DICE to Launch Community Test Platform for Battlefield 4

[The Joker]

The CTE will be open to BF4 Premium players, and will use a game client and Battlelog separate from the retail game.

EA and DICE are launching a "Community Test Environment" for Battlefield 4, in an effort to get more direct feedback from as many players as possible.

The CTE is launching tomorrow, May 8th, and it will initially be available to BF4 Premium members only. It will only be available to PC players, and it's not clear if it will be expanded to console versions of the game as well.

Once signed up, participants will download a second, separate game client -- different from the retail game client -- which will serve as a beta test platform of sorts. The first priority for the CTE, according to the email I was shown by a source to remain anonymous, is Battlefield 4's netcode.

From the aforementioned email: "Among the first things we will work on is the 'Netcode,' which is what the player experiences with the game world including player-to-player interactions like damage registration. This involves tweaking to the 'tickrate' servers and networking in general."

Given the rocky state of Battlefield 4 since its launch (although the playing experience over the last few months has been markedly improved), it's not surprising to see DICE launching such an initiative. If DICE can gather player feedback early and often, it should make for a smoother update rollout process in the coming months.

I was able to log into the Community Test Environment Battlelog page -- I'll stop short of posting the link since it's not properly live -- and grabbed a screenshot of what you should expect (seen below). The CTE page looks like the Battlelog you're used to, but with content tiles showing CTE-specific information.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news...-Battlefield-4

Not exactly on topic but I think relevant

What Jim thinks about thanking developers for "fixing" games:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/vide...amer-Gratitude

I have to agree with him and all this is a little to late, considering there is a new BF game launching in the next 6 months...What's the point? why release a broken game and then 7 months later try to fix it...ugh.

[Neo]

Look, I like playing Battlefield 4 - a lot. But there are 3 things that occurred with the launch of BF4 that irked me properly, and will probably stop me from buying another EA/DICE game. Those are:

1. The game launched with the exact same bugs that were present with the launch of BF3. What this tells me is that they didn't carry over any of the experience gained from the bugs they fixed in BF3. It seems to be a cookie-cutter development mindset over there.
2. Almost none of the bugs reported in the BF4 beta were fixed in the retail release of the game. Again, they had the opportunity for fixing bugs before it annoyed everyone, they were aware of most of them, and still didn't bother to fix them in time for the public release.
3. The game has very, very basic flaws which shouldn't be present at this day and age in any game. For example: not being able to move your character because of some "invisible" object in your way is utterly and completely unforgivable. If you cannot get a basic gameplay mechanic like "moving your character" 100% right - you honestly should not have launched your title to the paying public.

So what I've now associated EA/DICE games with is a completely botched launch and months of time before any of their new titles become remotely playable.

Therein lies the problem for me. You can't exactly "wait" for EA/DICE to fix the bugs and issues with their games before buying them, because they're churning out new games faster than what they can fix their current ones. So by the time their current game is actually playable, no one will be on the servers any more and would have moved on to the new (broken) game. And so the cycle continues. So you can't buy a new EA/DICE title unless you're willing to suffer for their (repeated) mistakes.

People have to make that decision for themselves. You either stand up with your wallet and do not buy another EA / DICE game. Or, you buy their games - knowing that their games will be riddled with bugs and issues. In the latter case, you honestly shouldn't moan or complain at all, because you should have seen it coming a mile away. EA/DICE saw YOU coming a mile away for sure.