Battlefield Heroes Goes Into Open Beta

EA Digital Illusions CE has quietly opened up the beta of Battlefield Heroes, their long-delayed, free-to-play shooter. After gradually scaling up the number of players in the closed beta, they've now made the game available to everyone and lifted the NDA. EA has not yet mentioned this in an official announcement, probably hoping to keep their servers from being overwhelmed. The game's website is now accepting signups. IGN ran a hands-on preview of Battlefield Heroes back in April.

Been Playing for a while

[rotide]

Figured I'd post a little info about the game as I've been a beta tester for quite a while now.

First, this is a FREE to play "web based" game. Web based is a bit misleading as while it is launched from a browser (ad supported), it is fully installed and runs fullscreen.

Second, the game is a "cartoon shooter" based around 3 classes. The heavy Gunner, the light knife/sniper rifle toting Commando and the middle ground SMG using Soldier.

You're able to level up much like in an MMO and every 2 levels you get another point to spend on new abilities. Burning Bullets, Stealth, Blasting Strike (an ability that knocks everyone back, including vehicles), etc. Currently the highest attainable level is 30 and it takes quite a while to get there.

The game takes a lot from past Battlefield games. Controllable territory via flags placed around the maps. Airplanes, Tanks and Jeeps are all fully controllable.

The only thing you can pay money for is "Battlefunds" (Roughly $5 for 700 Battlefunds). These can be used to buy outfits for your charater and give NO advantage to you. So someone that spends $100 on battlefunds will have zero tactical advantage over someone who never spends a penny. (For reference, a permanent Battlefund purchased item generally costs 560 Battlefunds but you can "rent" them for a month for 140 Battlefunds). There are also free points that you earn slowly during play called Valor Points. These can also be spent on "free" clothing in the in game store. There are also healing "widgets"/spells that you can pick up to heal you (and another type to heal your vehicle).

Right now there are only 4 maps (2 infantry only and 2 with a moderate to heavy emphasis on vehicles). All of them feel very polished and fun to play over and over again. DICE has mentioned that they have new maps on the horizon.

Now, my personal opinion. The game is about FUN. This isn't a hardcore shooter such as Counter-Strike and doesn't claim to be. This game is one of those that you can easily pick up and just have some fun! If you're looking for realism and a serious tournament game, look elsewhere. But if you just want some fun comedic gameplay (not all that much unlike Team Fortress 2) this game might be for you.

Overall, coming from an old school Duke Nukem/Quake1/2/3/Counter-Strike/Battlefield player, this is a fun game. Give it a try if you want to see what it is about, again, it is FREE!

Re:Just keep in mind the following

[rotide]

Entirely FALSE.

The only things you can buy with real money are:
Clothes
XP Boost Widget
VP Point Boost Widget

That's it. Clothes don't help you tactically in any way, VP points you get anyways and XP, while it will unlock abilities for you faster, doesn't give you anything playing will already give you over time.

So again, FALSE. There is nothing you can spend real money on to make you more formidable. Well, maybe a faster computer, but I digress.

Re:Pretty different

[rotide]

Been beta testing for quite a while and your insight from your first impression is spot on.

Like Battlefield 1942 without all that fun stuff.

[Garbad Ropedink]

A couple months back I was accepted into the Battlefield Heroes closed beta, so I downloaded, installed it, then after about 20 minutes of play I promptly deleted it.
It's like Battlefield 1942 except with all the fun stuff taken out. Seriously, it's a beautiful looking game, but that's it. The controls are dodgey, the weapons are weak, and the unlockables expire. Since this is an EA game you can pay real world money to get unlockables, which after a week will expire and be deleted from your inventory. I suppose that's the next step for DLC, and they've gotta test the water somewhere.

If you want to play a fun cheap battlefield game, then pick up Battlefield 1942, or Battlefield 2, they're bargain bin games now and are still great fun to play. Battlefield Heroes is just a dumbed down piece of crap designed to make you watch ads, and surreptitiously take your money.

Re:Less emphasis on "skill" and "strategy"

[mdmkolbe]

I've found BH emphasizes strategy more than many other games. You just have to use very different strategies than in most other FPS. Once I stopped relying strategies I learned from other FPS and instead analyzed BH's strategic dynamics to develop BH specific strategies, my scores shot up to where I am regularly the high scorer on any server.

I'll grant that BH is not strategic like maybe Rainbow 6 or AA. BH requires a much more dynamic strategy than that. Nevertheless, you can't bunny-hop or twitch shoot your way out of trouble so you have to be very situationally aware and strategically maneuver yourself into positions where you are more likely to kill than be killed.

Maybe BH isn't right for you, but if you want to give it another go, here are some tips. If you want to win at BH, you need to:

1. Understand the balance between going for kills and going for flag captures (i.e. kills get your team points, flags give your team a multiplier on those points). You must balance the two.
2. Understand the role your class plays in helping your team (e.g. soldier is the medic/grunt, commando should either be hazing with sniper shots or going invisible for behind-enemy-lines flag captures)
3. Equip the right weapons and understand when to use them (i.e. long vs short range gun, shootgun vs machine gun, dynamite). You will have to buy some of these weapons, but earning "money" is fairly easy relative to how long items last. I've never needed to spend real world money to get the right equipment even though I play only rarely (i.e. I'm not maximizing my earnings and items are more likely to need to be replaced between sessions).
4. Understand what vehicle to use when (e.g. dogfights in a plane may be fun, but they rarely help your team).
5. Build your character's abilities and understand when to use those abilities (e.g. heal). (It also helps to remap your mouse buttons for faster access to the right abilities/weapons.)
6. Move with a pack. A pack can do more damage per second.
7. Move with a pack. A pack can take more damage per second without dieing.
8. Move with a pack. A pack allows you to take advantage of your teammate's power-ups (e.g. a nearby teammate that uses "heal" will also heal you).
9. Move with a pack. Some abilities actually give you a bigger boost when you share the ability with friendlies (e.g. when you use "heal" you get more of your own HP healed if you used it to also heal friendlies).
10. Move with a pack. You will have more tactical options (e.g. stepping out of harms way for half a second to reload or recharge an ability) when there is an entire pack to keep the tangos busy.