Battlefield is doubling down on user generated content with its Portal

Battlefield is doubling down on user generated content with its Portal

This story about letting players do the work for you, boiled down, in 2:03 minutes.

What's the fuss?

The upcoming Battlefield 2042 is giving the keys to the castle to its players, allowing them to create their own wacky game modes and publish them for all to play. Sound familiar?

The situation

The Battlefield franchise has a storied history, spanning the eras of World War 1 all the way to the year 2142. 

  • Each game focuses only on one time period in order to immerse the player in era-specific warfare. 
  • A feature that players love from each iteration is the ability to create their own custom game modes/levels to share with others, only limited by the capabilities of the game itself.

With the newly announced Battlefield Portal, a mode in the upcoming game Battlefield 2042, such restrictions when creating custom modes have (almost) flown out the window.

  • Imagine a battle between 64 WW2 soldiers brandishing knives vs. 64 modern-day soldiers carrying defibrillators, or a mode where one army tank must take on a legion of duck-sized robots. Crazy right?
  • For the first time, players have the customization tools to mix and match time eras, have access to numerous fan-favourite maps from across the entire franchise, and can customize more details than they ever could before.

Boiling it down

Video games are now supporting user generated content more than ever. 

  • By having fans create and share their own content using the inherent assets of the game, the game retains endured relevancy within the crowded game market. 
  • Battlefield seems to have taken notes for games like Roblox, which quite literally consists of only player-created levels and has grown so much that it's listed on the NYSE.

Battlefield Portal goes against the traditional franchise formula, where additional content subsequent of the game's initial release was locked away behind an additional paywall. 

  • Since not everyone was willing to shill out extra dollars, these gamers were restricted from engaging with this new content, effectively dividing the game's player base between people who did and didn't pay.
  • As it stands, Battlefield Portal will be included for free along with Battlefield 2042, meaning that everyone will be able to play together no matter what.

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