What makes a Battlefield game special isn’t just chaos on a large scale—it’s when all the moving parts come together to create something that can be enjoyed by shooter fans of all ages and skill levels. It’s when striking visuals and top-notch sound design meet attention to detail. It’s when you and your squad can spend an entire match holding a single objective, then walk away with a sense of satisfaction knowing that you did your part.
It’s all the moments and stories that are born from a single match that, from a distance, looks like nothing more than mayhem. It’s Battlefield 6.
### Buffet of Choices
Battlefield 6 offers a plethora of ways for players to engage with it, but most of those options fall within multiplayer—the main reason the average person plays.
Multiplayer offers game modes in every shape and size, including series staples like **Conquest** and **Rush**, as well as returning modes like **Breakthrough**, **Domination**, **Squad Deathmatch**, **King of the Hill**, and **Team Deathmatch**.
**Escalation** is the new kid on the block. Escalation plays a lot like Conquest, but you’re fighting for permanent territory control. In the first round, take and hold more objectives than your opponent and you’ll score a point, removing an objective from the map and gaining territory. You then enter the next round where you fight over the remaining objectives. Take and hold more than your opponent again to score another point and remove yet another objective. The first team to three points (or to take three territories) wins.
While most shooters try to inject new modes, many fail to land in the long run. Escalation hits the spot and immediately feels like a core mode for Battlefield.
### The Return of Portal
The next big attraction is **Portal**, which existed in Battlefield 2042 and returns for Battlefield 6. Battlefield Portal allows creators to make their own custom Battlefield experiences that players can then enjoy.
This could mean a new mode or a scenario where players can practice their flying. The possibilities are endless, exemplified by a creator named Battlefield Dad who managed to make a BF Invaders game mode within Battlefield. Yup, he made **Space Invaders in Battlefield**. Not much else I can add to that.
Portal reminds me of the modding scene for DayZ in that the game’s life can be extended by players creating unique experiences. The number of modes on offer will swell as the community invents new and interesting things to play. Just when you’re tired of Conquest and Rush, someone will come up with a mode that reinvigorates the community and gives them something fresh to enjoy. Space Invaders in Battlefield, folks.
### Single Player Campaign
Finally, Battlefield 6 offers a single-player campaign.
Campaigns for shooters face an uphill battle. It’s difficult to surpass the adrenaline rush multiplayer gives you, so the story being told in an FPS campaign must stand out. It has to provide memorable moments that the player will hold onto long after it’s done.
I’m not going to spend a lot of time breaking it down, but the campaign didn’t get off to a great start for me. The early moments felt forced, and characters were killed off in ways that I was supposed to care about—but with zero development that would lead me to actually feel anything.
Things improved as missions passed, and there were cool moments, but it’s the kind of campaign I’ll only play again to grab all the collectibles—not because it was a banger that I need to revisit in the future.
### Progression, But at What Cost?
Battlefield 6 comes with a great deal of customization and player agency over their class and loadout. Yes, the four classes are back, each retaining the core of what makes it unique. However, you can take any weapon you’d like with any class, although each class has at least one weapon archetype that it specializes in, giving it bonuses when you use its native archetype.
As you play matches, you earn experience (XP) for everything you do, leveling up your weapons and vehicles while also gaining ranks in your career, leading to more unlocks. There are also daily, weekly, class, and a seemingly endless number of challenges—all offering XP or specific unlocks.
It’s a lot of challenges, folks, and none of it is particularly well displayed or conveyed.
The one thing I’m becoming addicted to is **weapon customization**. I love unlocking new attachments for my favorite gun and trying to improve it. It’s a wildly satisfying level of customization complemented by the inclusion of a firing range for testing.
If there’s one knock on weapons, though, it’s the progression. Weapon progression moves at a snail’s pace, and casual players will find it exceptionally difficult to reach the later unlocks that can put your favorite gun over the top. Truthfully, Delta Force does weapon progression better, allowing players to invest tokens earned through gameplay to level up their guns. At the very least, Battlefield needs to increase weapon XP dramatically.
Thankfully, vehicle unlocks and general XP progression don’t seem nearly as grindy as the weapons.
Vehicles, as you’d expect, are very powerful in the right hands. You can level any vehicle up significantly—even if you’re in the gunner position for a good run. Good runs in vehicles can be hard to come by, due to the powerful tools infantry have to keep vehicles in check. Too powerful and plentiful, if you’re talking about the mines.
