Just what is wrong with Battlefield 3?

Herd of Cats presents:

Battlefield 3 was sold to us as better than Modern Warfare 3.

To no one's real surprise, that's not what we got. We got an upgraded version of every other Battlefield game and that's not what we were promised.

There is nothing wrong with Battlefield 3. I have played the Battlefields: Battlefield 1942, Battlefield Vietnam, Battlefield 2, Battlefield 2142, Battlefield Bad Company, Battlefield Bad Company 2 and even XBLA's Battlefield 1943. And they were all decent games.

None of them were better than the competing Call of Duty series. Sorry but they weren't.

According to EA, the previews and all the rhetoric to the media, that's what we were supposed to get this time. A game that would take down Call of Duty.

Only we didn't. We got the latest update in the Battlefield series. Thanks for moving the medic into the assault class and all but we were expecting more. And we didn't get it.

What we got was another Battlefield game with the same old Battlefield problems and even some new ones.

What do we think is wrong with battlefield 3?

Where do we begin? Well. Right here as it happens:

What's wrong with the game:

• Why the f**k do I have to enter into the next round to quit out! I just finished a map and I don't want to play the next one. Give me a f**king quit option in the damn lobby. Seriously DICE, this is a legacy issue. Fix it.
• I'd better not be credited with a loss when I quit out of a running map right after it starts. I f**king tried to leave before it started. I really f**king did.
• Spawn camping is bad enough when you appear in front of someone and get gunned down. Sometimes you at least get to fire your weapon. Under no circumstances should you spawn 6 inches in front of someone facing away from them. I spawned once solely to get stabbed. Seriously to god DICE, next time just set it up so that I can hand them my dog tags. It would be easier.
• Why does the stabbing not work half the time. From behind sure, no problem. If someone runs right into you a stabbing seems to do nothing. Well that's not true. It delays you just enough that the enemy can line you up and shoot you properly. Dammit I just wanted to stab him and I should have been able to.
• If I'm in a squad with friends in the lobby, I'd really like to be in a squad with them in the game. Not in separate squads and absolutely not on f**king different teams. If there is no room in the server for this don't put us in it.
• Fill the damn servers. This may contradict the previous point but it shouldn't. I was playing a full server of team death match and we move on the the next map after people left. It was 3 on 4. Surely this will fill up as the game goes on. 30 minutes later the map finished. Still 3 on 4. It took f**king forever and the losing team didn't enjoy it. Ask how I know. Fill the damn servers.
• Did J.J. Abrams direct this? I mean really! What's with all the lens flare? I can't see anything if I look remotely near the sun. That's one entire direction removed from the map as far as I can tell. Is it easier to render that way or have you just never seen the sun? I guess if your core audience has never left their parent's basement...
• The blinding effectiveness of tactical flashlights. Are these things nuclear powered? It's bad enough when an enemy blinds me but at least I can shoot back. Every time a teammate looks at me with his tactical flashlight not only do I go blind but the enemy shows up. So now my teammate doesn't know why I'm not shooting back and, oh, I'm dead again. I've been outside with flashlights. If it's daytime you can barely tell they are on. Newsflash: most of your maps are in daylight! No bright lights should be blinding me. If nothing else I am pretty sure the military has heard of sunglasses! Of course, if I am wearing sunglasses why the hell are our tactical flashlights even on! Not to mention it's f**king daytime!
• Am I crouching, standing or lying down? You don't know? Neither do I! Where's the f**king stance indicator? Would have killed you to put it in? The fact that it's not there is f**king killing me!
• Would it be possible to have some sort of hit indicator feedback? Not them hitting me. Those red flashes never f**king stop. But it's hard to tell whether I am hitting the or not. Should I even bother shooting? Or is just easier to die all the time? That's pretty much my play style anyway.

What's wrong with the players:

• I knew I was back in Battlefield when I started a game and watched an APC drive off empty with just the driver. Three of us running after it trying to catch a ride.
• Please, please, please if you can't fly the f**king helicopters. Don't even try. I won't even go near them.
• And if you fly a helicopter just so that you can jump out to get to a flag, I hate you. Your passengers hate you. There is nothing worse than flying into the ground and exploding into a fireball because your asshole pilot abandoned you to get a quick 250 points at the flag. At least say something. Asshole.
• Ditto for planes as if it needs to be said.
• I like to be a gunner in tanks. As an engineer. So that I can pop out and repair the tank after battles. This is hard to do when your driver takes off mid repair. Now he's driving a damaged tank and cursing his gunner for abandoning him. Think about it.
• Still a legacy issue. If someone is repairing a damaged, empty tank. he isn't repairing it for you! It's his damn tank leave it there.
• Teammates who shoot you as a method of communication. Need more ammo? It seems anytime someone needs ammo they just empty a clip into me. Why do you think you're out of ammo all the time buddy? Stop shooting your own f**king teammates! And I'm a goddamn engineer! Go shoot someone in supply! Although some sort of communicate menu like the PC version used to have might have been helpful.

So there you have it. Our take on what's wrong with battlefield 3. Some of these are just pet peeves and some of these are straight burning hatred.

Get this straight – I am enjoying battlefield 3. It's just like every other Battlefield game which I also enjoyed. But it's no Call of Duty as promised. I had suspected that with all the talk, all the rhetoric from DICE and EA that they would have, at least, fixed the biggest issues with Battlefield but they didn't even bother to do that.

What do I expect to happen?

Nothing.

I am not even sure why I bothered.

EA got their unit sales. People bought the game in droves. This entire campaign of "we will be better than Call of Duty" served it's purpose. It had nothing to do with Battlefield 3, it was all about selling Battlefield 3 and at that, it worked.

Battlefield 3 sold a ton and EA is happy. But not all of your audience is and the strange thing is? They remember.