RPG or FPS, Battlefield Heroes will have what you need. It's completely free! So what are you waiting for?
It wasn't even fully released and the demo servers were packed constantly. Even months after it's release, people were still massively playing the demo for countless hours on end. That's how addictive and innovative this game was! I'd spend days over at a friends house and completely abused his hospitality and internet connection to play this for days and days. Eighteen hour sessions and all. I just sent him a random message thanking him for taking this abuse in stride. It really wasn't friendly of me to do so, but this game just overstepped friend boundaries.
This experience Battlefield gave you was the keystone of their success.
How did they make a game that would rise out of nothing and stand there with the best of them and even topple some huge names like Medal Of Honour in the process?
For you who aren't yet familiar with the game, this is how it runs down: This first person shooter sets two teams against each other. Each team has a set amount of lives pooled together, called tickets. The map the players are on have a certain amount of areas you must hold by holding your flags up there for your side. The more flags you capture, the harder the opposite side will fall, because 1 death will result in a bigger loss of tickets. If these tickets are depleted, the game is over and the one with the most tickets wins the battle.
If this wasn't enough to make for a seriously intense and fun filled, team battle, Battlefield also implements vehicles such as buggies, tanks and planes to cause some serious, vehicular damage.
All these elements combined, make for a battle with constant adrenaline, where you have to be watchful all the time and time is an added factor. And as a personal note, I think that some good team play helps a lot to this experience and is promoted in the game. If your band of heroes is tight, you'll be a tough act to compete against.
Battlefield has taken all these elements and increased the most important aspect of it, being that intense feeling, whilst removing all other aspects. What is left is the most intense arcade feel you can imagine.
First of all, they've implemented a Hero building system. Now you won't just play a First Person Shooter, but you'll also have a nice RPG feel to it. Actually, you won't play a First Person Shooter at all, as the camera is now based behind the character to make it a Third Person Shooter, contributing to the adventuring feel.
You start of creating your own customised Hero and from there on you can head into the game and gain experience and levels by getting flags, damaging and killing your foes.
Added to this, you'll have missions you can complete by doing certain things, such as doing damage or getting a set amount of kills a certain way. The aspects of this are just good enough to give you the sense of playing a nice, simplistic RPG without having to bore you with details, taking your mind off the fact you're hare to shoot and kill!
Another feature it has done to improve the intense gameplay is to add abilities that your Hero can use to his advantage to gain an edge on the competition. You can run faster, do more damage, heal yourself, the works!
Although purists might complain this takes away the realism, you can't say Battlefield Heroes was meant to be 100% true realism.
It's a cartoon for Pete's sake!
In the spirit of having a customised Hero, you'll also be able to upgrade these abilities when you gain Hero Points by levelling up.
If you customise these abilities well, you'll become quite a force to deal with. The most of the kills I got, I got by having the right skill at the right time. So be sure to pay attention to these, as they are a big part of the game, for you and your opponents alike!
The aiming has been fixed to a more forgiveable aspect. In the previous series, the aiming was a bit of a party pooper, as it was hard and sometimes completely random. You could stand perfectly still, aim the body and for some odd reason miss a stationary object; this in the guise of being realistic aiming experience. Horseradish I say! Battlefield Heroes remedied this and now if you aim well and true, you'll hit most the time. Of course moving objects are harder, so be sure to keep these feet going!
Keeping the simple and easy approach in mind throughout the entire game, Battlefield will let you bring ten things to war. In a bar underneath the character you can choose between 2 weapons, one explosive, abilities and widgets. These widgets usually consist of a way to heal you in some manner.
This way, everything you'll possibly need is nicely set up and you'll have it all at your fingertips.
And last, but not least, the game strips away everything else! This not only makes Battlefield Heroes approachable for all players to enjoy, it does so even for older and slower computers and connections. As my pc is an ancient demon, this was a deal breaker for me to join. I could still set everything to a fairly decent graphic level and enjoy a steady connection, with only occasional lags during big battles and only because my vanity refuses to play one of the many lower settings available.
