My First Week of Playing Battlefield 4

If only the game wasn't stuttering so much...

Well it's been almost a week now since Battlefield 4 was released here in Australia, so I thought I'd share my thoughts on the game so far.

Before we go any further, it might be worth posting my specs so people have some idea of what my experiences are based on:

  • i7 2600
  • Powercolor HD 7850
  • 4GB DDR3 1333MHz RAM

Graphics settings are currently set to "Auto" but it looks like "High" has been selected.

Minimum system requirements for the game are:

  • Intel Core 2 Duo or Athlon X2
  • GeForce 8800GT or Radeon HD 3870, 512MB VRAM with at least DX 10.1 support
  • 4GB RAM

So as you can see, my computer more than meets the requirements, at least when it comes to the processor and video card – however RAM could potentially be upgraded and this has been added to my TODO list :).

So without further ado, here's my list:

The Bad:
  • Stuttering issue. Jerky movement in single and multi player, and my number one annoyance at the moment.
  • Multiple reports of crashes to desktop and various other issues (though I thankfully have only experienced one crash to desktop)
  • Broken on launch server browser
  • Not enough change from BF3
    • Jets still overpowered in the right hands
    • Vehicles still regenerate health
    • Vehicles still have perks
    • English in really bad foreign accents - just like BF3
    • SOFLAM
    • Frag rounds for auto shotguns
    • 12G slugs for shotguns
  • No faction specific weapons at the start (e.g. Americans using AKs)
  • Maps have a similar feel to BF3 – in fact some seem even smaller
  • Long loading times, BF2 style (although admittedly I only have the minimum required RAM)

The Good:
  • Peeking over obstacles actually works well
  • Vehicles have to reload salvos of shots
  • Counter-knifing
  • Ability to refuse medic revives
  • Reloading discards ammo in clip (BF2)
  • Weather effects on maps are pretty
  • Commander Mode is back
  • Field upgrades places focus on team to stick together and leave no man behind
  • Points rewarded for completing orders from Squad Leaders and Commanders. i.e. reward people who play the objectives

So what has everyone's experience been with BF4 so far? To me it seems a lot like BF3 with Commander Mode - which has left me feeling somewhat ambivalent about the title so far. It has good stuff but also some of the more annoying features of BF3. If the bugs and crashes were fixed I would probably be more forgiving of its flaws though.

Comments

  1. You hit the nail on the head.

    I'm getting stuttering / jerky movement as well, even though my ping and Framerate are fine.

    I also get the Battlefield 4 has encountered an error. This always happens during a map load, which obviously means it's server related.

    I have a Sapphire 7850 OC ( overclocked even further to 1200 / 1400 @ 1.176 volts) running on Ultra with the exception of Anti-aliasing which I bring back to x2 (low to medium), rather than x4 (high). It looks great and plays well, when....it's not jittery. Which isn't often.

    I'm sure a graphics driver update and DICE update will sort itself out eventually.

    By the way, I can barely read those 'prove you're not a robot' checks. Please consider using something else, it's extremely annoying.

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    1. Cheers Jason. Here's hoping you're right and DICE does do something about this issue - I *have* heard that there is an unparking cores gimmick now but I'm a stickler for a 90% polished product - it doesn't need to be 100% but it has to be smooth most of the time - which it isn't at the moment. Apparently EA *did* rush the release of BF4 so they could beat COD: Ghosts... which is poor form and probably why it's even buggier than it should be.

      I'll have a look into the robot checks. Maybe I'll trial disabling them for awhile and hopefully the amount of spammers will be manageable :).

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