Former Battlefield 3 lead designer David Goldfarb is "astonished" by the "many missteps" of Battlefield 2042 and believes a 100-year time leap might do the near-future shooter some good.
In a recent Twitter thread lamenting the many issues facing Battlefield 2042, Goldfarb stressed that he is still "trying to understand why some of these design calls were made," specifically highlighting the role (or lack thereof) of infantry in the game's map design and 128-player lobbies.
"Was no one in control of quality over there?" reads one tweet. "Who thought this experience honored the BF sandbox experience and took it forward? I’m astonished that there were this many missteps even knowing the obstacles from higher up."
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"And for all my friends and colleagues over there – ugh," Goldfarb added.
On the heels of an EA earnings call which saw the publisher commit to fixing Battlefield 2042, Goldfarb expressed his dismay at seeing Apex Legends effectively dethrone Battlefield as EA's flagship shooter, and at the time wondered if making a new entry in the Bad Company series rather than Battlefield 3 might've altered the series' trajectory. "Not that I regret BF3, but my heart is now and forever Bad Company," he said.
However, Goldfarb now reckons that 2042 itself is better off leaning into its futuristic themes and doubling down on the series' core tenets. A hypothetical Battlefield 2143 could allow DICE to "reclaim their mantle of combined arms badassery that they built their legacy on alongside a really unique IP," Goldfarb argued.
With low server populations stranding players in some regions and a refund petition surpassing 150,000 signatures, Battlefield 2042 certainly has its work cut out.
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