EA Pulls A Fast One WIth Battlefield 3

[natster43]

Apparently I have only played on well ran servers. I have not had any problems on the 360 with people being asshats with the player ran servers. It still sucks that DICE decided to not have any official servers.

 

[chadachada123]

Err...most or at least much of the time, the posts saying to not use shotguns aren't to simply "not use any shotguns," but to not use any exploits, like the Masterkey glitch that is not an intended feature of the game and constitutes cheating

Pretty big distinction there, author.

And you didn't even mention the hosts that will boot players just for being skilled at the game, which, according to some people and my own captcha, "run amok."

Edit: Though, I should clarify, I have NEVER once been booted on the 360 for destroying the other team, or booted at all, and have only met an admin once (who was a pretty cool dude).

 

[Aeonknight]

This is why you look for a server named "original" or something along the lines. Just look for the original rules and take that. Seriously, people ***** and moan about this game more than MW3.

I don't angry over battlefield being hated or complained about. It's little things that apparently are a big deal that make me angry.

Besides, some guns are overpowered or cheap, that is why they are banned in player owned servers.

Capcha: get over it

What's funny is the only server I've been on that's had any real changes to original rules was one Rush server where the attackers had 200 tickets instead of the usual what... 80ish? And you know what? It was still fun. I wasn't banned for using a specific gun or beating the admin in jet dogfighting... and what's more is you can favorite the "good servers" that you come across.

So what's the problem again? The official servers have gone down seemingly overnight and it has had 0 influence on my experience.

But hey, it's the Escapist. They'll take anything EA does as some massive slight that is destroying gaming forever.

 

[NvrPhazed]

I don't want to have to quote everyone who is missing the point, but what the author and most of the reasonable people are saying is that player run servers aren't bad, but not being able to have an option to join a vanilla game easily (either by having an only vanilla option or having the DICE server names exclusive [seriously WTF EA that is SO EASY]) detracts the value of the game because you have to spend extra time sifting through servers like its COD2 all over again instead of immediately and easily dropping in and out. Online Pass and renting of the servers is a different beast and does not matter to this situation since DICE has their dedicated servers back now. Admin behavior is also irrelevant because if you want to play vanilla, there are no powers to be abused. If you want to be on player servers, then just quit and find a better server.


Sum up: PLAYER SERVERS ARE GOOD BUT HAVE A VANILLA BUTTON OR A SYMBOL SIGNIFYING THAT IT IS ACTUALLY A VANILLA SERVER.

 

[oliver.begg]

um is it only the states and Europe that get [dice] servers cos thats the way its been since launch for me in oceania and its worked out fine.

it sounds like the people running your servers are dicks.


and as to console not being PC, i would say that PC isn't console but that hasn't stoped EA and Activison trying to make PC console so drink a cup of concrete and harden the F*** up

 

[Sovereignty]

I stopped reading when this clearly flame-bait article mentioned how console players were SOOOOO different from PC players.

As a recently converted PC gamer (I have Battlefield 3 for the 360 and for my PC.) I can say that I as a gamer was missing a large chunk of the experience by limiting myself to consoles. I'm not saying that consoles are worthless, it's horribly underrated just how the ease of use of a console is compared to the often times complicated and potentially headache causing install of a game.

It's pure sensationalism to assume that ALL the servers rented by players will suddenly be high ticket, single map games where everyone is banned for using a shotgun. It's not like this on the PC, and it hasn't been like this on the 360. The truth of the matter is letting the community put up and manage servers is BETTER than giving that task to the publisher and/or developer.

Now instead of being pigeonholed into what the mob wants, we get a bit of everything. Are there more 2000% ticket caspian border servers than anything? Sure, but you know why? Because that's what most people will actually go and play.

It certainly does NOT mean that there are no random map normal conquest games. And it also means that now if you don't like it, you can in effect do something about it, all for the price of two months in WoW.

I really don't see how there's a negative other than that players still can't host servers on their own machines for free. If anything for consoles at least there is finally a viable option for server renting to pave the way.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

As a primarily PC gamer I find these complaints rather bizarre.

