A few weeks ago DICE revealed that Xbox 360 copies of Battlefield 3 will ship with low-res textures, while players will have the ability to install higher resolution textures on the Xbox 360 hard drive. Now it’s been confirmed that the install takes up 1.5 GB of disk space.
DICE’s Patrick Bach said in a recent interview that the Xbox 360 version is basically “standard definition” with the regular texture pack. The reason they need to ship with an optional install is that not all Xbox 360 consoles have a hard drive, so Microsoft requires all game installs to be optional. Bach pointed out that the high-res textures do make a big difference to Battlefield 3. He said,
“It does make a difference, yes, absolutely. The whole engine is based around streaming textures, streaming terrain and a lot of other content.”
The PlayStation 3 version has a similar feature that automatically installs high-res textures to the PS3 hard drive.
If you’re interested in seeing how the Xbox 360 version looks with the high-res texture pack, check out the recent Xbox 360 screenshots.
DICE has confirmed that Battlefield 3 will indeed receive a day one patch, as the game has already gone gold and is being manufactured as we speak. We’ve gotten a few little insights about what the day one patch will include, besides some fixes from the beta: the day-one patch will bring the Commo Rose communication interface, according to a recent Tweet from DICE. Commo Rose, short for “Command Rose”, is a much requested feature for Battlefield 3. It works by pressing and holding the “Q” key, which gives the player access to a number of commands they can issue to teammates.
Finally, some good news after all the heartbreak we’ve had to endure with EA’s Origin, Battlelog, lack of multiple soldiers etc. Now EA has released an online service where users can change their Origin username. It still looks like we’ll be able to have only one soldier in Battlefield 3, so chose your username wisely. Previously, players could update their name through an iOS app. Either that, or write to EA support, which, given its sheer incompetence, didn’t seem to provide much help to many players.
The three major game retailers in the US, GameStop, BestBuy and Walmart, all have different pre-order bonuses for Battlefield 3 (yes, you can still pre-order), and the three retailers have each released an ad for Battlefield 3. You can check out the GameStop ad above, which showcases the Physical Warfare pack. We got the Best Buy and Walmart ads after the break. READ ON »
Until now, we’ve seen plenty of Battlefield 3 PlayStation 3 screenshots and tons of PC screenshots, but we’ve seen very little of the Xbox 360 version. Now, Korean game site ruliweb.com reveals a pack of Xbox 360 screenshots of Battlefield 3, and we must say, we’re quite impressed the how the game ended up looking. Especially considering this is on 6 year old console hardware. Xbox 360 owners can rest assured that Battlefield 3 will indeed look awesome on their console, as you’re about to find out. Check out the screenshots after the break. READ ON »
The latest Battlefield 3 trailer gave us a glimpse of Strike At Karkand, one of the Back To Karkand maps, but what you may have missed is that the trailer included a few frames of the map without destruction, and a few with full destruction. We’ve extracted those from the trailer so you can see for yourself on the image above (and make sure to check out the high-res version).
DICE has released a brand new Battlefield 3 multiplayer trailer, showcasing the new maps that were unveiled last week, including Damavand Peak, Tehran Highway, Operation Firestorm, among others. Finally, we also get a glimpse of Back to Karkand maps at the very end. Suffice to say, this is the multiplayer trailer we’ve been waiting for, and is easily one of our favorites. Let us know what you think of the latest trailer in the comments. Also, don’t forget to subscribe to our YouTube channel for lots of Battlefield 3 videos.
Last time we heard anything from EA on the pre-order front, they announced that pre-orders had topped 1.25 million, making it by far the most pre-ordered Battlefield 3 game to date. EA’s brand manager Kevin O’Leary recently did an interview with Fox Business, where he revealed that Battlefield 3 now has “a couple of million pre-orders”. EA announced a month ago that they reached 1.25 million, so it’s of little surprise that we’ve past at least 2 million, considering the successful beta and the rising anticipation of the game.
Battlefield 3 hits the store shelves on Tuesday, October 25, exactly one week from now, on the PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Later, it’ll be available on iOS mobile devices as well.
We got a boatload of Battlefield 3 renders of all sorts: equipment, weapons, vehicles, accessories, etc. These are actual 3D models that are used in the game, and we have an assortment of them in high resolution. Check out the full gallery after the break. READ ON »
There have been some unfortunate developments with EA Norway and the way they’ve been handling access to Battlefield 3 review copies. According to Norway’s top news outlet, NRK, EA has withheld review copies of Battlefield 3 to reviewers whom they thought would give the game a bad score. A number of Norwegian gaming outlets, including popular ones like Gamer.no, have been refused review copies of Battlefield 3 due to their review scores of past Battlefield games.
Furthermore, EA inquired potential reviewers of Battlefield 3 to see whether they were Call of Duty fans, whether they played the beta and if they were frustrated with the beta. You can see the full list of questions above.
EA’s actions in this case have been criticized by Norway’s top journalists, like Gunnar Bodahl-Johansen from Norway’s School of Journalism, calling EA’s actions “unacceptable”, adding, “It is a sad situation for both EA and game journalism that it appears that this is normal.”
EA has been quick to issue an apology, with EA Norway marketing manager Oliver Sveen saying “this should not have been sent out. We have made a mistake and we apologize. This is not something that neither should have happened earlier or what we intend to continue”.
BF3 SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
