History VideoGame / Battlefield

* {{Abandonware}}: Most of the games from ''Battlefield 2142'' and earlier have become this, due to EA discontinuing support for them in favor of the newer games in the franchise.

* CarFu: Possible in most of the games, taken UpToEleven in some games with Tank Fu!

*** ''Northern Strike'': An add-on pack that added maps set in Northern Africa.

** Also unexpectedly suffered by the Assault class in ''Battlefield 2'', which is meant to be the game's plain combat-oriented rifleman class, only to end up relatively less-played because it's only ''good'' at infantry vs infantry combat and useless against any vehicle that isn't a transport car. Several other classes can do that while also having additional useful abilities. When the ''Special Forces'' expansion introduced the game breaking [=G36E=] it caused a mass exit from Assault to Medic because the medic heal ability is much more useful than the nerfed grenade launcher. Unsurprisingly later games in the series made sure to give the Assault more useful and unique abilities and equipment, ''Battlefield 3'' eventually decided to combine the two classes into one character to give players choice over which type to use, until Battlefield 1, which brought back the medic class and made the Assault a buffed version of Battlefield 2's anti-tank.

* CoolShip: The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Essex_(LHD-2) USS Essex]], known affectionately as the "Iron Gator" by her crew, lugs the USMC around in ''Battlefield 2'' and ''3''. ''Battlefield 2: [[ExpansionPack Special Forces]]'' even featured a level where it was raided by enemy special forces. Presumably, it survived.

* {{Abandonware}}: Most of the games from ''[=BF2142=]'' and earlier have become this, due to EA discontinuing support for them in favor of the newer games in the franchise.

** In [[GameMod Desert Combat]] especially, bots simply cannot use helicopters. They either fly them straight into the air or they drive them straight into the ground. Usually in that order. This is due to the fact that ''[=BF1942=]'' was never designed to have helicopters, and bots will try to see them as regular airplanes instead. This is subverted however in that bots seem to use everything else at least marginally well.

** ''Bad Company'' was going to roll out a program where players could purchase new guns with real money. This triggered a large backlash, so it was scrapped, but the idea returned in the form of an OldSaveBonus in ''2'', where having positively owned a prior ''Battlefield'' game unlocked the M1 Garand.
** Now played straight with the "shortcut" packs for ''[=BF3=]'' onward, which gives the purchasers ''instant access to any weapon for that kit'', or even ''all'' of them. Needless to say, this is somewhat unbalanced for those who don't spend cash on their games, leading to starting players having the best kits[[note]]Of course, just having the "best" weapons doesn't automatically make you more skilled, just slightly more deadly, so the shortcut packs really only increase your options, not your abilities[[/note]].

** ''Battlefield 2142'' and ''Battlefield 3'' combined the previous Assault and Medic classes into an Assault class armed with the usual assault rifle, and a medical kit consisting of health packs plus a defibrillator. Several DICE employees have even referred to this combination as a Combat Medic in interviews. The main difference here is that the ''2142'' Assault troopers always have their medkit handy, while ''[=BF3=]'' Assault troopers always have their defibrillator (once unlocked). ''[=BF4=]'' allows you to swap out any of the gadgets for the class, allowing for your own ratio of Combat to Medic, although since you can only pick one of the two offensive options (either GrenadeLauncher or underbarrel shotgun) you'll always have some ability to heal or revive teammates.
** ''Battlefield 1'' and ''Battlefield 5'' bring the Medic class back, replacing the Engineer class, whose gear is scattered between the Assault and Support classes. Medics in [=BF1=] carry self-loading and assault rifles, many of which can be equipped with scopes, making them better suited to longer-range engagements, while the Medic in [=BFV=]'s Alpha can choose between either the scoped Gewehr.43 DMR or the tried and true MP.40.