However, I can see where they're coming from. In that past I've gotten rather annoyed at having to sift through lists of crazy modded servers (500% health! All rocket launchers! Instant vehicle spawns! Melee only! All sniper, 1%hp) in search a proper balanced game.

My history with the FPS genre started on the PC. When I played Team Fortress, there were two servers I favored because they included the map Frontlin in the rotation. But then, at the time, there were entire cultures built around this exact concept. People who have only played PC games certainly have no cause to be annoyed by such a thing because such a thing is normal.

Prior to BF3, the whole concept of "Server" was relatively nebulous. You joined games and game modes. You did not join servers. Hell, the same was largely true of BF3 at launch. You could certainly pick to join a server but since there was nothing to distinguish them, the feature was only used in instances where quick match failed.

I personally appreciate that the servers are different. I like that there are servers I can join where I don't have to play maps that I hate. But that doesn't mean that the maneuver is beyond reproach. It simply offsets the cost of maintaing those servers to the players. Sure, such has long been standard on the PC but such a move on consoles is customer hostile thinly disguised as a feature. I don't begrudge the move - hell I even benefited from it. I just think it was handled in a particularly scummy way.

 

[Buizel91]

If only more people were playing Bad Company 2, this shit they are pulling off with 3 made me sell it. Ah well, back to War for Cybertron

That's no better, it is a good game, and if you manage to get a good Online game you can have a blast, but at least 6 out of 10 games you have will be glitched to fuck. On PC it is worse, but dear god even on Console im seeing Scouts with the Whirlwind and Warcry ability!

OT: Yeh, this doesn't affect me at all seen as thought Battlefield isn't a game i own, and by the looks of it never will.

Now if everyone will excuse me, I'm going to clean up Arkham City.

 

[UrieHusky]

I was playing the other day for roughly 6 hours to relax, just shooting choppers out of the sky.

I cycled through about.. 8 servers? 7 of them banned shotguns, the 8th banned sub machine guns.
I personally don't use those types of guns but seriously.. it's insanity. I don't really mind the inflated tickets, because I find the matches are a little too short for my liking, I'll just be getting into the swing of thing and then the end of match music begins playing =/ but I can definitely see how it's an issue for other people.

Anyway.. I dunno I don't personally think this is massively terrible since it's 6 months down the line and the PC is simply the better platform for FPS games in my opinion (I've played it on my PS3 and a high end PC, found it a better experience in every way on PC but mine has no hope of handling it so console for me)

So yeah, I'm presuming this is a console specific issue? if it's not please disregard my stupidity XD

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Err...most or at least much of the time, the posts saying to not use shotguns aren't to simply "not use any shotguns," but to not use any exploits, like the Masterkey glitch that is not an intended feature of the game and constitutes cheating

It depends on the server of course. Plenty of them run with vanilla rules. I've seen plenty that ban the use of a variety of weapons and combinations. Semi-auto sniper rifles is common (even though their use offers no advantage in sniping and simply makes it somewhat equivalent to using an assault rifle if outfitted properly) as is Shotguns with Frag rounds (in spite of the fact that various nerfs have made that combination exceedingly difficult to get a kill with. Needing to connect with four rounds on a weapon with absurd recoil and terrible accuracy is a rather difficult task). Hell, I've been admin killed because I was using a weapon in a scenario they didn't like.

It isn't common. It is easily avoided. But here's the catch: I didn't need to avoid such things or even worry about them. If I wanted to use an M3A1 with frag rounds, the thing that ought to stop me is that the combination isn't going to be useful. Not some arbitrary limitation.

Of course the other side of that equation is that at least there is some feeble mechanism to control bug exploits. The m26 one is fairly uncommon largely thanks to admin policing for example.

I don't think the move is entirely bad by any stretch. But part of the reason I play games on a console is because sometimes I don't want to search for servers and such. Sometimes I want to mash a button and play. If I wanted control, I'd be playing the game on my PC.

