Battlefield 3 – More on Co-Op, Post-DLC, Scripted Moments, Atmosphere

While Swedish-based developer DICE are readying up for Battlefield 3′s launch this month, the company has started to talk about the third installment’s co-op, post-downloadable content for the shooter, as well as future installments in the franchise.

Speaking to AusGamers, the developer’s Community Manager and Marketing man, Gustav and Daniel, first spoke about the co-op feature implemented into the game, stressing on the fact that it’s completely different from the single player experience:

Co-op is very much about playing the same mission a few times and trying to beat your previous scores or your friends scores. So co-op is actually a completely different campaign from the single-player. It’s not that you’re playing through the single-player campaign with your buddy. Across the six missions it’s a brand new storyline with new characters that you meet in the story; new characters that you play as.  It’s very much a completely separate experience that is, of course, tied to what’s happening in the single-player. Co-op is also very focused on you and your buddy playing co-op, whereas single-player is very much single-player. So we’ve added in elements to co-op such as “complete the map in a set time” in order to unlock stuff — in order to achieve self-reliance and victory, that sort of stuff.

Playing the co-op campaign offers a lot of new incentives; a lot of new stuff. You can unlock weapons that you can bring with you to multiplayer later. That’s the big difference. Co-op is focused on the storyline, but of course, you and your friend play. Whereas single-player is focused on the storyline, but we want to give you yourself an amazing experience.

With the confirmation of one downloadable content pack for Battlefield 3, the Back to Karkand expansion pack, DICE also commented on post-DLC support for the shooter, confirming that they’re aren’t ruling out that it’s planned:

We’re not ruling out any possibilities, but at this point we’ve only announced the Back to Karkand expansion pack, coming out later this year. What I can say, is that we want our dlc — no matter how it’s set — to be a new experience for the player. And that — in theory — could just be an extension of the co-op, for example.

But it’s important to us that it’s not just a map pack; it’s a new themed-setting; it brings you something that’s more than maps. Vehicles, weapons, new ways of playing; expanding the experience and giving players something fresh and new. That’s how we’re thinking and that’s what we’ve done with the first planned expansion which is Back to Karkand.

Much has been made on scripted modes in Battlefield 3, and here’s what DICE said on it, as well as touching on the subject of atmosphere:

I would say that yes we use a lot of scripted moments in the single-player to give you the immersion and the tone that we want to deliver in the single-player. I think we learnt a lot, starting at Battlefield: Bad Company 1 — which was very open — and we kind of narrowed it down to take you on a more emotional journey since then and Battlefield 3 is the pinnacle of that development I would say. But you still have the variety of the multiplayer in the single-player. You can play with all these different weapons, gadgets and vehicles so even in more scripted environments, you still have this huge variety to play with that in a way prepares you for multiplayer, which is what we want people to experience in the end.

He then went on to explain how each mode in Battlefield 3 had something unique to offer fans with:

Because Battlefield 3 is for a big part, about multiplayer, because that’s the heritage for us. So a lot of variety in single-player that will help you in multiplayer. Also, I’d like to mention there’s some more randomised events in co-op for example, so that it’s not always the same experience when you play it several times in a row. Co-op is very much about playing the same mission a few times and trying to beat your previous scores or your friends scores.

Battlefield 3 is currently scheduled for a release on October 25th.