* CoolShip: The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Essex_(LHD-2) USS Essex]], known affectionately as the "Iron Gator" by her crew, lugs the USMC around in ''Battlefield 2'' and ''3''. ''[=BF2=]: [[ExpansionPack Special Forces]]'' even featured a level where it was raided by enemy special forces. Presumably, it survived.
** ''[=BF3=]'' added ''Nimitz''-class aircraft carriers in the single-player mission "Going Hunting" as Shark 4-6 and Shark 4-2's mothership.

** This is somewhat averted by the vanilla unlock for the AT class in ''[=BF2=]'', the DAO. As a semi-auto shotgun with 12 rounds is it absolutely devastating at close range. Beyond approximately six inches it is pretty useless though. Another example?

** Try going between ''[=BF1942=]''/''BF:Vietnam''/''[=BF2=]'', ''[=BF2142=]'', and ''Bad Company 2'', then switching weapons with the number keys. Chances are you'll get a medkit when you wanted a grenade, or a grenade launcher when you wanted the assault rifle, or a defibrillator when you wanted the medkit...hell, ''2142'' alone is rife with this due to how hand grenades are now an unlock and all the way down on number 7, and the scroll wheel weapon selection reflects this.
** ''1942'' and ''Vietnam'' use the number row for switching seats in vehicles, with the F-keys used for shouting orders and warning players. ''[=BF2=]'' onward uses the F-keys for switching seats in vehicles, since the number row is used for switching weapons in certain passenger seats and the F-key radio system has been replaced by the Commo Rose.
** ''2142'' and later merge the parachute and jump keys. ''[=BF2=]'' and earlier have them separate. Forgetting this fact can be a fatal error.
** On a similar note, ''2142'' and earlier have a dedicated keybind to pick up dropped kits/weapons. ''Bad Company 2'' instead merges it with the Use/Enter Vehicle key. ''[=BF3=]'' uses the Reload key.

** Taken to its logical extreme with ''[=BF2=]''[='s=] scout helicopters. Flying a littlebird sideways full throttle through a maze of trees with barely enough space to fly and being only inches from the ground, while simultaneously taking out a squad of enemy infantry? All the time.

* ElitesAreMoreGlamorous: The entire premise of ''Special Forces'' expansion pack for ''[=BF2=]'' is based on this premise.

* GatlingGood: No Blackhawk helicopter would be complete without those. ''[=BF2's=]'' Cobra attack helicopter and its Chinese counterpart also sported a gatling-style cannon for the gunner. Also mounted in pairs on EU battlewalkers in ''2142''.

* GrapplingHookPistol: More like zipline crossbow, for some classes in ''[=BF2=]: [[ExpansionPack Special Forces]]''. Other classes have a thrown grappling hook used to climb up onto the roof of buildings.

** The designers are also fond of taking sound bytes from military-related videos. "I'll get you ice cream for dinner" was stripped from a [[http://www.break.com/usercontent/2007/6/10/gunship-strafing-run-310145 helicopter gun camera recording]] and mixed into the UAV walla in ''[=BFBC2=]''.

** The first two sets of Rush objectives in ''[=BF3=]'''s Damavand Peak are at the top of a mountain. The third is at its base. Helicopters (and the occasional Humvee) join the plunge.

** In ''[=BF2=]'' and ''2142'', at least, some things would [[DeaderThanDead kill you sufficiently dead that you couldn't be resurrected]], such as artillery. Not so in ''[=BC2=]''.
* MasterOfNone: The assault class in ''[=BF2=]''. Everything he does, a medic or spec-ops can do just as effectively if not even better.

* NightVisionGoggles: The player's standard equipment The ''[=BF2=]''[='s=] ''Special Forces'' ExpansionPack includes night-vision goggles which can be of great benefit on pitch-dark night time maps.

* NoseArt: The American A-10 Thunderbolts in ''[=BF2=]'' sport a warthog face on the nose of the aircraft. The Apaches introduced in the ''Special Forces'' pack have a shark mouth on the nose too.

* OhCrap: ''[=BF2=]'' is simply one moment after another. The roar of incoming jet engines, and the sight of an F-18 emptying its entire bomb payload on top of you; the screech of incoming artillery; the rat tat tat of an Mi-28's main cannon... death is imminent.

