Key Highlights:
- Battlefield 4’s Total War trailer shows land, sea and air combat powered by DICE’s Frostbite 3 engine.
- The footage highlights Levolution, vehicle warfare and Battlefield 4’s second-screen Commander functionality.
- Battlefield 4 launches first on PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 this autumn, with PS4 and Xbox One versions following later in 2013.
EA and DICE have released a new Total War trailer for Battlefield 4, combining campaign and multiplayer footage to show the scale of Frostbite 3 across infantry, vehicles and destructible environments.
The Total War trailer runs for around 90 seconds and moves between combat on land, at sea and in the air while demonstrating several of Battlefield 4’s major gameplay systems.
Much of the footage reinforces the scale DICE demonstrated at E3, including tanks, helicopters, boats and infantry fighting across large environments. The Siege of Shanghai skyscraper collapse also appears again as an example of Levolution, DICE’s system for allowing major environmental events to alter the state of a multiplayer map.
The trailer also shows Battlefield 4’s connected Commander functionality. GLN previously reported that Battlescreen would not be available on Xbox 360 or PS3, with the second-screen tactical map instead designed for PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 alongside compatible devices.
From what I can see in the footage, the important change from Battlefield 3 is not simply that Frostbite 3 produces better-looking destruction. DICE is trying to make destruction affect how a match develops, with collapsing structures, changing routes and vehicle access becoming part of the tactical decision-making rather than remaining purely visual spectacle.
Battlefield 4 also brings Commander Mode back to the series, allowing one player to oversee the battlefield, issue orders and support squads from a strategic view. At E3, DICE demonstrated the multiplayer game with 64 players on PC and next-generation hardware while showing the Siege of Shanghai map running at 60 frames per second.
The single-player campaign follows US Marine Sergeant Daniel Recker and Tombstone squad as a conflict involving the United States, Russia and China escalates. DICE is also bringing elements associated with Battlefield multiplayer into the campaign, including larger environments, vehicles, destruction and squad commands.
Battlefield 4 launches on October 29 in North America for PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, with its European rollout following later that week. PlayStation 4 and Xbox One editions will follow alongside the new consoles.
Later update: DICE continued demonstrating the technology shown in Total War almost immediately. Four days later, new Battlefield 4 PC footage showed the game running at Ultra settings, while Gamescom later provided a much deeper look at Paracel Storm, Levolution and 64-player multiplayer.
The finished game delivered the large-scale destruction, Commander Mode and land, sea and air warfare promoted before release, but Battlefield 4 also suffered significant technical problems after launch. DICE subsequently issued repeated stability updates and made multiplayer networking problems commonly described as “netcode” one of its main priorities, addressing issues including latency compensation, crashes and inconsistent player interactions.
Battlefield 4 continued receiving support and expansions long after launch, although its original-console era eventually ended. EA shut down online services for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions on November 7, 2024, while the newer-platform and PC versions remained available.
