Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Review

Kingdom Come

The run and gun game play that makes up the bulk of the game in single and multiplayer is hardly rare, but there are two reasons it works so well in this game.

The first is the fact that almost the entire world can be blown to pieces as you move through it. This means that combat feels more real even as it gets more over the top.

Battling through a jungle base, shooting up all the exploding barrels, chucking grenades around, blasting walls and roofs apart and spraying the bad guys with automatic gunfire creates a gaming experience reminiscent of Arnie and his team in Predator going to work on the guerrillas.

The second reason it works is that it’s actually quite a tough game. Although there is no health bar and you heal over time, the destruction of cover means you have to keep moving, particularly as you can’t lie prone. Without the ability to shelter almost anywhere from fire you can suddenly find yourself in real trouble if you’re taking fire. This usually means that your best, indeed often your only way to survive a bad situation is to kill everybody who is attacking you in double quick time.


While the single player is engaging enough and substantial enough to while away a few evenings, when it comes to Battlefield games the main event is the multiplayer and Bad Company 2 does not disappoint.

From the PC users perspective Bad Company 2 is a breath of fresh air in this regard as it is clear that from the ground up this part of the game has been made with PC gamers in mind. All the menus are designed to be used with a mouse, there’s a server browser, dedicated servers, all the kind of things that we’ve been used to and happy with for years until developers told us we didn’t need them.

The core dynamic of Bad Company 2 multiplayer is the use of squads and teamwork. A squad is a four man team which can spawn off each other and assist each other as a unit. Though the squads are smaller than in earlier games this means that co-operation and co-ordination is easier.

The actual game modes themselves are Rush, Squad Rush, Conquest and Squad Deathmatch. Rush and Squad Rush are objective based and, along with Conquest, offer the more traditional Battlefield style of play.

Squad Deathmatch allows you and your squad to fight other squads. The Squad Deathmatch mode might sound quite unappealing at first, however if you and your friends are hating the world due to the perceived failings of your random team mates in an earlier game then Squad Deathmatch allows you to play without randoms cramping your style.


As with earlier Battlefield games there is a class system and a degree of persistency to it all. You can play as Medic, Recon, Engineer or Assault class, and you can level up both your character and weaponry over time. While Battlefield 2 introduced this system as merely a means to unlock some shiny new guns Bad Company 2 makes the whole thing rather more involved, allowing players to tailor their equipment and set up for their play style. As in earlier games there is an array of vehicles to be had on each map, everything from ATVs to gunships and tanks are provided, although usually not in the large numbers Battlefield 2 players may remember.

In multiplayer the lack of an ability to hit the deck, coupled with the ability to level the map and the availability of some seriously mean vehicles means that things can be frustratingly lethal a lot of the time. Trying to attack a target which has had all its surrounding cover destroyed and which is protected by enemy snipers is frustrating and difficult, but generally teamwork will prevail. Rewards are greater for the winning team, which further acts an incentive for people not to obsess over their kills-to-deaths ratio and get stuck into the fighting.

Bad Company 2 has superb graphics despite its humble console origins. Not only do the maps and levels look amazingly well detailed and rendered, but you can smash them all to bits, leaving detailed and well rendered wreckage.

The destruction of the game environment is hugely satisfying and there are plenty of grenades, rockets or explosive barrels lying around to help out. It could be argued that this destruction adds an additional tactical layer to the game, as key positions can be completely levelled and defences or cover for attackers flattened, but it’s not uncommon for the map to simply get razed in the chaos of the fighting anyway.

If you hide behind something and the enemy sees you, chances are it’ll get destroyed, if you see an enemy in cover (or even if you just think you see an enemy) then a good course of action is to dig him out with grenades and rockets.