The Bad Company spin-off series limited its battles to 24 players on consoles and 32 players on PC. This distinguished the Bad Company series from the mainline Battlefields (the ones with numbers and no subtitles), which focus on large-scale battles involving 64 (and now 128) players.
Bad Company’s smaller player cap was a necessary compromise for the consoles it was developed for back then. Contemporary console hardware couldn’t handle 64-player servers without serious sacrifices. Even Battlefield 3 and 4, both mainline Battlefields, were limited to 32 players on the PS3 and Xbox 360.
At the time, many PC gamers considered the Bad Company series inferior to the Battlefields that had come before for this very limitation. Even I, a console gamer then, thought 64-player servers would improve Bad Company. I was jealous of PC gamers with their beefy rigs, their flowing white hair, and the awesome chaos I imagined 64-player battles to be.
Since every Battlefield following Bad Company 2 has had at least 64 players, it’s possible to look back and ask if I was right. Would the Bad Company series have been better with 64-player servers?
The answer is obviously subjective. Some would say yes and some would say no. Whatever your view, smaller servers undeniably gave the Bad Company series (and Battlefield 1943) a unique style.
Smaller player caps not only reduced the size of the maps and the amount of action that could happen on those maps at any one time – smaller player caps affected a great deal of the way these games were designed, resulting in many of the features and aesthetics that helped the Bad Company series stand out from the mainline Battlefield series and earn it the continued adoration of many Battlefield fans even after all these years.
Here are the most important changes that resulted from the Bad Company series’ small-scale take on the Battlefield experience:
Linear Maps
The Bad Company series saw some of the best maps in the entire Battlefield franchise. This was not a coincidence. Smaller maps are just easier to balance.
Smaller maps take less time to make. More time can thus be spent testing and tweaking them. It’s also easier to predict how players will move throughout a small map than on a large one because they are fewer routes to traverse.
Bad Company’s maps are also more linear. They tend to be made of three main routes: the central route flanked by two side routes with connecting points between. Even the Bad Company series’ conquest maps are designed like this. Compared to the far more expansive maps which are the standard of the mainline Battlefield games, this simplifies routing for the players and makes the maps easier for the devs to design.
Some Battlefield players prefer the more expansive and circular-shaped 64-player maps. But for those who prefer a more simplified list of tactical options and more consistent map quality, the smaller scale of the Bad Company series lends itself to that sort of map design very well.
A More Casual Experience
The word ‘casual’ is often used as a curse word in gaming enthusiast circles, but casual games aren’t always bad. Sometimes a casual experience is exactly what you’re looking for.
Low player caps and small linear maps lend themselves well to the causal experience. They reduce the number of variables players have to deal with by reducing the number of enemies you have to account for and the amount of ground you must cover. Even when players converge on a single area, such as the final objective in a game of Rush, the action may become chaotic, but it will never get as chaotic as a 64-player match would.
Additionally, smaller maps make it easier to make tactical routing decisions since there are fewer places to go than in a map designed for 64 players. And since the maps tend to be long and thin, it’s easier to figure out where the action is (hint: the answer is usually ‘forward’).
Greater Focus on the Individual Soldier
Having fewer players on the Battlefield means the actions of each individual soldier matter a lot more.
One of the most frustrating things about the mainline Battlefield games is that it is sometimes impossible for players of average skill to have any noticeable effect on the course of the battle. There are sometimes simply too many enemies, too much ground to cover, too much of a need to rely on your teammates to do their jobs.
In the smaller servers of the Bad Company series, killing a single enemy has a more significant effect on the flow of the battle than it would on a 64-player server. You’d have to kill 4 enemies in a mainline Battlefield game to achieve the same shift in the balance of power.
Fewer players give competently skilled players a better chance to affect the course of the battle. Matches are thus less about large-scale movements of armies and more about the actions of small numbers of competent players.
Rush Focus
Bad Company’s lower player cap meant Conquest matches were less chaotic and took place on more linear maps. This, as I said earlier, makes for a calmer, more casual-friendly, and more individual-focused Battlefield experience. But it tends to lack the intensity of a 64-player server.
Bad Company 1 introduced Rush as a more intense alternative to Small Conquest. Rush suited the smaller scale of the Bad Company series perfectly because it simulated the intensity of a 64-player server while keeping the action small and focused, preserving the simplicity and casual-friendly nature of the game.
Rush was later carried over into the mainline Battlefield series. But if you’ve ever played 64-player Rush, you know that Rush does not suit large numbers of players unless you like meat grinders (which some people do – you grind that meat, King).
The fact that most maps were designed primarily for Rush may have had something to do with Bad Company having the best Rush maps in the series. But that’s just a theory 😉
Rush strikes a good balance between chaos and tactical focus, giving a small number of players one or two objectives at a time and allowing the match to move across several regions of the map to provide the sense of fighting on an enormous battlefield, simulating what 64-player conquest matches are like while preserving the small-scale focus and simplicity of the Bad Company experience.
The Uniqueness of Bad Company
DICE has ignored the small-scale Battlefield experience for a long time. Not only have they not made another Bad Company game, but their latest game, Battlefield 2042, raised the player cap even more.
So how exactly did small-scale servers work so well for Bad Company? How did the expectation of 24/32 players influence gameplay and map design?
The CEO of DICE once said he didn’t know why people liked the Bad Company series so much. While not the only reason, small-scale servers are definitely a big part of the Bad Company experience.
Bad Company 3, if it ever gets made, must retain a low player cap. The series’ smaller focus is one of the main reasons why Bad Company 1 and 2 are special and continue to be the favourites of many Battlefield fans.
There are other reasons, too (destruction, sound, graphical style, comedic tone, easy gunplay, and big bolter-like weapons), but I’ll get to those some other time.