The highlight of the Battlefield 4 fall update is the new, “community map” – Operation Outbreak.
Battlefield 4 is just over two years old now, which given Electronic Arts’ previous track record would mean it’s been pretty much abandoned by now, right? Wrong! An absolutely massive “Fall Update” for the game has just gone live, adding so much new content, bug fixes, and balance changes that you’ll need to read a whopping 30 pages of patch notes to know what’s new. In another shocking move away from the status quo, the update is completely free to all Battlefield 4 players – regardless of whether you own Battlefield Premium or not!
The highlight of the update is the new “community map” – Operation Outbreak – which was designed by the Battlefield 4 team with the help and influence of the Battlefield community. You can check out the awesome cinematic trailer for the map above.
“Our initial goals for this map were to have an infantry focused, terrain based, medium sized map (like Zavod 311) featuring all out destruction but sporting no massive set-piece event, and it was to be a pleasant place to play for longer periods,” explained DICE.
“With this as a starting point, we asked the community through polls and our channels what direction we should take, and everything from the theme (Jungle won the first vote), the name (Operation Outbreak) and points of interest (Waterfall, Temple, among few) were picked by and influenced by the active community.”
The vast majority of the balance changes focus on vehicles, with infantry changes made to compliment those balances. There are also quite a few netcode improvements, as well as some “quality of life” style changes – such as encouraging more objective-based play by promoting players to squad leader if they request an order, and are not given one by their current leader within 30 seconds.
It’s a big patch and I’m honestly surprised to see DICE putting this much effort into the game so long (comparatively) after it’s release. It gives me hope for Battlefront…
Source: Electronic Arts.