Some of the unlocks that you get will be for appearance customization. You can change your soldier’s outfit, the skin that your vehicle sports, or even your player card. I’m a bit beyond caring too much about that, but occasionally I’ll spend a couple of minutes choosing new camo for my vehicles.
Unfortunately, the menus and user experience in those customization sections are bad, but more on that later. The point, for now, is that you can customize your butt off in Battlefield 6.
### Game Within the Game
As I sit firmly in my mid-forties, I’m forced to come to terms with the fact that those 50/50 gun battles in FPS games are more like 60/40 in favor of my typically younger opponents. I’m sure before long that number will become 70/30.
A couple of years ago this was a tough realization, as I became increasingly frustrated that I couldn’t run into the middle of the fight and take out four or five opponents relying on skill alone. I couldn’t be successful and have fun playing the way I’d spent my entire life playing. I had to come to terms with the fact that my video game youth was gone.
Make no mistake, it’s coming for you too.
What makes Battlefield 6 special is the game within the game.
Every round—especially large-scale modes—is made up of dozens of players and even more moving parts. Tanks roll through the streets, choppers rain death from above, jets dogfight in the skies, and infantry battle for every street, building, and room.
While the bulk of players will charge towards the objective and the hail of bullets that await them, Battlefield 6 lets you carve out your own niche—no matter what you enjoy or what your capabilities are.
Have you heard of Grndpagaming? Check him out on YouTube to see what I mean.
If you’re an ace pilot who only wants to fly jets, you can mostly do that. If you’re a sniper who doesn’t care if you ever win a round and only wants to hit those long-distance headshots, go for it. If your squad fancies itself a tank crew and you just want to keep a tank alive and rolling all match, well, you can try to do that.
Maybe you’re a pacifist and never want to fire your weapon, spending all your matches only reviving your teammates. You can do that. Good luck to you, but you can do that.
In my case, I generally want to remain useful to my team and win more gun battles than I lose. Instead of charging face-first into the wall of bullets, I’ll go prone on my back when I hear an enemy coming and ambush them as they enter the room. I’ll crawl near the front lines with a supply bag and huck smoke grenades on the objectives we’re trying to take. I’ll spend an entire match sitting on a mountain, painting and spotting targets for our crack pilots to eliminate.
No matter what you want to do or what you’re good at, you can find a way to have fun in the sandbox that is a BF6 multiplayer match while also being useful.
But if you’re getting older, like me, you probably can’t keep running directly into those gun battles and going 1v5, bro. Come at me, bro. Yeah, those days are gone. Time to evolve.
### Not All Battles Are Won
Despite possibly being one of the best Battlefield games ever released, BF6 isn’t perfect.
The weapon progression system is a real grind. I don’t mind it, but I’m a sicko like that. It’s going to be frustrating for casuals who just want to hop into a match and have a weapon with a suppressor.
There are plenty of balance issues to deal with, like grenades universally being weak or anti-vehicle mines being way, way, way too powerful and plentiful.
Perhaps the worst aspect of Battlefield 6 is the user interface and experience. Right from the first screen, things are messy and navigation isn’t intuitive. Try figuring out how to change your soldier profile or enable an XP boost. Have fun sorting through the mess that is the game’s challenges.
If you leave a match, your squad doesn’t go with you, nor do you have the option to take them along. More often than not, I’m tossed back into matchmaking so quickly that I’m forced to leave a live game when I want to call it a night.
The menus are by far the weakest part of Battlefield 6, but hopefully this is something that can be improved in the weeks and months to come.
### The Art of War
Battlefield 6 is a triumph in almost every way. It has problems that need to be ironed out, but nothing that can’t be addressed as time goes on.
The good news is that the core of the game—the soul of what makes a great Battlefield experience—is there. The visuals, the sound effects, the destruction raining down on you while you lie prone in the rubble, exhausting the last of your rifle’s ammunition.
The tools and details required to give every player, no matter their interest or skill level, the opportunity to create memorable moments.
Battlefield is back, baby.
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*This Battlefield 6 review was completed using a Steam key provided by Electronic Arts. The review environment included closed testing and live servers full of humans.*
https://www.shacknews.com/article/146365/battlefield-6-review-score