 

[porpoise hork]

I have absolutely no issue with player run servers. Some of the most fun and best games I have ever played were on them. It's been this way for years on PC, but what I do object to is them having the ability to name them the same as a default server. Either block the default name system from player rented servers or force an identifier into the name so we the players can tell right off that it's a private run server.

 

[Something Amyss]

There's also online passes, which Battlefield 3 uses, which should be paying for the official servers. If they're getting rid of the official servers, what is that online pass money being used for? It certainly isn't going towards keeping the servers up if the players are the ones fronting the cost for that.

That's the fun of this whole thing. Remember when the argument was servers weren't cheap? And then...Yeah.

 

[Semitendon]

I couldn't agree with the article more.

BF3 was my multiplayer of choice. . . and then they changed it to the new "shitty" setting.

I tried to play for a few days after they rented out the servers, but it was too tedious. I don't want to play by some shit-head 12 year olds bajillion lives or limited weapons rules. There is no system to filter out rented servers other than a visual inspection of each servers title, which as the article points out, is easily faked.

After scrolling through server after server, I don't have an exact count but the remaining normal servers must be less than 5%. Which leaves precious few options, and loads of crap to search through.

So my choices are:

1. Play a game controlled by idiots, with rules that are stupid, arbitrary, or unfair.

2. Spend the majority of my time looking for a normal game, and then hope like hell I can join, or if I do join, that nothing goes wrong because it means more time looking if it all goes south.

3. Play something else. ( I chose this option)

So far, I have not put BF3 into my xbox for about 3 or 4 weeks, and I don't see that changing any time soon.

 

[userwhoquitthesite]

Ok, I'm not even a battlefield player and this pisses me off.

I say its time to declare war on EA. Break open the weapons! Step to the rigging! put the kettle on!

 

[samsonguy920]

As someone who got to watch the progression of CounterStrike and the direction its servers went, I can sympathize. Too many server owners turned out to be the whiners about campers and high powered weapons, and thus forbade either in their server. I could have started my own server, but what chance did I have to get players, as with that game people wanted to find populated games, and most gamers usually go to just what shows up first in the list, either without paying attention to the rules, or just not caring.
However, I look at this as a clear opportunity to give console players more choices for their buck. In the past, consoles had fewer choices as far as what tweaks or mods their games could undergo to the game rules. Now we see more customization becoming available to console players, and the one of the first reactions is that customization is going to be bad and will ruin the game. Oh well. If you are such a purist and want to keep playing vanilla, pony up the $30 to rent your own server. If you are so certain that your gaming friends are with you on this, then you should have no worries. Want more players? Advertise your server on message boards and Reddit. Of course you run the risk of getting griefers and the like, but risk is part of anything that you feel should be worth getting.
If you feel you can't afford $30 to rent a server, then your gaming lifestyle isn't as strong as you like to portray it as, and therefore your opinion lacks a lot of foundation. A lot of gaming servers are supported by groups of people chipping in to maintain the server. Forever Alone doesn't win you accolades in the 'I want it this way!' column. Either you do have a lot of gaming friends willing to support the chance to play vanilla Battlefield 3, or you take the time to figure that maybe the good fight you felt should be fought isn't so good anymore. After all, it's not like your single player game is being affected.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

First: Don't give a damn about the hard life of a console gamer. You're responsible for the shambles the games industry is now in, you've ruined PC gaming so frankly I don't give a damn.

Second, and on topic: $30 for 30 days? You can't be serious. That isn't "nickel and diming" as you put it, that's outright robbery. $30 a year *maybe* (and that's a big maybe, with a really long "a").

Third: I'll concede that at least having a feature to filter servers by whatever criteria should be par for the course. If I couldn't do that on PC I quite simply wouldn't play the game MP. Ideally filtering should be available, at a minimum, by ping, server full/empty, password yes/no, match type and/or map.

