Battlefield could "dethrone" Call of Duty during next gen switch-over - analysts

As we reported last November, Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 isn't quite the record-breaking success its predecessors were. You'd have to be a raving idiot to conclude that the franchise is on the rocks - it's still far and away the industry's best-selling shooter, and that modest sales slippage could be attributed to slowing sales across the board - but analysts agree that Activision must work harder to retain pre-eminence in the face of stiff competition from the likes of EA's Battlefield.

[dirigiblebill]

If it wants to beat COD, it needs to stop trying to be COD. Bring back Bad Company! Bring back senses of humour about stuff!

[Bladesfist]

It tried to be cod? I do love the characters from bad company though.

[dirigiblebill]

Perhaps it's just me, but BF3's tone and emphasis on scripting and close-quarters gunnery feels a lot closer to Call of Duty than previous games.

[DarthJay]

I am the biggest Battlefield fanboy out there, and in the single player, they absolutely tried to be COD. In their defense, they had never tried to do a single player campaign before, but it is what it is.

The OP's point remains true: the Bad Company part of the franchise was at least unique in that there was humor involved and the premise that you were a crew of screwballs was a different vibe than the super serious plot twisting story Battlefield 3 had.

I liked the campaign in Battlefield 3, but I definitely walked away thinking "man, they tried to be COD a little bit here."

[Crazyglues]

Actually I love Bad Company 2 but, I also loved BF3 -What I think they should do is bring back both - If COD can do Modern Warfare & Black Ops...

Why can't we get BF4 and Bad Company - That way you would have a Battlefield every year... Build DICE up into two Teams..

-And in the end fans win and DICE & EA win, I would have bought a Bad Company 3 if that would have came out in-between waiting for BF4... I love the style and the feel that was in Bad Company - Would love to see the series come back. -But I don't want to lose BF4 to do it...

We need both... I'm surprise EA has not made this happen.

While Medal of Honor is not that bad a game it's no Bad Company, and Danger Close is no-where near as good as DICE...

.____........___...____
.____||......||.......____||
||.........___||.......____||

[sway_z]

Why you're getting disagrees is beyond comprehension??

Who wouldn't want both BC & BF series??

The Bad Company series is the superior FPS (at least on consoles). BF3 was too ambitious for current gen.

Showing off the PC version 1st, then selling us a poor man's console version wasn't very clever either.

It (BF3) was always going to be compared to high end PC's.

[Hufandpuf]

DICE studio shouldn't split to make two very similar games. BF3 has all the modes BFBC has so it wouldn't be efficient to make two games so similar to each other.

Besides DICE is cooking up something with Mirror's Edge 2 and they need a team dedicated to that game not split to make the same game every year. It takes time and quality and that is why DICE is so well respected as opposed to other EA owned studios.

[asmith2306]

When did it try to be COD? Massive maps, vehicles, great class system, no perks, slower gameplay, etc. I don't get why people say BF3 is trying to be COD. COD sucks, BF3 is awesome. Two completely different games in my opinion. As for the BC argument... BC is a spin off, a heck of a spinoff but still a spin off. Both are allowed to exist separately.

[Donnieboi]

If Dice wants a great story for their campaign, they should consider hiring the guys who made Spec Ops: The Line. DICE is a wonderful online game developer, but their sense of humor is dry and boring, so they should stay away from making campaign stories themselves. Just stick to MP and give the campaign to good storywriters and those who've had success with making quality campaign games.

[DestinyHeroDoomlord]

Haahahaha not this again please, noooooo....

[Double_Oh_Snap]

If BF4 is running 64 players with FULL destruction of the environment an insane graphics. I believe it might just be possible.

[matgrowcott]

There will come a point where Call of Duty isn't as popular as it once was - that's why Activision are putting so much funding into Bungie.

But it's not going to be an on-off switch. They'll make sure that everybody currently buying Call of Duty will have access to it for the foreseeable future, on whichever platform they choose to buy it on.

[DigitalSmoke]

They deserve it, COD is an infant toy compared to Battlefield.

[sdozzo]

That's a pretty big swing in numbers... I think cod is around 20 million per year and BF 5 million or something.

