Author Archives: Ryan McCaffrey

Battlefield has always prioritized a certain degree of multiplayer insanity, but nothing in the series thus far prepared me for a mega-cyclone tearing across the map, wrecking cars, uprooting trees, and sucking up any poor souls who’ve gotten too close with their parachutes. Between the bullets, the gunships, and the artillery, we also have to watch out for this?Battlefield 2042 aims to take us into the near future, with a world on the brink and a cascading series of environmental catastrophes towering over the petty squabbles of mankind. After a few hours with the beta that’s about to open up, it is clear that DICE has gone absolutely giddy with excess — totally lapping the chaos it experimented with in its previous historical veneers. The Battle of the Bulge was hellish, but at least there weren’t any tornados.

Battlefield 2042 will be the first entry in the franchise released with the PS5 and Xbox Series X in mind and thus, naturally, DICE has juiced all the specs. The maximum headcount in the matches has increased to a galactic 128 players, all of whom are strewn out across dense, multipronged maps. We played on Orbital, set in French Guiana, where I found space shuttle launch sites, flooded coastal villages, and vertigo-inducing skyscrapers, all smashed together in one volatile warfront. The sheer size rivaled the average battle royale island, and I quickly realized that my tried-and-true Battlefield strategy of hustling from one skirmish to the next on foot was untenable at this scale. Thankfully, with the tap of the “B” key, I could airdrop in a fresh set of wheels like it was coming straight from Metal Gear Solid’s “Mother Base.” Suddenly, 2042’s scope became a lot less overwhelming.

Environmental apocalypse aside, Battlefield diehards will be right at home in 2042. Once again, EA has created a bedlam-generation machine, with more things going on in every firefight than any one person could possibly process. In one particularly memorable sequence, I found myself at eye-level with a whirring helicopter on top of a building, like an impromptu boss encounter. (I came out on top with a shot from my rocket launcher.) The gunplay also feels consistent with the pace and mechanics established in both Battlefield V and Battlefield 1. You will spend a lot of time taking potshots at microscopic targets across the environment, and constantly need to be wary of your flanks.

However, the most useful addition to 2042 is the ability to customize your arsenal on the fly. Do you have a clean shot and need something a little more precise than your assault rifle’s iron sights? No problem, snap on a scope and squeeze out some rounds. Battlefield has long made us feel like grunts in a war effort; but in the apocalypse, we all have a smidge more tactical flexibility.

That same philosophy carries over into 2042’s reworked class system. You are no longer bound to the rigid roles first established back in 1942. Now, you choose a specific specialist — complete with their own name, personality, and trait — and can adjust the rest of your loadout from there. The end result is similar to Rainbow Six: Siege’s operators. I spent most of my time with Mackay and his wondrously versatile grappling hook, which has a knack for putting you at an optimal vantage point. I didn’t try to attach it to a helicopter, but that will be my first stop on live servers.

All that said, EA warned me I was playing on an old build, and sure enough a number of noticeable bugs leaped out at me. I was unable to pull up my full map, and the corpses of blown-apart vehicles would freeze in the air and flicker to the ground at single-digit frame rates in the distance. Most prominently, I started up each of my matches with an invisible weapon — just my soldier’s hand floating out there in the ether, cradling a muzzle that simply did not exist. So the eternal question is, will those rough spots be ironed out before launch? DICE has gotten really good at making Battlefield games over the years, but the left-field postponement from October 22 to November 19 leaves me slightly worried.

Of course, that delay bought some time for fine-tuning, and if DICE does successfully squash enough of the bugs, Battlefield 2042 has the potential to be the first great shooter of the new generation. Finally, a chance to snipe your friends from the heart of a superstorm. The end of the world has never looked so bright.

Battlefield 2042’s short delay has set up a heck of a Fall/holiday season for first-person shooter fans. We discuss each of the five major FPS games out between now and the end of the year: Far Cry 6, Back 4 Blood, Call of Duty: Vanguard, the aforementioned Battlefield 2042, and Halo Infinite. And please welcome back guest panelist NeoGameSpark!

Subscribe on any of your favorite podcast feeds, to our new YouTube channel, or grab an MP3 download of this week’s episode. For more awesome content, check out our Halo Infinite Flight performance preview, which does a deep-dive tech analysis on the still-in-development slice of Halo Infinite multiplayer:

Oh, and you can be featured on Unlocked by tweeting us a video Loot Box question! Tweet your question and tag Ryan at @DMC_Ryan!

