Thanks again to all of you who’ve been helping us with the Beta – it’s been a while since we’ve been in touch, but we’ve been putting that time to good use…

Below you’ll find a list of the issues and bugs that we’ve been addressing – there are of course many other issues that we’ve been looking at, but these are some of the main points that have been raised in the community forums.

Bugs

Hit detection – we took a look into this and discovered a few bugs in there – this is now significantly improved for the main game, thanks for your help in tracking this down!

Freezes/End of round – there are many stability issues in the Beta which are now addressed for the main game

Floating barrels and debris – now fixed for the main game, you won’t see barrels 40 ft in the air any more…

‘I need a medic’ sound reduced – this is playing way too much in the Beta – have fixed an issue so you’ll hear it much less frequently

Quicksnipe bug fixed – fixed an exploit where you could fire more rapidly, thanks to all of your posts on this.

Grenades – damage and use – there were some issues with their behaviour which are now fixed in the main game, and the damage values are tweaked slightly.

Tweaks/systems

Vehicle performance – altered some physics values so vehicles feel much more massive now (makes a HUGE difference)

Squads and spawning – added some new parameters to the squad system, so you’ll spawn on better choices and closer to the action.

Vehicle alarms – have tweaked the sound values on these so they fit much better in the mix.  Incoming missile alerts now play correctly.

TKing – finished a system for this which we didn’t have time to implement for the beta.  Those who knife people in artillery, your days are numbered…

Sprint lag – some issues with this have been addressed – won’t be an instant swap, but is much improved.

Controls – have tweaked some of the control settings to allow a greater range of sensitivity and give more precision

Scoring and awards – have tweaked the scoring based on the beta feedback and progression.

Server performance – have made some large server optimisations to improve performance

Laser designator – we’ve tweaked the laser designator so it’s not so powerful.  Still a one hit kill, but tanks can now avoid more easily with the right tactics.

Bullet and impact decals – didn’t make the Beta, no one was more disappointed than me.  These are fixed and in the main game.

Comments

Free Downloadable content – this has probably been one of the hottest topics out there, and we need to clarify this.  There will be a variety of programs that will allow you to download 5 weapons for free – more info on this to follow.  The remaining weapons will be available with the gold edition of the game, but we’ve taken all possible care to ensure that they don’t impact game balance negatively.

Prone – we won’t be implementing prone in the game, primarily as a balance issue for the recon class.  We playtested extensively here, and with prone the recon class becomes invisible, which is really imbalances the game.  As I’m sure you’ve noticed from the Beta, the recon class is powerful enough already…

Parachute – again, we won’t be implementing parachutes, primarily from a balance perspective.  The battle already takes place in 360 degrees, and with parachutes and the additional vertical element, it just becomes too easy for the attackers to overwhelm defenders.  (Besides, the though of parachuting from a helicopter 100ft in the air certainly doesn’t appeal to me ;)

Rifle grenades – there’s a lot of comment on rifle grenades not being powerful enough in the game, and this is intentional.  As we’ve seen in previous BF games, if you make the RG a one hit kill then very quickly the game devolves into a ‘noob-toob’ fest.  The RG will however do very significant damage – if the target has taken any damage you’ll probably finish them off, and certainly you should be getting a kill assist pretty quickly after hitting someone with one.

Squad and online play – we mentioned this in the last release, but it’s worth re-iterating.  As this was a Beta and not a full release, we had to turn off a lot of the normal Xbox Live functionality, and with this the squad functionality went.  For the full game, you and 3 of your friends will be able to join and play together in a squad – you’ll be able to chat over VOIP and earn special squad awards together.  Believe me – a good, coordinated squad is by far the most dangerous thing you’ll meet on the Battlefield.

The above issues are only a small part of the fixes and tweaks we’ve been making – the team here have been working tirelessly on numerous rendering, physics and performance improvements to bring you the best game experience possible.  We think you’ll really see that difference in June.

We hope that you continue to enjoy the Beta as much as we’ve enjoyed putting it together and playing alongside you.  We really appreciate all of your feedback and participation; it’s been candid, direct and we hope you’ll notice that difference it’s making to the game!

All the best!

Jamie Keen, MP Producer & The DICE team