With EA’s flagship shooter franchise ditching its Modern Warfare gimmick, at least temporarily, it’s time to look into our crystal balls and try to guess where the series can go next. There’s no strong evidence that EA will go any of these routes, except that Hardline exists and that the series was not always so staid in its ways.
Battlefield set in the future
Time: The 2040s
Place: Dystopian East Coast USA I hope
Right now, I’m just echoing the thoughts of everybody that wants a sequel to Battlefield: 2142, and what better time to get one than now? We have Battlefield trying out new things, Call of Duty pushing its timeline further and further into the future, Titanfall breathing new mech-scented life into the shooter genre, and the new-gen consoles allowing us to see more of that destructive “Levolution” that EA keeps talking about. In a freak accident, it seems that the stars have aligned perfectly to justify Battlefield: 2143.
Back in 2006, it was a novel concept. While some dismissed it as a Battlefield 2 reskin, which was apt, given that the WWII shooter was still riding high, if a little weary before Call of Duty 4 turned the genre on its head. In either case, the familiar Conquest mode attracted the crowd, but it was the surprisingly modern Titan mode that kept them coming back.
Capturing anti-Titan missile silos and launching a suicidal do-or-die assault on the reactor core once the shields of the flying fortress were down is something that sounds like it should be on new-gen. And if the 2017 iteration of Battlefield is the long awaited 2143, it soon will be.
Battlefield set in Vietnam
Time: The 1960s
Place: Vietnam
As far as wars are concerned, few ring as many bells in American culture as Vietnam, given how every tough guy actor has at some point played a violent Vietnam Vet. Facing an enemy that has every reason to fight dirty can put any guy through the wringer.
This location has remained woefully underrepresented in mainstream video games apart from the odd Bad Company DLC. A game set here could have a stunning single-player campaign, as well as multiplayer that is both sneaky lone man guerrilla tactics and all out fire fight with tanks and aeroplanes. Next-gen visuals of forests such as those shown in The Last of Us Remastered and Far Cry 4 could make the game really visually appealing.
Carrying on from the Bad Company theme, this kind of setting plays to a four-player horde mode or campaign similar to Call of Duty: Black Ops 3. Playing with your buddies while fighting off the Viet Cong is an ensamble action movie ready to be made.
Battlefield set in WWII
Time: 1942
Place: Western front
It may be time to bite the bullet and go back to the roots of the military shooter genre, first put forward by Battlefield’s former stablemate Medal of Honor. The genre practically dominated the shooter scene in the sixth-generation of consoles, and it may be time to take new-gen consoles old school.
The plot can’t change much unless it’s Wolfenstein, but there’s plenty of room for character stories about heroes and sacrifice. The gameplay can hark back to the original 1942 Battlefield with a few twists to take advantage of the new-gen horsepower such as bigger matches and improved physics as well as the required graphical enhancement.
Overall, the temptation to return to the familiar setting is something that DICE has had to fight for a long time to keep up with Call of Duty, but maybe now is the time to do something radical. Going back to a simple good versus evil story while filling it with memorable characters could just be the thing the series needs.
Battlefield in Space
Time: A long long time ago
Place: A galaxy far far away
Placing a Battlefield game on an alien planet allows the developers to let their imaginations run wild; ice planets, walking tanks, hover bikes, and the such. Having the soldiers wear white armour would help them blend in and give them a truly unique look.
They could even tie in to an established sci-fi franchise such as Star War-OH WAIT!
I know you can not hear it anymore. What I want to say though is: your local gaming mashine does not have enough calculation power to run our game engine. I think we always communicated it that way and there is no reason not to be honest here. If you want to deliver something that has never been done before in that kind of scale, then you can not make compromises. We totally know that there are huge risks involved. But this is the route we will take. We are super confident here and can’t wait to get out of the dark.