4) EA Bends DICE Over A Table
Battlefield Hardline. Not much else to say really. Just superb. The EA conference was something of a wet blanket. Hardline‘s offical appearance certainly livened things up, and the shock announcement that the beta was available to download the second they’d finished talking had so many people logging on that the servers blew up. So it’s definitely a Battlefield game. DICE’s Frostbite engine still makes it look out of this world though.
So what next then? Oh, Mirror’s Edge! On the Frostbite engine! Wait, it’s just concept art. What’s this?? Star Wars Battlefront! On the Frostbite engine! Wait, it’s just concept art. I mean, what are they going to show us next? Some concept art for a bloody golf game, running on the Frostbite engine? …oh… my… shit…
The demo seriously features a man swinging a driver over one of Battlefield 4‘s burning dreadnoughts. Is this for real, guys? A golf game with destructible, war-torn environments? Show me the focus group that gave this the thumbs up. The EA presenter even said “THIS… is golf without limits,” and that alone is a good enough reason for him to be fired.
As expected, there were a lot more sports, and it was all a bit “meh.” EA have the monopoly on sports games, so we’d buy them no matter what, because no one else makes them. And now that their main new selling point to the next FIFA football game is “emotions,” you might start to wish that someone else did.
