1 Minute Madness Review – Battlefield 1943

We reported a few days ago that Battlefield 1943 would be launching on Xbox Live Arcade on the 8th of July, and by golly, it has!

As reported earlier today, the game has been severely struggling with capacity issues on it’s servers, meaning that many people that bought it didn’t even get the chance to try it out on release day.

But late last night, I managed to get into a game, and so I bring you this 1 Minute Madness to let you know if it’s worth the Microsoft Points or not.

Battlefield 1943 is basically the original Battlefield 1942 PC game that has been dropped into the Frostbite Engine from Bad Company.

Changes have been made for the console version though, with 3 classes being available (basically long, medium and short range), destructible buildings and scenery as well as some nifty new ways of killing a lot of people.

The game plays fantastically well, and is basically an amalgamation of the 1942 and Bad Company gameplay mechanics. Only 3 maps have been made available for the XBLA game, with the promise of a fourth for free, and soon. There is a wide variety of vehicles ranging from tanks and jeeps, to airplanes and boats and all of them feel very unique and fun to use.

Visuals are colourful and great to look at, but the sound… oh the sound in this game will blow your mind, especially when you get buzzed by a plane on a full surround sound system.

Maybe one of the best parts of the game is that even though the ranked games are all entirely hosted on overseas servers, the lag was barely noticeable, and the gameplay remained smooth and fun throughout my time with the game, meaning that even if none of your friends are around (and squads can be formed before jumping into a game), you can always just hop in and have some fun.

The only downside is that the game only has 24 player multiplayer, which may seem decent, but when compared to the old Battlefield, and when you’re on the actual maps, it feels a fair bit quieter than you may remember, although they have tried to rectify the issue with quicker respawn times.

For a 1200 point (590MB) XBLA game, Battlefield 1943 is an absolute steal and I highly recommend it to, well, pretty much anyone looking for some online fun.

Last Updated: July 9, 2009