The Latest Casual Playlist Ignites Intense Discussions Over Bots, Experience Points, and Wait Times
Recently, Battlefield Studios launched a new game mode called Casual Breakthrough. In essence, this mode resembles the regular Breakthrough setup but features several key adjustments:
- Each team has just 8 human participants, with the rest filled by 32 bots.
- Activities performed by real players award full XP, while AI activities offer reduced XP.
- Just a pair of maps are available: Siege of Cairo and Empire State map.
- Elements like Player tags, accolades, and stat tracking are disabled.
In short, this mode delivers on its name: it offers a casual take of Breakthrough. On the surface, you might think there's nothing wrong, as it provides additional choices for gamers looking for different methods to enjoy the title. However, gaming history has shown one thing, it is that you can't please everyone. Which is to say, a lot of Battlefield 6 fans are upset.
Player Responses: Anger to Praise
"Gamers prefer real players. Avoid making the mistakes of your competitors," states a response to the mode reveal. "Truly disappointing concept," says another. Meanwhile, on the Battlefield subreddit, a player notes, "I have no idea where we are going with this game," while another lists everything they consider to be broken in Battlefield 6: "Fix bugs, address drone issues, fix IVF rockets, adjust aiming after sprinting, improve hit detection. We don't need this bot mode."
However, for every complaint, some gamers sharing how much they're enjoying the new mode. "It's very fun to practice, real players prevent it from being a complete grind but it's very relaxed," says a forum post. "The community fails to see that there are gamers who actually go outside and can't play this title 24/7. Let them find a middle ground," states another. One reply on Twitter clarifies that as they're "a battledad with limited time, this is great for me," and another praises the mode for "avoiding intense competition."
Valid Criticisms and Community Feedback
Despite the support, players have constructive reasons to complain about Casual Breakthrough. Some users have pointed out that it will make wait times more extended for different playlists due to the large amount of options currently available. Similarly, some areas often face mostly bots in the current modes. Additionally, it appears a little backwards that the mode won't start without a minimum number of human gamers, even though it focuses mostly on fighting AI opponents.
Finally, a major grievances is that Battlefield Portal was promised to offer full XP, including AI matches, but that was removed when they attempted to remove XP farming from the mode. So this new playlist feels like the community compromising halfway, according to a Reddit comment. Another describes this mode as the devs "dropping the ball significantly, I had so much fun in the initial release, why did they feel the need to adjust it?"
Future Prospects: Adjustments Be Made?
If the development team has proven anything so far with the latest installment, it is that they're paying attention and responding to player input. Assignments that were overly hard got fixed rapidly, as did the specific battle pass objectives. Chances are that, should analytics shows this recent mode is underperforming to their standards, they will not hesitate to make further modifications.