What you need to know
- Electronic Arts has unveiled Battlefield Portal, a supplementary sandbox for Battlefield 2042, developed by Ripple Effect Studios, recently rebranded from DICE LA.
- The upcoming creative mode provides players with tools to develop custom Battlefield 2042 experiences, mix and matching various eras from past Battlefield titles.
- Battlefield Portal leverages in-game assets from Battlefield 2042, alongside remade maps, weapons, and vehicles from Battlefield 1942, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, and Battlefield 3.
- Battlefield 2042 launches on October 22, 2021, on consoles and PC.
Electronic Arts has unveiled "Battlefield Portal" at its EA Play conference, a new sandbox launching alongside its next mainline entry in the franchise, Battlefield 2042, this October. The upcoming mode brings new creative tools directly to the title, geared around creating custom experiences and mixing several multiplayer shooter eras. It couples with returning legacy maps, weapons, and vehicles from three earlier Battlefield games, including Battlefield 1942, Battlefield Bad Company 2, and Battlefield 3.
Battlefield 2042 will ship alongside six former Battlefield locales, fully recreated in the new game engine, each faithful to their predecessors. Valparaiso and Arica Harbor return from Battlefield: Bad Company 2, while Battlefield 3 maps Caspian Border and Noshahr Canals also see a latest-generation upgrade. Battle of the Bulge and El Alamein also join from Battlefield 1942, albeit with expanded destruction previously not offered in the 2002 release. Electronic Arts has specified that select weapons, gadgets, and vehicles will also migrate to Battlefield 2042.
These maps and armaments join Battlefield 2042 through a newly unveiled mode, Battlefield Portal, condensing content from the game and aspects of former titles. Developed by Ripple Effect Studios, formerly known as DICE LA, the mode allows players to tweak an extensive suite of settings and parameters for custom multiplayer matches. Exhaustive tools allow for mixing multiple eras into one battle, including options to fine-tune gameplay balancing and other fundamental gameplay elements once static in earlier games. Advanced users can even dive into a full-fledged logic editor, utilizing deeper visual scripting with rules, variables, subroutines, and more to create full modes from scratch.
These community-made experiences turn Battlefield 2042 into a playground for military battles, detached from the near-future combat of its traditional multiplayer. It's accessible via an upcoming web tool, with the results all browsable in-game, leveraging full cross-play between platforms.
Battlefield 2042 will ship alongside various DICE-approved experiences, including revisiting the older Battlefield maps on traditional Battlefield modes. However, with more games striving to deliver platforms for content creation, DICE hopes Portal will spawn a new wave of community content beyond launch. Battlefield 2042 will receive new maps and playable specialists via tri-monthly seasonal drops, all headed to Portal, but the developer stopped short of talking more legacy Battlefield content to come.
Battlefield 2042 launches October 22, 2021, on console and PC. While available on Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, and PC, the game will also hit Xbox One and PlayStation 4 families, albeit with reduced player counts over the 128-player limit on next-generation hardware.
Battlefield goes back to the future
Battlefield 2042 debuts Electronic Arts' next-generation vision for the military shooter, supporting up to 128 players, the largest-ever maps, and is shaping up as its most ambitious entry to date.