** If a knife hits you as an infantryman in ''2'', ''2142'' or ''Bad Company 2'', you are dead. Certain other games take a few slices to kill, with the exception of ''[=BF1942=]: Secret Weapons of WWII''[='s=] throwing knives. Because of lag in ''2'' and ''2142'', it may appear that it takes more than one stab to kill a player, but this isn't the case.

* {{Qurac}}: Many of the locations shown in ''[=BF2=]'' and the ''Bad Company'' series are set in generic middle-eastern locations, such as the notorious Strike at Karkand map from ''[=BF2=]''.

** ''[=BF3=]'' averts this somewhat: the cities and countries are all named and nonfictional.

* RecurringRiff: Most of the games in the Battlefield series base their Main Theme around the Theme of ''Battlefield 1942'', but each has their own unique genres that fit the individual games' theme. The singleplayer campaign trailer for Battlefield 1 even mixes the main theme's beat into the otherwise unrelated trailer song, Suns and Stars. A complete compilation can be found [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFYbQqIz7Ug here]].
** Orchestral: ''Battlefield 1942'', ''Battlefield 2'', ''Battlefield 2142'', ''Battlefield Bad Company'', ''Battlefield 1943'', ''Battlefield 1''
** Electronic: ''Battlefield 3'', ''Battlefield 4''
** Rock: ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MgNMJum7gM Battlefield 2142]]'', ''Battlefield Hardline''

* ReverseGrip: How knives are held in ''Vietnam'', ''2142'', ''[=Play4Free=]'', ''Heroes'', and ''[=BF3=]''. Dima from ''[=BF3=]'''s campaign does this with his fancy Spetnaz hatchet.

** [=BF3=] has both the aforementioned [=MP412=] Rex and the Taurus .44 Magnum. These, along with two auto-revolvers return in [=BF4=]

A series of FirstPersonShooter games by Creator/{{DICE}} (Digital Illusions Creative Entertainment, based out of UsefulNotes/{{Sweden}}), with help from Creator/ElectronicArts and other associated studios. It is DICE's major franchise. Apart from this series, the only other games DICE has released are ''VideoGame/MirrorsEdge'' series, and the multi-player aspect of the recent modern-set ''VideoGame/{{Medal of Honor|2010}}'' reboot, and the ''VideoGame/{{Star Wars Battlefront|2015}}'' reboot series.

** ''VideoGame/Battlefield2ModernCombat'' (2005): A reimagining of ''Battlefield 2'' for consoles that includes a single player campaign with a hotswap mechanic and a 24-player multiplayer mode.

** ''Battlefield: Bad Company'' (2008): A console exclusive and a spiritual sequel to ''Battlefield 2: Modern Combat'' set in an AlternateUniverse where the UsefulNotes/UnitedStates is at war with the [[UsefulNotes/{{Russia}} Russian Federation]] in [[{{Ruritania}} Eastern Europe]] for unknown reasons. Unlike past installments, the game's tone was comedic and light-hearted and its advertising campaign made fun of other games like VideoGame/RainbowSix and VideoGame/{{Metal Gear Solid 4|GunsOfThePatriots}}. The story is set from the point of view of [[OnlySaneMan Preston Marlowe]], an infantry man that was just recently transferred to B-Company, where criminals and troublemakers are assigned to serve their country as cannon-fodder.

** ''VideoGame/Battlefield2042'' (2021): The series' return to modern combat, set in a [[Main/CrapsackWorld crapsack]] [[Main/TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture near-future]] and serving as both a sequel to ''Battlefield 4'' and a SpiritualSuccessor to ''Battlefield 2142''.

** ''Battlefield 1943'' (2009): A console-only spinoff, essentially a somewhat-simplified [[VideoGameRemake remake]] of ''1942'' on the ''Bad Company 2'' version of the Frostbite Engine.[[index]]

** ''VideoGame/Batllefield2042'' (2021): The series' return to modern combat, set in a [[Main/CrapsackWorld crapsack]] [[Main/TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture near-future]] and serving as both a sequel to ''Battlefield 4'' and a SpiritualSuccessor to ''Battlefield 2142''.