For more next-gen coverage, make sure to check out our Xbox Series X review, our Xbox Series S review, and our PS5 review.

Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s executive editor of previews and host of both IGN’s weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our monthly(-ish) interview show, IGN Unfiltered. He’s a North Jersey guy, so it’s “Taylor ham,” not “pork roll.” Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.

Publisher 110 Industries and Soleil, a game development studio comprised of Team Ninja veterans who worked on both the Ninja Gaiden and Dead or Alive franchises, has announced Wanted: Dead, a new third-person fast-action game for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC set in a low-tech sci-fi version of Hong Kong that will allow you to master combat with both guns and melee weapons. The team cites Bayonetta and Devil May Cry as inspirations. Wanted: Dead also includes “an in-depth investigative side where players must analyze evidence and dive into real police work.”

Key members of the team include former Team Ninja employees that left Tecmo with Team Ninja boss Tomonobu Itagaki in 2008. All senior developers that worked on Ninja Gaiden and Ninja Gaiden II, DOA, DOA2 and Xtreme Beach Volleyball including producer Yoshifuru Okamoto, director Hiroaki Matsui, and lead planner Natsuki Tsurugai. See the uncensored Wanted: Dead announcement trailer above and the first several screenshots below.

As Lt. Hannah Stone, head of the “Zombie Squad” that operates outside of the normal purview of the police, players will have the choice of whether to engage enemies up close with melee attacks (including “a limb-severing mechanic that changes enemy attack patterns”) or bring them down from afar with guns. As you can see in the uncensored trailer above, Wanted: Dead definitely shows its Ninja Gaiden roots in addition to its Bayonetta and Devil May Cry influences.

There is no release date as of yet as from simply “2022,” but stay tuned to IGN for much more on Wanted: Dead in the coming months.

Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s executive editor of previews and host of both IGN’s weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our monthly(-ish) interview show, IGN Unfiltered. He’s a North Jersey guy, so it’s “Taylor ham,” not “pork roll.” Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.

Dungeon Encounters is directed by Hiroyuki Ito, involved in the creation of titles including Final Fantasy IV, V, XII, and Tactics. I started sweating a little bit as I began playing because not only is he well known for his work designing battle systems, but I was told that it was first and foremost about its systems, so naturally, I prepared myself to have to take a lot on board. Some of you may also be interested to know that Cattle Call, known for the Metal Max series and The Legend of Legacy, handled its development.

Not a game with lush visuals and effects or a deep, engrossing story, but a turn-based, numbers-focused, bare-bones RPG of sorts. IGN Japan had the opportunity to try it out before release, so here are our initial impressions.

This dungeon crawler RPG involves forming a party of up to four characters and delving into the depths of a board-game-style square grid map. Though the dungeon is divided into squares, you’re able to focus on exploring and fighting your way across maps without having to worry about systems like stamina or hunger. As you progress down floors, the maps get bigger and the enemies get tougher.

Stepping on one of the numbered squares found along a map triggers either a battle or an event. Think of these numbers as replacements for enemy symbols or treasure chests, with black numbers representing battles and white numbers leading to events. Almost like a sinister version of snakes and ladders.

Bloober team sent IGN a very cryptic teaser for a new Layers of Fear project, saying only that it’s based in Unreal Engine 5.

The short teaser, which you can watch below, makes it clear that the crazy painter we all know and love is still around.

“Layers of Fear was a breakthrough project for us,” said Bloober Team CEO Piotr Babiebo. “It paved the path for Bloober Team and began our rapid growth, allowing us to explore more stories we’ve wanted to tell. I’m really glad we’re coming back to this world, wiser and more experienced. For me, it’s important that we make this announcement during the Tokyo Games Show, as for many of us Japan is the cradle of psychological horror games. As a studio, we also have two other projects in the works, one in production and one in pre-production.”

Bloober Team also scored a hit with The Medium, the first-ever next-gen exclusive game for Xbox earlier this year. It has since also come to PlayStation 5.

Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s executive editor of previews and host of both IGN’s weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our monthly(-ish) interview show, IGN Unfiltered. He’s a North Jersey guy, so it’s “Taylor ham,” not “pork roll.” Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.