 

[ThunderCavalier]

Now instead of being pigeonholed into what the mob wants, we get a bit of everything. Are there more 2000% ticket caspian border servers than anything? Sure, but you know why? Because that's what most people will actually go and play.

A bit of 'everything?' Have you even tried to play any of the rented servers?

I'll be quite honest; I don't care whether PC gaming has always dealt with this and that we, as console gamers, should have to 'adapt' to something is so radically new and came right the hell out of nowhere. I wouldn't mind if they never gave us the option to play Vanilla severs before... but they DID, and that's my problem here. This isn't variety; this is basically letting the people with the most money control the game here.

And I'm not a PC gamer, so I can't really judge, but if the people that run the servers are about the same as PC gamers, then I have absolutely no qualms for calling you guys out as elitist pricks that will do anything and everything to make sure the game is always your way. Whenever I play in Battlefield, I am guaranteed to get into at least ONE game where either:

1) A certain weapon or weapon class entirely is banned and is grounds for booting.

2) A certain playstyle entirely is banned and is grounds for booting.

3) All good players are regulated to one team while all the bad players are regulated to another team.

And, of course, games like Conquest or Rush take upwards of one to two hours.

NO.

I. Do. Not. Care. If. This. Is. More. Like. Superior. PC. Battlefield 3. If I wanted to play that game, I'll go out and get a superior PC and that copy and play THAT game. However, I'm playing the console BF3, which has a smaller amount of players and, thus, a smaller ticket count to accommodate it. I'm playing the console BF3, where I can play however I want without modifying my console and not have to worry about losing my progress in the game, since it's still in the game and, thus, is completely valid, completely free, and should be allowed in-game, fairness be damned. If this rent-a-server thing was considerate to all players, it'd give us that Vanilla option, but it doesn't; it expects US to pay for it.

And I already pay for the Internet connection, the Xbox Live Subscription, AND the game itself. Why would I pay continually for a server just so I can play the way I want to. I'm not made of money, nor am I stupid. If the game wants me to keep shelling out money so that I can play it like, I think I'll sell it and pay for something else.

I mean, CoD may copypasta itself every game or so, but at least it doesn't make you pay to play a NORMAL game.

 

[Brett Bowling]

Woah woah hold up, there is a girl playing Halo, a girl playing an fps, a girl playing a video game, four outs before the sides change?
What horrible distortion of reality has EA caused here?

 

[Anti-Robot Man]

I always thought that the LIVE Gold membership was supposed to pay for the whole "online" thing...

It was/is, EA actually strong-armed Microsoft into letting them run their own servers (basically if you don't let us run our own servers we won't publish games on the 360 - which would've been comercial suicide for Microsoft's games division).

They did this purely so they could exploit their customers by doing things like turning off the servers in order to push them into buying a newer instalment of the game (using the excuses that not many people are still playing/it's expensive to run servers - it isn't that expensive and that's a cost they fought to place on themselves).

If you don't like the way EA is taking the games industry there is only one thing you can do to preasure them to change - stop buying EA games.

 

[Sovereignty]

-snip-

As I stated in my post, I have played on the rented servers. I've found normal games (and I wasn't actively searching for it.)

I've also been in a game that supposedly banned players for using shotguns, yet myself (And the rest of the server) were proceeding to run around with them to no ill-effect. (I've actually yet to be booted from an xbox server in all honesty.)

As for the team stacking, that's been a problem of nearly all FPS' that allow team switching. Suggesting it has anything remotely to do with the fact that these servers are user moderated and funded is not really valid imo.


Adding to it, I am so glad to see that people who abuse and/or cheat are now able to be kicked/booted/banned by the server admins. It is much better than the alternative of having to wait and hope that your little report sent through the xbl interface actually bans that guy two weeks from when you send it.

I still don't see much negative to letting players rent servers, after all it's not like if you're so unhappy with the current list of servers you couldn't.. You know, go out and rent your own. I get that to some this may be seen as a, "Why do *I* have to pay to play the game the way I want to play it." though considering that why should everyone else be forced to play it the way you wish to play it on the other side of that coin?