Electronic Arts' (EA) new large-scale multiplayer FPS Battlefield 6 has enjoyed an incredibly successful launch period this month, complete with widespread positive reviews from critics and fans alike, almost 750K players on Steam on launch day, over 7 million copies sold in three days, and a peak position on the Steam Top Sellers chart that's still holding weeks later.
But while Battlefield 6 is all the rage right now — and for good reason — it notably hasn't been updated with very many post-launch fixes and adjustments yet, with only a handful coming in small hotfixes. This has been a source of frustration for many, especially those that have encountered the game's remaining bugs and launch issues often.
There are far too many changes to get into many specifics here, but overall, some of the big highlights of the patch are:
- Improved movement and movement animations, including smoother transitions between stances, better vaulting, and physics fixes to prevent bouncing into the air after certain jumps or spawns
- Nerfs to progression Challenges that either make their objectives something less frustrating or much easier to complete
- A fix for the game's infamous bloom and weapon dispersion bugs causing inaccuracy issues, along with adjustments to make heavier-hitting weapons deviate from the crosshair slower, and faster low damage, high fire-rate ones build up dispersion a bit more rapidly
- Major improvements to lighting and visibility along with smoke and fog reductions to improve visual clarity and make enemy soldiers easier to see
- New sound effects and adjustments to audio mixing for a more balanced soundscape, along with better haptic feedback for controller users
- Fixes and improvements made to the UI and HUD, such as clear overtime indicators and new unlock notifications for weapons and attachements
- Countless map-specific fixes for spawning animation issues, out-of-bounds bugs, misplaced assets, and performance problems in Conquest, Breakthrough, and Rush.
All of these adjustments and fixes are fantastic, and many improvements in particular — such as more consistent movement, resolved weapon bloom bugs, and clearer visibility and overall visual clarity — are going to make Battlefield 6 an even more enjoyable experience than it already is. Challenge nerfs, too, will go a long way in rectifying how frustrating those are to engage with.
And yet, I can't help but feel quite disappointed with these patch notes, because they're missing one crucial fix for an issue making a huge part of the game unplayable right now: the infantry fighting vehicle's (IFV) secondary MR Missile unlock, and the way it guarantees kills on air vehicles.
Since the MR Missile is laser-guided — something IFV drivers can do themselves by switching to the secondary gunner seat and utilizing the vehicle's built-in laser designator to paint a target before switching back to the driver seat and firing the projectile — it's not stopped by flare countermeasures. The only way to deal with it is to use projectile-destroying countermeasures available to tanks and other IFVs, but aircraft don't have these.
Paired with how few buildings and other line-of-sight blockers Battlefield 6's maps have, this means that with the MR Missile, IFV drivers can shoot down helicopters and jets wherever they are on the map, from anywhere on the map, with just a single lock-on missile that can't be countered.
It's wildly overpowered, and has arguably been the one issue fans have complained about the most since launch, so I'm shocked that Battlefield Studios isn't addressing it with the Season 1 update. At the very least, the MR Missile needs to be disabled while its interactions with aircraft are reworked.
As frustrating as it is that the MR Missile isn't being addressed yet, though, I am at least glad that Season 1's big patch is significantly improving pretty much every other aspect of Battlefield 6.
As frustrating as it is that the MR Missile isn't being addressed yet, though, I am at least glad that Season 1's big patch is significantly improving pretty much every other aspect of Battlefield 6. From gunplay to UI, from sound design to visual clarity, an amazing FPS is about to get even better — and that's without even taking Season 1's new maps, weapons, and more into account, too.
Indeed, with this update and all of Season 1's content coming in hot, Battlefield 6 is poised to keep on going strong, attracting waves and waves of new players. If you'd like to be one of them, you can get the game now on Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, and PS5 for $69.99. Note that the Xbox version is just $61.19 at Loaded (formerly CDKeys) thanks to a nice deal.
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