IGN's community asked, DICE responded.
by Cam Shea SEPTEMBER 3, 2013
Just before this year’s Gamescom, I put out the call for Battlefield 4 questions for DICE. Nearly 2,500 comments later, I, erm, had quite a few to choose from. I picked a few specific questions as well as some common themes among the questions and hit Lars Gustavsson, the Creative Director at DICE with them during the show.
I’ve tried to attribute questions where possible, but please bear in mind I’m largely paraphrasing. Here we go!
[Skiptomahloo and others] How do you guys feel about the rent-a-server model? There’s quite a bit of chatter on IGN about admin abuse and players feeling as though they’ve been punished for skill as opposed to any kind of infraction.
Lars Gustavsson: We’ve definitely heard the community and we experience it ourselves. What we’ve done is we’ve introduced a new system where basically we have pre-defined scales, so if you’re within certain boundaries it will be an official server, which means that people who use – for example – quick match, will be slotted into this. You will be guaranteed a good Battlefield experience. You’ll know what you’re getting into. If you start tweaking around with the settings a little more, it will go down to being ranked which means that you’ll still get your persistence and everything, but some settings might be a bit different from what you’re used to. And then [finally] you can go crazy and change all of the settings, but then it will go down to unranked, so we give you as an admin the freedom, but also to take responsibility for the end user who wants to have a good experience.
So we definitely listened to them. And also we’ve been revisiting how we can ensure that your skill or your XP can be better balanced from game mode to level, so it’s not like some levels are so much more popular than others, just because of a higher XP ratio.
[Ruwagrong, SamMcK1664 and others] Will Battlefield 4 have bot support?
Lars Gustavsson: It’s not in for Battlefield 4. We have our single player experience, we have our multiplayer experience and we’ve been focusing on delivering those. If we had to choose, we’d focus on delivering a good experience to the 64 players that we cater for, as well as adding two commanders on top of those 64… so it’s more possibilities than ever. We’ve also learnt that when we try too much we kill ourselves. (Laughs)
Is it something that you’d look at experimenting with in the background?
Lars Gustavsson: We did it with 1942 and Battlefield 2, we had, kind of, the bot war, which was appreciated by people, even though most people went to the online experience. Who knows for the future. If the voice keeps on getting stronger then that’s something that we need to listen to.
[senior-twinkie, MikeTheAmerican and others] A lot of Battlefield players find vehicles like helicopters and jets daunting. Will you have any kind of tutorial or training in Battlefield 4?
Lars Gustavsson: We’ve definitely heard that people are afraid of getting in there [and using vehicles like helicopters] and that’s not our intent, so what we’ve done is, we’ve added a test range, which allows you to try out all the hardware ahead of time so that if you want to learn to fly a helicopter you can get in there and you can find the settings that work best for you. And then start doing some stunt flights just to feel safe before you go out and get the responsibility of a bunch of other people sitting in your helicopter, so I truly hope that this will help people feel more safe about trying out the whole battlefield.
[Switchphone and others] It’s a running gag, but… Dinosaur mode?
Lars Gustavsson: We definitely hear them and I like the thought of it too, so who knows. It definitely sounds extremely sexy and sounds like something that would fit the battlefield universe very well.
But it’s not something you’re working on?
Lars Gustavsson: Not right now, we’re focusing on Battlefield 4.
[Hawki90] Will you be able to play Battlefield 4 on the Vita via the PS4’s remote play?
Lars Gustavsson: That is the intent. That’s something we’re looking into and working on to see if we can guarantee it.[/B][/B]
Do you have it up and running?
Lars Gustavsson: Yep.
And how does it feel?
Lars Gustavsson: It’s getting there, so it’s, yeah. As always when you’re working on a game you’re still taking one day at a time, but it seems like we’re getting there.
[Aspelin] Will the PS Vita be integrated with Commander mode much like tablets are?
Lars Gustavsson: No, that’s not in the plan today at least.
[ILOVEGAMESANDMOVIES and others] Will Battlefield 4 have splitscreen?
Lars Gustavsson: No, not for Battlefield 4. What we’re trying to do is really up the visceral experience, the dynamic experience, to give a more complete experience than ever on the battlefield. And with new friend join functionality and a lot of focus on playing together as a squad, and what we’ve done for squads, what we’ve done for commanders, we felt that’s the social gaming focus that we’ve had.
DICE seems to be leading the charge with second screen functionality.
Lars Gustavsson: We took a brave step with Battlefield 3 and Battlelog, and it’s probably like Christopher Columbus or someone who set out to do something new and people called them crazy, but it’s proven to be a good strategy and now it’s established. Now we’re pushing the boundaries: we bring it to your tablet, we integrate it to all clients, and on top of that giving you second screen so you as a squad leader can provide orders to your squad or use it as a map. And on next-gen and PC you can use it as well. And of course, Commander, so it’s a plethora of possibilities! On top of that you have customisation of your kit, you have joining servers, there are so many things. And maybe not every player will adapt to use everything, but we’re not telling you how to play: you use what you feel matches your way of playing.
I could sum it up with a sentence. 