If you, like me, aren't quite up to date with the modern flash of things, but secretly long to play some newer games, Battlefield Heroes will hook you up!
In fact, I believe it would serve a lot of developers well to hop on this train and tone down a bit of flash for accessibility. I'm not saying it should look bland, because this game still has the necessary pizazz, but not going overboard on needless details and replacing them with easier access can only be resulted in a win-win situation for both client and developer.
To top all that, Battlefield Heroes is a free game to play! Say what? Yes, it's free! Completely free!
In a few easy to follow steps you can download it and be blasting away according to your level and preferences. I didn't know this myself until I saw numerous ad banners pop up on my screen annoying me about a free Battlefield game. After some calculated risks, I decided to click one and, lo and behold, it delivered what it had advertised!
And they say ads spammed across the internet don't work. They're only right 99% of the time!
Graphically, Battlefield Heroes chooses for a cell-shaded, cartoon view, not unlike Team Fortress 2, to aid it in it's arcade intentions. And although, again, it might not feel as realistic as it's previous franchise brethren, the experience doesn't become any less addictive. Even without complete realism, all buildings, maps, vehicles, people and surroundings still look nice and seem right in their form. When a tank approaches, you'll really feel your heart go faster as if a tank was approaching, cartoon or not.
Everything feels as real as it can get and will give you a genuine war experience, once you get over all the whoopee sounds and the fact people shouldn't have abilities. You'll be at the front line just like in other war games, be it unconventional war in this case.
This game seems to be too good to be true, doesn't it? Well it is superb, but not flawless.
Some glitches here and there can be detected or overlooked, depending on the type of player you are.
The biggest drawback I encountered is that in the heat of battle, things could go awry and sporadically your controls won't be 100% responsive. I found this to be specially true when pressing down numerous buttons and then wanting to activate a skill. for instance if I'm in battle and firing, while going diagonally and jumping, I won't be able to activate my Shield. For this to work, I'll have to let go of at least one direction and preferably not jump. Although this isn't always the case, I've died numerous times because this happens and that's really frustrating, really fast.
Also, there is a kill glitch that some players can get credit for a kill they didn't even nearly commit, but that also doesn't happen often and doesn't hurt the gameplay too much. Don't confuse this with the kill they get for shooting down your vehicle when you crash or explode it.
Last aspect people might consider a downside is that the game isn't completely free. Did I lie? No, I didn't. But you didn't expect that EA would launch a Battlefield game and not try and cash in on it's success, now did you? They might be the biggest, but that doesn't mean they should do charity work.
In the game you can gain Valor Points by playing or you can buy Battlefunds. With these things you can customise your character by buying new outfits, emotes, weapons, widgets and such. And although Valor Points will get you certain items, having Battlefunds will give you an edge and will also allow you to buy better weapons and keep them.
This edge is often frowned upon by the people who chose to play for free and in a recent update this has only gone worse.
More so, this has even been oracled as the demise of Battlefield Heroes.
A lot of new weapons have been set loose and most items in general have become exclusively available with Battle Funds or have become ridiculously priced.
Does this destroy the great gameplay aspect it once had? The answer to that is: Only in rare cases where there are a load of players on the same team with superior weapons.
But let's not forget that the masses that are complaining are a vast amount of players and all these cheapskates should just come together and overcome this minor inconvenience. There are a ridiculous amount of people that play completely free and if you are a decent player, you'll man up and kill even your superiors, instead of crying like a girl. Brain over brawn; every obstacle is surmountable if you choose it to be.
This is a war soldier, it wasn't supposed to be fair!
But just to appease the nay sayers, I will have this flaw deduct some of the overall score, although I do not consider it a problem. Yes, this game originally should have scored a solid 9.2.
In conclusion; If you like shooters or just online play in general, Battlefield Heroes will have what you need. You might view it from an RPG point of view or from a straight shooter, but either way, this addictive game will eat hours from you if you let it under your skin. Did I mention it's free? It's completely free! So what are you waiting for? At least give it a try; you will not regret it!