** ''Battlefield 2042'' (2021): The series' return to modern combat, set in a [[Main/CrapsackWorld crapsack]] [[Main/TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture near-future]] and serving as both a sequel to ''Battlefield 4'' and a SpiritualSuccessor to ''Battlefield 2142''.

* UrbanWarfare: Strike at Karkand is considered to be one of the best urban maps in modern [=FPSes=] and that's not even mentioning many other maps in the series that take places in some of world's most renowned cities such as Tehran, Paris, Shanghai and Hong Kong.
** ''Battlefield 2042'' also set to continue this trend by including two urban maps of Hourglass and Kaleidoscope as part of its initial roster that were set in [[UsefulNotes/{{Qatar}} Doha]] and [[UsefulNotes/SouthKorea Incheon]] respectively.

* UrbanWarfare: Strike at Karkand is considered to be one of the best urban maps in modern [=FPSes=].

** Also averted in ''Battlefield 2042'' with the two revealed Middle Eastern maps in the game were said to be set in Egypt and Qatar.

** Also averted in Battlefield 2042 with the Middle Eastern maps in the game are said to set in Egypt and Qatar.

These games are notable for being [[TropeCodifier among the first]] to make large-scale use of mobile vehicles in an FPS game, as well as using large maps, and widespread use of environmental destruction after switching to Frostbite. The games are designed to be played in multi-player mode. The earlier games had no 'single-player' campaign, only multi-player missions with bots. For games set in 'reality' these maps and missions recreated important battles in ''1942'' and ''Vietnam''. ''Bad Company'', however, changed this, coming with not only a cohesive, new storyline, but a group of notable characters that stuck with you the entire game, with their own distinct personalities and voices.

** ''Battlefield4'''s campaign centers around the ''Valkyrie'', a fictional ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America_class_amphibious_assault_ship America]]''-class amphibious assault ship that a number of the protagonists call home.

** Also quite common is the tactic of throwing multiple explosives onto the hood of a really fast vehicle (C4 on Jeeps in most games and RDX on FAVs in ''2142'') then ramming it into an enemy vehicle at full speed. Usually they bail out. For added bonus, in ''2142'' you can get an Engineer to throw a vehicle tracking radar device on the car, giving you a guided missile.

** It can also be raining FAVs, Humvees, and Vodniks, if a hacker gets into the server and hacks the vehicle drop feature.

** Played straight in ''Bad Company 2'' with the MP412 Rex, which can drop an enemy in just a couple of shots. The flip side is the slow rate of fire and low ammo capacity.
** [=BF3=] has both the aforementioned MP412 Rex and the Taurus .44 Magnum. These, along with two auto-revolvers return in [=BF4=]

* WorldWarThree: In ''Battlefield 2'', ''VideoGame/BattlefieldBadCompany'', and ''VideoGame/{{Battlefield 3}}''. They probably aren't the exact same war, either.

*** ''Road To Rome'': An expansion set during the Italian campaign (1943-1945) with maps ranging from Sicily to Monte Cassino and adds the Italian Army as an Axis faction.
*** ''Secret Weapons Of WWII'': An expansion that features a variety of seldom-seen and strange prototype vehicles (jet planes most notably).

*** Desert Combat was GameMod set during the 2003 invasion of Iraq between the US military and the Russian-armed Iraqi army. At it's height it was more popular than the vanilla game and inspired elements of Battlefield 2 as the mod team were hired to help work on it.

** ''VideoGame/BattlefieldHardline'' (2015): Developed primarily by Visceral Games instead of DICE, ''Hardline'' takes the series' existing gameplay style and transplants it into a [[CowboysAndIndians Cops and Robbers]] setting of Law Enforcement versus Criminals, including [[GoodGunsBadGuns several weapons exclusive to one side]].

