Battlefield Bad Company 2 Reviewed – is it better than Modern Warfare 2?

DICE themselves haven’t been shy in putting Battlefield Bad Company 2 up against that monster of a title, Modern Warfare 2. From official statements by PR people to even coding in quips against MW2 in the game it is obvious that they want to be measured against MW2. So I will.

There are two distinct parts to both games, we have the single player and the multiplayer, while the multiplayer is the obvious legs of both titles lets take a look at the single player first.

The game starts off with a flashback to World War II where the Japanese are hard at work developing their ultimate weapon, a scalar weapon.

There are two interesting side notes to this idea, firstly scalar weapons were first envisaged by Nicola Tesla, a Yugoslavian scientist who was possibly one of earth’s greatest visionaries and yet isn’t nearly as well know as Albert Einstein.

And secondly it is one of the most interesting search terms known to man if you love crackpot conspiracy theories and nut job websites. Apparently scalar weapons are responsible for hurricane Katrina, the Haiti earthquake and I would put money on someone proving it created the Asian Tsunami.

So the story continues that you now need to recover this mythical scalar weapon and return it your American army colleague and of course Bad Company is the squad to do it.

Being Bad Company embodies what the single player is all about, you are part of a four man squad which includes a grumpy sergeant who is about to retire, a near psycho who enjoys blowing things up, a geeky smart ass who can handle a weapon and you. You are pretty much the hired gun who gets sent into all the suicide missions while your team backs you up.

In this way it’s different from Modern Warfare 2 as you stick with the same squad for the entire story which helps breed a sense of belonging and isn’t the least bit confusing, so one point to Battlefield.

The story mode is very similar between the two games where each segment of a stage feels like a mini-game that has been setup for your pleasure. Thinking back I find it hard to differentiate between the two games when thinking about the stages and yet at the same time I feel that the MW2 stages were tighter and more controlled which made them more exciting… so that’s a point back to MW2.

When it comes to twists and turns Modern Warfare 2 had far more and it did them better while Battlefield had more rounded characters who were far more entertaining.

Both stories were short and while entertaining both would struggle to justify being a full priced game.

If you haven’t played either and you don’t do multiplayer then I would recommend MW2’s single player over Battlefield’s, I feel it’s technically superior and easier to enjoy.

Multiplayer

But we all know the multiplayer is where it’s at so let’s get into that.

Battlefield Bad Company 2 is all about squad play, it’s all about teamwork and being a balanced squad.

You can choose one of 4 different types of soldiers everytime you spawn being either Assault, Engineer, Medic and Recon.

The Classes

The Assault guys are your grunts who come fully laden with assault rifles and grenade launchers. As you rank up you unlock new weapons along with smoke launchers and under barrel shotguns. The smoke grenades are perfect for obscuring the vision of enemy recon soldiers while moving up. You also unlock the ability to re-supply your squad mates with extra ammo which allows your squad to continue a sustained assault on the enemy position.

The Engineers come with less powerful machine guns but to counter this they also have RPG’s to help take down those tanks. As you rank up you unlock new guns, new launchers, anti-tank mines and the all important repair tool. The repair tool is invaluable to ensuring your tanks and helicopters can sway the battle in your favour. A tank without an engineer isn’t going to last long in the heat of battle.

Next up we get the Medic with their light machine guns and once unlocked the health packs and defibrillators. The medic is the easiest class to rank up with as you get points for every person you heal or revive and not to mention that the LMG comes with a whole load of ammo and can be devastating if you know how to handle it.

Last up we get the Recon, which most people just use as a simple sniper but it is so much more. Not only can the recon see further than anyone else (using the scope) which means they can mark enemy soldiers using the back button but they also come armed with C4 for taking down enemy tanks or Rush targets with ease. The most powerful thing a Recon can unlock is a mortar strike which allows them to reign in artillery hell from a distance making them more than just a little annoying.

So how does this compare to MW2? Well in MW2 you can change your weapons and alter your abilities using 3 different perks but in essence you are always the same person and as such I feel Battlefield gets that extra point for being just that little bit more.

Gameplay

Battlefield Bad Company 2 is all about tactics and war on a large scale. In some maps it can take up to 5 minutes to walk from the spawn point to the current battle along with the ability to spawn on your squad members pretty much eliminates spawn camping all together.

Battlefield is a much slower game and the typical MW2 tactics of run and gun will pretty much always end in disaster for you, you need to work as a team and co-ordinate your attacks or defences to ensure victory.

From a technical standpoint I find that MW2 is better, it’s smoother and has fewer issues with clipping, floating bodies or getting stuck in the environment. In Battlefield I have experienced all the above along with grenades not exploding and guns not reloading. However there are as yet no game ruining glitches that have been exploited and thanks to the speed of play it is still possible to do well even if your connection is not perfect.

So in terms of which is better, it really does depend on what you want. I prefer the pace of Battlefield Bad Company 2 over Modern Warfare 2.

Look and Feel

Battlefield looks good, it sounds great but it only looks good. The size of the maps is the main reason for it not looking great as the scale of Battle just couldn’t be rendered in Modern Warfare 2 styled graphics on the hardware that we currently have today. So if graphics are your thing then MW2 is the clear winner, while I feel they tie in audio.

However on the audio side a major setback for Battlefield is that the language is absolutely terrible, I pretty much played the entire game with the dialogue turned off just in case my kids wandered past and heard pretty much anything they had to say. It really felt like DICE had shoved in every swear word possible to up it’s cool stakes but forgot that some people don’t appreciate it and never added in the ability to fudge the language.

Conclusion

Both games are absolutely awesome and if you are a fan of FPS titles then you are doing yourself a great disservice by not picking up both. However I believe reviews need scores as the reviewer shouldn’t be allowed to chicken out of giving a final opinion.

Modern Warfare scored an incredible 9.4 but since then it has allowed it’s online play to be plagued by glitches and if you stop playing MW2 for a bit you will quickly fall of the pace which makes getting back into it really difficult, the squad based gameplay of Battlefield Bad Company 2 and slower pace resolve those issues.

If you only have enough money to buy one PFS title right now then I would say go for Battlefield Bad Company 2, it may not be as graphically polished as Modern Warfare 2 but it’s a whole lot of fun and doesn’t suffer from the problems that plague Modern Warfare 2 either.

For Fans Of: Shooters, destruction and team work.

Scoring

Gameplay: 9.0

It’s fun and the amount of vehicles and classes will keep it going strong for months.

Presentation: 8.0

Not the best looking game around but it’s size does make up for it’s graphical inferiority.

Sound: 8.5

Apart from the appalling language the rest of the sound is impressively delivered and perfectly placed.

Value: 9.0

The single player campaign isn’t worth the full retail price of this title, however if you are into online play then this game is going to give you hours of enjoyment.

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Overall: 8.7

Battlefield Bad Company 2 is an awesome game that I strongly recommend. If you are a fan of shooters then this is an absolute must have.

[Reviewed on Xbox 360]

Last Updated: March 23, 2010