Battlefield 3 Story and Review PS3

Battlefield 3 (commonly abbreviated to BF3) is a first-person shooter video game developed by EA Digital Illusions CE and published by Electronic Arts. The game was released in North America on October 25, 2011 and in Europe on October 28, 2011 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360[4] and EA Mobile confirmed a port for the iOS platform. It does not support versions of Windows prior to Windows Vista as the game only supports DirectX 10 and 11. It is a direct sequel to 2005's Battlefield 2, and the eleventh installment in the Battlefield franchise. The game sold 5 million copies in its first week of release, and was released to critical acclaim from most game reviewers. The PC download is exclusive to EA's Origin platform, through which PC users also authenticate when connecting to the game. In campaign mode, players take on the personas of various military roles; including a special forces soldier, an F-18 systems officer, and a SPETSNAZ operative. The campaign takes place at various locations, including Iran, and follows the story of Sergeant Blackburn and later, Dimitri Mayakovsky.

Story

Set in 2014,[26] SSgt Blackburn leads a five-man squad on a mission to locate, find and safely return a US squad investigating a possible IED, whose last known position was a market controlled by a hostile militia called the PLR. Blackburn and his squad are later sent to Tehran to apprehend a the leader of the PLR, Al-Bashir. While investigating an underground vault in the target's suspected location, Blackburn and his team learn that the PLR acquired Russian portable nuclear devices, and that two of the three devices are missing. Being overrun, and requesting back-up, an M1 Abrams convoy led by Sergeant Miller is deployed to extract Blackburn's team. Miller facilitates Blackburn's helicopter extraction, but is captured when waiting for a Quick Reaction Force. Miller is promptly executed by Solomon and Al-Bashir, with the event being filmed.

Left with no other option, Blackburn and surviving squad member Montes break out of captivity to stop the attack in New York. Solomon shoots Montes, but Blackburn manages to kill Solomon in the resulting melee, as well as recovering the last nuclear device. In the epilogue, having been diagnosed with radiation poisoning, Dima writes about the efforts of both him and Blackburn to stop Solomon's plot. He then readies his gun when a knock is heard at his door.

Review

When shells are kicking up dust all around, and bullets are sparking off the rocks ahead, you don’t stop to process a little thing like a box no exploding when you shoot it. Pace hides a multitude of technical niggles, and Battlefield 3’s Operation Guillotine mission moves at terrifying lick, catapulting players down a slope towards MG nests and mortar batteries. Between the goons tumbling over sandbag walls at coaxing of a grenade, the ratatat of radio chatter and an onslaught of new guns, it’s possible to miss the jaggies on graffiti-plastered walls or the odd outcrop of blocky foliage.

            Only later, with another player watching the door in co-op mission Ex-filtration, are able to pick at frayed edges-smashed bulbs that still give light, guards that get stuck on low obstacles. It’s a very handsome game nonetheless, and the usual allowances should be made for pre-release code, but anybody expecting Battlefield 3 on console the best those maxed-out marketing shots will be disappointed 

Battlefield 3's Frostbite 2 engine delivers great visuals. It doesn't evolve as far beyond Battlefield: Bad Company 2 as its PC cousin does, but the use of light and dark, smoke, fire, and smudged lens flares consistently impresses. The facial features of your fellow soldiers during campaign, the ocean surging around an aircraft carrier, the fluorescent-lights of nighttime cities, and the wrecked debris of entire buildings brought down all look great. Certain textures take a moment or two until they smooth over, but overall Battlefield 3 performs admirably. 

The engine isn't perfect by any means. I encountered prone legs jutting through walls, tears flickering across solid surfaces, saw snipers half-buried in mountainsides, and bits of green flashing across the screen. I've seen trees planted in midair, noticed AI soldiers in their shooting position long after death. These glitches are annoying, but they don't break the game.

While longtime fans know Battlefield as a multiplayer experience, its campaign and cooperative experiences can't be ignored. For those of you more interested in the single-player campaign than multiplayer, definitely take note. Whereas both Battlefield: Bad Company games added a story underwritten with humor, Battlefield 3 takes a more serious path. Its tale of global threats reads like twenty years of military fiction thrown in a blender and turned into a checklist. WMDs? Check. Russians? Uh huh. Insurgents tucked into Middle Eastern alleyways? Yup. It's all there and woven into levels through the recollections of Sergeant James Blackburn during an interrogation (didn't we see this in Call of Duty: Black Ops?). There's inherent tension in the threat of a terrorist attack, but Battlefield 3's campaign feels like well-trodden ground. 

Battlefield 3's campaign does hit some memorable moments (skydiving, explosions, and entire buildings crumbling), but as a whole it's trite and frustrating. The campaign jams Battlefield 3's multiplayer into a linear box where freedom of choice gets thrown out a non-destructible window. There are only a few buildings to blow holes in, barely any vehicles to take the wheel of, and quicktime events adorn enemy encounters in almost every level. While you can literally crash a helicopter on an opponent's head while parachuting to safety if you so choose in multiplayer, campaign makes you hit X at just the right moment to avoid getting punched -- they're two different games.

The co-op missions surround the events of the campaign, yet feel more enjoyable as individual levels. Working with a teammate leads to more creative approaches of attacks, though the same AI frustrations are in place. While opening doors and during other set animations, AI enemies gain invulnerability. They also have an uncanny ability to pick you out of the crowd. Even while using an AI teammate as cover -- not standard operating procedure, I know -- enemies still find you. 

Additionally, most levels feature a bottleneck where death hits out of the blue. Whether it's a grenade exploding without an indicator, a blast from an unseen enemy, or late-game quicktime event that introduces a new button, the campaign and co-op levels are a minefield of frustration -- especially when cranking the difficulty up to hard. All told, it's a brief affair -- I burned through the single-player portion in under six hours, the co-op content adds another two or three. Also On: X Box 360, PC

Closing Comments

When you shut down Battlefield 3 and let the Frostbite 2-powered dust settle, it certainly has some problems. But DICE’s adoration of and expertise with the online experience permeates every aspect of its multiplayer. Regardless of the narrative missteps or the occasional glitches, Battlefield 3 offers an unforgettable, world-class multiplayer suite so fun that it more than makes up for the package’s shortcomings.

source: ign, wikipedia, games master

Posted in: Shooter