Battlefield Play4Free Closed Beta

Hi everybody:

Been awhile since I've been around! Just installed a second video card in my machine in SLI and it really woke it up, so I've been dabbling in computer games for the first time in forever...

EA sent me a five-use key for their Battlefield Play4Free Closed Beta.

Thought I'd post it here in case anyone wants to give it a try:
7H54-US75-NBCU-QHAE

I've heard that they're switching to open beta on April 4th, but I'm not sure. Either way, this gives you five extra days and free is an awfully good price...

If you try it out, do a search for me. Right now I'm playing as Hookers-and-Blow. If we end up playing as a group, I'll switch back to Sonic Boom. As it is right now, you can't change your name once you've signed up.

As always, maintain your defensive positions!

Signed up and got access almost instantly, just asked for my EA id and then I was downloading. Pretty cool would have been better if they made new maps instead of reusing old ones from previous versions. By doing so I think they will have people getting bored fairly quickly. Overall though enjoying it for the time being.

The way it looks to me is that they're using old maps to get the engine right and will be expanding more when it switches to open beta on the 4th. (BTW, I got an e-mail and it is official.)

From what I've read, closed beta really is very beta. I got my invite from a software friend in the bar in the lobby of my building.

No matter what, things will improve and I'm just happy to hear the old BF theme song playing again...

For those of us who bought Bad Company, there won't be a huge difference except in the end it will be a Play4Free game, meaning tons of newbies.

On that note, the developers said anyone who purchased the Bad Company games are eligible for an early reg key before the April 4th open beta.

Even though it's play4free pay2win I am having fun with this. The fact people can take out their credit cards and buy better weapons is weak but I'll probably do that once it is released. I'll be on tonight and in vent if anyone else feels like hopping on I'll be on my Recon toon more than likely which is RedVapor or my assault toon GunnyHighway. (yes include the period to add to friends :) )

Not sure if it'll be necessary to whip out your credit card in the future. I seem to remember the developers saying as sort of a reward for participating in the closed beta, your characters won't get nerfed when they go gold.

So far, that seems to be the case. They said they're ramping up invitations before the open beta so there won't be all newbies getting creamed by lvl 20 dudes.

Having said this, I can't imagine what things will be like on the 4th when open beta starts. My guess is you won't be able to get a vehicle, but if you do, it'll be a turkey shoot.

I've got a lvl 19 Medic and a lvl 8 Engineer. The beta limits your level to 20, so I'll probably switch to engy on the 4th.

Will get Ventrilio running tomorrow and look for you this weekend.

Got my Recon toon to level 9 last night, it's tough doing recon this go round since you can snipe with an MG across the map it seems. So you really have to be careful and conceal and move much more often then previous versions. Loving the claymores though :)

I will load this afternoon

That was fun last night! It was a blast to hang out with Gunny and shoot people. We went several rounds where we had no deaths. Amazing what a little teamwork will do...

It was really nice to chat and catch up on things. Amazing how fast the years start going by...

Gunny and I did a good job as a team, I'm hoping to see what we can do with more manpower.

I'll be looking for Rocks this weekend. Hopefully we can hook up. :-)

Yeah that was fun, been a long time and even though the Vodka was flowing not a single "maintain your defensive positions" :)

Wish I could create more toons but will have to wait for the release for that. Being the first version of the game that you can't change classes on will take getting used to, but with the talent trees you can spec into guess it wouldn't make much sense.

Look forward to more folks getting in on it, I mean come on it's free and has very low resource requirements so no excuses. ;)

I was going through the various uniforms and I think I'm gonna buy the pilot's helmet just because it looks so ridiculous. It's like an advertisement for a walking headshot, running around with a giant white "SHOOT HERE" sign on your head...

I'd look like a freaking clown...therefore I must have it. :cheese:

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/_H...Ridiculous.jpg

I have received quite a few friend invites please post any toons you have here so I know which are from AK.

I have Rocks and Rocks61

A less than stellar review over at Ars:

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2...d-cash4ea.ars/

I think the author of that piece makes very valid points and I'm certainly not here to evangelize about the game.

For me, I've been away from gaming for so long that I'm just having fun dipping my toe back in the water again and finding that many of you AK fellows that I had so much fun with for so many years are still here.

I suppose my only point about the whole thing is that I'm having fun and glad to be here and free is an awfully good price. :-)

He makes some valid points mixed with a bit of whining. Spawn camping has always been a part of battlefield as you have select flags to spawn at not much you can do about that. Window mode doesn't bother me don't play windowed never have never will and the only time I had it revert back to a window was when I alt tabbed out then came back in, minor IMO.

Like Sonic said we are having fun with it and invite anyone that's not too old to play fps games anymore :) (Squidly Bribo, stitchiepoo, Kidd, Nuts and several others) to come have some fun. Why read a review when you can try it yourself for free and form your own opinion ;)

It is fun but not really my cup of tea. I am going to wait for BF3 to hit, plus I am playing the 360 version on a regular basis now.

Since I've always had a crappy ping and I kinda suck at toe-to-toe combat anyway, I need every advantage I can get when I'm playing Engineer. (Also, I'm a 43 year-old with a real life and a crappy ping playing against 14 year-olds...)

Somewhere along the way I read in a post of a technique where at intermediate and long ranges you just rapidly left mouse click and essentially single-shot fire your weapon.

Tried it tonight with my UMP and I'll be damned, it really does seem to work. Before when I'd have guys from long range three-shot bursting my ass, tonight I was returning the favor. Even had other teammates turning around to see what that weird sound was when I shot past them and saved their hide...

Best I can figure, the game algorithm pretty much puts your first shot on target and then degrades from there. I spent a half round experimenting at different ranges on the side of a building to see what was what and found that my groups were pretty much face-sized at quite a distance.

Will go back tomorrow and try some more. After my early success, my biggest problem was not leaning on the trigger when a bad guy was three feet away...

Either way, it worked for me tonight and it really sounded cool. :smokin