Last week I talked about how games could still try new things in space and one of those ideas is what I called Spacefield, a game that takes the Battlefield into the far future, focusing on the idea of how a realistic shooter like Battlefield could do space combat.
To recap, I would love a Battlefield of Battlefield like game to go into space, where the battlezone would be divided into three areas of combat: ground & low-altitude combat, high-altitude combat, and space combat. Ground and low altitude would be be like how much of Battlefield is now, with ground soldiers, tanks, jeeps, and helicopters battling it out for control of various command points. In space, there would be the attacking team’s space ship, a massive warship that has many roles such as serving as the main spawn point for the attack team, orbital bombardments, and intel to ground teams. In space, the defending team will attempt to take out major points on the ship and dealing enough damage to eventually destroy it. Of course, a space fighter will undoubtedly be built differently other kinds of vehicles, and in fact, unless we are in the realm of Star Wars, wouldn’t be able to just transition between atmosphere and space so easily. This is where the high-altitude combat will be the main focus, consisting of mostly fast-moving aerial vehicles like jets. Their job, aside from just shooting each other, will be to intercept enemy spaceships and escort friendly ones to their destination.
The three tier combat zone idea however was just the tip of the ice berg for this hypothetical game. Using Battlefield 3 and 2142 as the base, I could not stop thinking of new ideas that would both freshen up the system and provide a much needed boost to the cooperative nature of the game.
1) Futuristic Weapons
Attack of the drones
I would imagine that this game could take place in the year 3,000 (preferable 3142) and thus, normal bullet-shooting weapons would almost be a thing of the past. Now, I’m not necessarily saying lasers, but I do think lasers would be incorporated in one way or another. Actually, any of these weapons could just be rid of their limitations and imagined to be the ultimate weapons of destruction that we want them to be. Automated weapons for example, in the year 3,000 could remove human input at all, and instead a class of soldier like engineer could be charge of calling in automated strikes and releasing mobile turrets and basically being more of a passive-aggressive type of soldier than the normal anti-vehicle guy.
The idea of some non-violent weapons like the one that can make people flee might be a good tool to, like a temporary way to flush out and force enemies away from an area over a certain distance. Not too long, but enough to get guys away so you and your allies can make a quick escape.
2) Augmented Classes
This could technically be done with any era of Battlefield, but I would love to see it implemented into this one. So, one thing that I love about Kid Icarus Uprising is the better the player’s stats, the more points he’s worth. This is something I would like implemented all over the place, because I’m tired of games like Battlefield having super amazingly high-ranking people just making absolute fodder out of lower-ranks with advantages like weapons and gear and still counting the same number of tickets as those guys (1). So instead, in addition to the classes like assault, recon, support, and engineer, there would also be tiers available to higher ranks that would offer more unique and devastating equipment, but also count for more spawn tickets.
Now while other eras could have like elite soldiers, spec ops, etc. in the future, we could have augmented soldiers. Augments can be small but still helpful boosts like less recoil and more health, and then they can be bigger bonuses like jetpacks and heat sensors. In addition, they would more ground spawn points, meaning that unless a bunch of players are specifically guarding some of these areas, they would be able to pull off some very covert like missions. Of course, the downside would be that they cost more spawn tickets. So while a whole team could be super elite jetpack super soldiers, a team of skilled normal class players can deplete the enemy forces in only half the time. To prevent this, it might also be a good idea to limit how many of these 2nd tier classes will be on the battlefield at a time. Maybe only a squad of four players who are all prestige level?
3) Unique Control Points
In the titan mode of Battlefield 2142, the control points were replaced from just flags that acted as spawn points but missile silos that were used to take down enemy Titans, complete with countdowns and stuff like that. Well, I think control points like this need to make a come back but maybe have very specific ones each with a very specific purpose.
In Star Wars Battlefront II, in the space battles several components of the carrier ships actually serve a purpose, like a shield generator that protected the ship with a shield while the automated turret defense controlled AI controlled turrets to shoot down enemy fighters. Teams that have either of these deactivated are put at a great disadvantage.
I want these kinds of things put onto a much bigger scale in Battlefield or whatever this hypothetical game would be like. On the ground, planetary shields, missile silos, long range radar, robot control center, etc. Likewise, the ship would have points like this as well. Orbital targeting capabilities that can be knocked out from the inside and outside that allow it to perform its bombardments (countered by the shields), automated defenses, shields, etc. This way, the shift in control of these points would greatly effect the battlegrounds and provide player more incentive to protect them, rather than just head off and do their own thing.
