The latest and greatest in EA's huge multiplayer first-person shooter franchise, Battlefield 2042 remixes the series with looser classes, bigger battles, and a portal mode that allows you to relive your favorite moments from earlier Battlefield games.

Battlefield 2042 is the most recent entry in the long-lived Battlefield series. Just like other entries in the series, Battlefield 2042 focuses on gigantic multiplayer battles with up to 128 players per side. This means that combat is epic, long, and hectic. In Battlefield, it's a common occurrence to get into a fight with a squad of players that's bigger than the maximum team size in most other shooters.

Vehicle Combat

While Battlefield 2042 is a first-person shooter, the game doesn't limit itself to battles of infantry vs infantry. instead, a plethora of vehicles spawn periodically at key locations on the map. These vehicles are fully controllable by any player who manages to get in the driver's seat, meaning you can drive tanks, armored personnel carriers, helicopters, jets, and more. Many of these vehicles have powerful armor and dangerous weaponry, allowing them to take out dozens or even hundreds of infantrymen before they're blown up by a shoulder-mounted rocket or another vehicle.

This means that combat in Battlefield 2042 often centers around vehicles in one way or another. Sometimes, it's you sniping enemy soldiers equipped with rockets to keep your friend in a helicopter safe. Other times, your team will fight to control vital spawn locations to deny enemy vehicles. Alternately, you might sit back in a tank looking out for armored targets to destroy with your main cannon.

Unmatched Scale

Battlefield 2042 has a variety of modes, including a couple of massive battles with 128 players per side. With a good squad and a bit of organization, these battles provide a totally unique experience and convey a sense of scope unlike any other shooter on the market. Unfortunately, you don't usually get a good squad. Playing in public servers tends to yield an unorganized mess, with a plurality of each team waiting around for vehicles to respawn or aimlessly running around looking for someone to shoot.

New Game Modes

The other, smaller modes seem to be where Battlefield 2042 shines. There's a small-squad game with persistent loot that's a Battlefield-themed ripoff of Escape From Tarkov, giving you small-scale tactical combat and a sense of progression as you get better gear with the rewards you get from extracting successfully. There's also a mode called Battlefield Portal that serves as the custom game hub for 2042. Portal offers a robust set of features for community leaders and organizers to create custom game modes with all sorts of crazy combinations of gear, maps, and vehicles from previous Battlefield games. You'll see zombie shooters, games where you respawn with a random kit from World War 1 to the future setting of 2042, and everything in between. It's a lot of fun.

Rocky Release

Battlefield 2042 was criticized at launch for its lackluster gunplay, lack of class identity, and lack of in-game progression options. These faults have largely gone unfixed. Bugs have been fixed, so the game generally runs a lot better than it did in November 2021, but you're still able to pick up any gadget on any character, there's little point to unlocking things except in the Tarkov clone, and guns feel floaty and undamaging compared to most other modern shooters. This means that there's less incentive to play with an organized squad, but also that the game feels like it doesn't reward individual skill as much as something like Call of Duty, Apex Legends, or Escape from Tarkov. If you're outnumbered, you're probably dead.

Play With Friends!

While the game doesn't seem to reward it as much as previous entries in the series, the best way to play is still in a squad of friends. Just because anyone can grab a medkit and play support doesn't mean that you shouldn't have a group of friends that can cover multiple roles. By queuing up with friends and communicating as you play, you'll be a lot more effective in your efforts to undermine enemy positions, destroy menacing vehicles, and win games. Plus, you'll have a lot more fun.

Driving School

Vehicles can be incredibly important to the success or failure of your team in Battlefield 2042. The key to controlling a jet, helicopter, or tank well is to have plenty of practice. It can be hard to get into the driver's seat of these in-demand vehicles on public servers. Don't be afraid to join or host a custom map so you can get some flight time in! With a bit of work, you'll be able to pull off loops, barrel rolls, zooks, and other elite maneuvers, enabling you to show off your skill and dominate the competition in public matches.

Are you a Battlefield 2042 veteran? What are your favorite Portal servers? What operators do you think are the strongest? Do you have any tips or tricks to share? Let us know in the comments below!