Review - Battlefield Vietnam
Uploaded by MrPhooey on Jun 17, 2005
I am a hardcore Battlefield 1942 junkie. I spend long nights sniping infantry in the ruins of Stalingrad and trekking across the mountains of Gazala in my ceaseless struggle against the Third Reich. So it is with a sense of slight awe that I waded into the first official follow-up to EA's Best Game of 2002.
Though Battlefield Vietnam will certainly draw comparisons to its predecessor and to community modifications, it isn’t set up as a sequel to BF 1942. Instead, it’s an extremely fine-tuned update to the Battlefield franchise that brings all the features we love about the original to a completely new setting. And the bottom line is, it’s just frickin’ fun.
The “battlefield” of Vietnam is fundamentally different from that of the shores of Normandy and the deserts of North Africa. Instead of large-scale assaults spread across kilometers of virtual terrain, BF Vietnam emphasizes more intense confrontations at key choke-points — and guerrilla warfare, complete with sabotage and booby-trapping. While playing, I was always focused on my immediate surroundings, engaging in close-quarters firefights and constantly paranoid about imminent danger. Developer DICE has done a great job breathing life (and death) into this dense, foliage-filled world.
Great historical details give each map a unique personality. Ho Chi Minh Trail pits infantry against each other amid a jungle of trees, bushes, and vines dimly lit by moonlight. I would often crawl my way through tall blades of grass to capture an enemy control point, only to realize that enemy soldiers were laying prone just a few feet away, watching for attackers!
There are still urban environments, which become havens for snipers picking off gunners atop tanks and jeeps, while powerful anti-tank troopers launch rocket-propelled grenades at Sheridan and T-54 tanks.
But the best maps are the ones built around airpower. New Cobra and Huey helicopters dominate the battlespace, both as transport platforms and as gunships, and you’ll be awestruck at the damage that can be dished out by napalm strikes from F-4 Phantoms. In Operation Flaming Dart, you’ll see a battle involving gunships, helicopter transports, MiG fighters, and Phantoms, all dancing a fiery ballet of death in the sky. It almost brought tears to my eyes. This spectacle — mixed with the ambiance of “Ride of the Valkyries” (which can be blasted from your helicopter’s speakers, along with several other licensed Sixties-era songs) — put me in pure gaming nirvana.
The only aspect...