapping or menu to show you so you have to go to the Battlelog forum to get them from Zh1nt0:

WASD - Move
z - Toggle Prone
Ctrl - Crouch
x - Toggle Crouch
G/5 - select grenade
Mouse 1 - Fire/Drop med or ammo kit
Mouse 2 - Aim down sight (not toggled)
Q - spot enemies (maybe used by squad leaders to point to objectives)
F - quickknife
6 - select knife
R - reload (tap); pickup weapon/ammo (hold)
E - arm/disarm MCOM station
V - Fire Select Switch
Shift - Sprint/Hold Breath/Deploy Bipod (when prone or at flat cover/barricade)
T - Flashlight
C - 3rd Person vehicle view
M - large map
N - map zoom level
JKL - Chat: All, Team, Squad
Left Alt - VOIP chat
F1-F6 - Vehicle Seat

That's all I have to type for now. I have to go out. I'll be back later to finish.

[Mr Buckshot]

Please let this not be another Crysis 2 (to be fair, the initial release of Crysis 2 did run surprisingly well on PCs that struggled with the first game).

I'll give them the benefit of the doubt since this is an alpha trial though.

[ODX]

I'm sure EA will let them handle all the optimizations and graphics settings to allow for the most amount of people to play the game. Especially after this Alpha trial which if I remember correctly is mainly for hardware testing and not exactly gameplay testing, a lot more settings will probably be added by Beta.

[Cortexian]

IIRC this alpha trial is the same one that was demo'd on the DICE/EA machines at the conferences and such. Meaning that graphics options and optimization don't really matter since all those machines were identical.

We won't see a full multiplayer experience until the beta starts.

I remember them saying that BF3 wouldn't have a commander, they said it was a pretty useless roll with the way the new squad layout goes.

EDIT - FYI, this is what the alpha invitation looks like:
http://newsletters.ea.com/2011/BATTL...PHA_INVITE/en/

[ThePlague]

If Amit would let me try the alpha, I could max it out at 1600x900 (or even get my 1920x1080 tv) and record footage :C

[Cortexian]

I'll be doing that at 1920x1200 if he gives me the key. Your GPU is broke sorry Plague!

[ThePlague]

It ate through the center of the thermal pad, all I need to go do is get a new one (hopefully will today). There's a perfect diamond on it.