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Battlefailed

I went to the gym after work tonight, to give myself time to brainstorm about this review. However, as I was waiting for an elderly parapalegic woman to relinquish the pink dumbells, I was overcome by a frighting realization: I had nothing mean to say about Battlefield: Bad Company! My reputation was ruined! :'(

Not to worry, my panic attack would soon pass. Immediately following my seventh and final pushup, and as I artfully deflected the inappropriate but not unappreciated advances of the aforementioned elderly parapalegic, it dawned on me that I did indeed have some mean things to say about the game. Needless to say, I was so overcome with joy that I felt compelled to share the excess happy with a nearby unfortunate soul, so I handed my telegraph number to the grey-haired upper-body-builder, and we partied hard with shrimp cocktail and prune juice until well past 8pm.

Now I sit here, with my mind emancipated and my libido assaulted, ready to share with you the most intimate details of Bad Company. Better go put a Depends on your head, because if you’re anything like me then this game might blow your mind, and you wouldn’t want to get brainy bits all over your Now Serving #13 t-shirt, would you? Or maybe you would…

Battlefield: Bad Company is, at its heart, an FPS with aspirations of greater things: you fight on foot like Chuck Norris in Delta Force, a huge component of the game is vehicular mayhem via hummers, boats, APCs, tanks, and roflcopters. You can jump in an out of vehicles at will, and every ride has at least two seats (most of which have a turret of their own!) This means your lazy-ass roommates can hitch a ride with you down to the capture point, Taco Bell, Forever 21, and wherever the hell else you feel like cruising. Just remember to take it easy on the Mountain Dew unless you have a sober driver.

I know, on digital paper it doesn’t sound like much, but what sets this game apart from its peers is the fact that you can blow up (almost) everything!!!! Is there a pesky little sniper hiding in that bungalow over yonder? Blow it up with your rocket launcher and send the cabana boy packing. Fangorn Forest blocking your path? Go Paul Bunyan on those troublesome ents by ejaculating a steady stream of heavy machine gun fire in their general direction. Or just run them over with your tank. Few things in life are as satisfying as clearcutting a virtual forest.

As far as I’m concerned, blowing shit to pieces is the highlight of this game. I can spend hours wtfpwning the countryside, giggling gleefully all the while. Everything else is just so-so, if not flat out crappy. Compared to Call of Duty 4 or Halo 3, the on-foot infantry FPS combat sucks hard. If you have already played either of those gems then you’re going to have a very hard time coming to terms with this game. It just feels sloppy, random, and ultimately frustrating. Whenever I play online I find myself hurling an inordinate amount of curses at pretty much anything that will listen, and some stuff that won’t. If you’d like to practice making sailors blush, then this is the game for you.

The vehicle combat feels much tighter and can be very satisfying, especially when you’re introducing a building full of soldiers to your tank’s main armament. But on the other hand, there aren’t enough tanks, helicopters, or hummers to go around, so most of the game is spent beating on your groin while you wait for a suitable form of conveyance to respawn in your base. Oh, and flying helicopters is really lame now. Back in Battlefield 2 (which was an amazing friggin’ game, and still is) flying helicopters was very difficult but very very rewarding: now it just feels like you’re flying around in the short yellow bus, or even worse the Magic School Bus.

On the technical side of things, the graphics and sounds are really top-notch. The audio team deserves special recognition for producing the most immersive aural assault I’ve ever, uh, witnessed in a game. The booming report of gunfire washes across the countryside, incoming shells whistle past menacingly, and voices echo against the bare walls of an underground bunker. Effects like this take supreme skill to produce, and I am, quite frankly, amazed at their quality. Even the voice acting is superb, with the exception of the main character’s voice—I don’t know why, but he just sounds like a total pussy to me. The other guys in your squad sound are chock full of genuine badassery, while Preston gives off the “I got lost on the way to a Coldplay concert" vibe. *Shudder*

Despite suffering from a plethora of failures (and yes, I know what a plethora is) overall the game is still fun to play. The single-player campaign is nothing revolutionary, but your squadmates are funny as hell and the story makes you feel like a badass. Multiplayer is also enjoyable, but to really appreciate the game you need to play with people you know and stick together, otherwise it feels too chaotic and the expletives start flying. An added bonus is the leveling system, but it’s not nearly as good as COD4’s. Just saying.

All things considered, this game is easily worth a rental, if for no other reason than to blow (almost) everything to smithereens.

Brolo’s Game Views
Official Score: 83% (+19 because there aren’t any boss battles.)

What I’m Listening Too: In Flames

You know that feeling when you go for a ride in a subterranean drill-car and you get the wrong coordinates and accidentally surface in the middle of a war zone? Me neither. But these guys rock very hard, and the album Come Clarity has quickly risen into one of my favorites of all time, ever. \m/