[kevnb]

battlefield is more like 10 million plus, but it also has legs. battlefield 3 is up to close to 20 million now. Around 6 million on each console, over 2 million retail on pc. But since there are more players on pc than either console, im guessing the sales must be pretty close overall. Im going by vgchartz, I know they are always way off on pc games but give a roughly accurate figure for consoles.

[DARK WITNESS]

It's a long shot, but I am starting to think it could.

I am not speaking for the whole gaming population but as far as little old me is concerned I have finally started to see a lot less people on my friends list playing blops2.

A lot of them bought it, I can tell just looking at the leaderboards, but on average I am seeing maybe 2, 3 or 4 friends at most playing blops2 these days.

Most people I know are just frustrated with the game and one or two of my friends have gone back to BF3.

Time will tell but even Rome fell..

[LackTrue4K]

What is the point?! As long as there getting good sales ( not comeing in short)
They should be ok....I don't want Battlefiled/Bad Company over flowing with kids!

[whamlollypop7]

It would go along way if there was a "zombie mode" or "spec ops". There were fan trailers of BF3 dino mode a few years back, they got a great multiplayer better than Cods in my opinion cuz every COD map is the same play type but BF3 has giant vehicle based maps and smaller COD style maps. If BF wants the crown it needs that extra something.

[Donnieboi]

Hell. No.

[whamlollypop7]

So your anti-dino?

[porkChop]

Dude. A survival mode that pits 64 players against a whole bunch of Dinos would be beyond awesome.

*Imagines a T-Rex swinging its tail, sending jeeps rolling down a hill, crushing players*

Fuck, that needs to happen.

[whamlollypop7]

Thankyou, COD has always had that weird extra that it just seems BF lacks. And I prefer BF.

[Detoxx]

Everyone will love BF4 you'll see. 64 player battles in native 60 FPS and 1080P will be awesome

[Evil_Ryu]

the developers of battlefield are definitely more forward thinking so i can see this happening.

[kevnb]

it already has on pc, even with competition from some awesome free to play shooters its doing great on pc.

[IK IR Y IP T]

Trying to be call of booty don't flatter your selves bf3 campaign was well written and very realistic to the over the top blockbuster hollywood crap call of booty is all about !
BF will never dethrone cob until the hardcore gamers stop buying it and let the casuals play there arcade simulator

[venom06]

Battlefield CRAPS ALL OVER ANYTHING CoD related.. and then with nex-gen graphics and standard gameplay, it's only a matter of time before they do some serious market damage to CoD ... cant wait for BF4....

[JeffGUNZ]

Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't COD suppose to be dethroned by Bad Company 2 and then again by BF3? Give it a rest.

[Mikeyy]

BF 3 would have done a lot better if they didnt change all the recoil with that patch.

A lot of great guns became useless overnight. The recoil is soo over the top

[braydox21]

a few things need to happen before the battlefield series can fully surpass the Cod franchise.

1: a better online matchmaking setup: although Bf3's wasn't bad the whole take on servers was silly speacially when alot of servers have people who have their rules as well have a no-stinger/javelin rule. the online pass although not a real big deal, when i tried to use mine it did't work, so i had to make an origin account among other things just to access the online proportion of the game. (in my opinion so damn worth it)another part is leveling up since it took me awile to actually get business sorted by the time i started everyone was already equipped with the higher level weopens although i still able to help my teamates i still felt underequipped since everyone else was so far ahead of me and spending money to be on par with everyone else didn't seem worth it. another thing this one smaller is the bullets collision system when i fire a rocket at someone at point blank range i expect it to kill that said person but instead he kills me before my rocket makes contact and the rocket just disappears, and as i lay there as the respawn counter to go down i feel cheated at least until i start playing again, i forget about until the next time it happens.

2: single player/story mode: just because the majority of people buy a game just for its online play doesn't mean that the story has to be bare minium (although bad company 2's story wasn't that bad) Bf3's story was essentially ripped from black ops storyline. black ops story was really good with black ops 2 improving the story mechanics as your descisions affect the storys result. you can bash it all you want but at least they put some descent effort into it and thats what bf4 needs to have a decent/good story.

thats the main stuff i believe and i think there are some others things that probably need to be addressed such as becoming more console friendly as i have always seen Bf franchise like crysis all about graphics and mean't to be played on a pc which it is. (ps4 player btw)