*** ''Special Forces'': An expansion focused around tactical infantry movement thanks to the addition of zip-lines and grappling hooks with fewer heavy vehicles. It gained a cult following among the player base as it contained several extremely well balanced maps that had interesting settings such as a submarine base, a missile launch facility, the interior of an aircraft carrier and an airport map set at night. It also gave each class a new gun to use in the base game. It is widely praised as the best expansion pack for any Battlefield game before or since.

*** Desert Combat was GameMod set during the 2003 invasion of Iraq between the US military and the Russian armed Iraqi army. At it's height it was more popular than the original game, pre-dated the Modern Warfare craze that began with Call Of Duty 4, and inspired elements of Battlefield 2 as the mod team were hired to help work on it.

*** ''Special Forces'': An expansion focused around tactical infantry movement thanks to the addition of zip-lines and grappling hooks with fewer heavy vehicles. It gained a cult following among the player base as it contained several extremely well balanced maps that had interesting settings such as a submarine base, a missile launch facility, the interior of an aircraft carrier and an airport map set at night. It also gave each class a new gun to use in the base game, which was a big thing in an era before every game was an "online service" filled with unlocks & lootboxes. It is widely praised as the best expansion pack for any Battlefield game before or since.

** Also quite common is the tactic of throwing multiple explosives onto the hood of a really fast vehicle (C4 on Jeeps in most games and RDX on FAVs in ''2142'') then ramming it into an enemy vehicle at full speed. Usually they bail out. For added bonus, in ''2142'' you can get an Engineer to throw a vehicle tracking radar device on the car, giving you a guided missile. Freddie Wong and Corridor Digital used this in a TV ad EA asked them to make for the game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zo5-XpQ5Jkk

** Also unexpectedly suffered by the Assault class in ''Battlefield 2'', which is meant to be the game's plain combat-oriented rifleman class, only to end up relatively less-played because it's ''only'' good at combat. Several other classes can do that while also having additional useful abilities. When the ''Special Forces'' expansion introduced the game breaking [=G36E=] it caused a mass exit from Assault to Medic because the medic heal ability is much more useful than the nerfed grenade launcher. Unsurprisingly later games in the series made sure to give the Assault more useful and unique abilities and equipment, ''Battlefield 3'' eventually decided to combine the two classes into one character to give players choice over which type to use, until Battlefield 1, which brought back the medic class and made the Assault a buffed version of Battlefield 2's anti-tank.

*** ''Special Forces'': An expansion focused around tactical infantry movement thanks to the addition of zip-lines and grappling hooks with fewer heavy vehicles. It gained a cult following among the player base as it contained several extremely well balanced maps that had interesting settings such as a submarine base, a missile launch facility and an airport map set at night. It also gave each class a new gun to use in the base game, which was a big thing in an era before every game was an "online service" filled with unlocks & lootboxes. It is widely praised as the best expansion pack for any Battlefield game before or since.

*** ''Special Forces'': An expansion focused around tactical infantry movement thanks to the addition of zip-lines and grappling hooks with fewer heavy vehicles. It gained a cult following among the player base as it contained several extremely well balanced maps that had interesting settings, it gave each class a new gun to use in the base game, which was a big thing in an era before every game was an "online service" filled with unlocks & lootboxes. It is widely praised as the best expansion pack for any Battlefield game before or since.

*** Desert Combat was GameMod set ostensibly during the 2003 invasion of Iraq between the US military and the Russian armed Iraqi army. At it's height it was more popular than the original game, pre-dated the Modern Warfare craze that began with Call Of Duty 4, and inspired elements of Battlefield 2 as the mod team were hired to help work on it.

*** ''Special Forces'': An expansion with an increased focus on tactical movement thanks to the addition of zip-lines and grappling hooks, with maps that either promote asymmetric or competitive gameplay.

*** Desert Combat was GameMod set in modern times between Russia and American armies. At it's height it was more popular than the original game, pre-dated the Modern Warfare craze that began with Call Of Duty 4, and inspired elements of Battlefield 2 as the mod team were hired to help work on it.