Video Game Review: ‘Battlefield: Bad Company 2: Vietnam’ Offers Amazing New Shooter Maps

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CHICAGO – “Battlefield: Bad Company 2: Vietnam” is the best multiplayer DLC ever released. With some of the best-designed maps, period, DLC or disc-based, along with new weapons, vehicles, trophies, and even music, this is simply a must-download release. Even if you haven’t picked up “BBC2” in months and have departed its world for that of “Call of Duty: Black Ops,” this amazing release will suck you back in.

Video Game Rating: 5.0/5.0

Although it provides easily as much per-dollar entertainment as any disc-based release of the season, “Vietnam” does not stand alone. You need to still own “Battlefield: Bad Company 2” in order to play it. In fact, those of you that sold your copy may want to go back to Gamestop or download it through XBLA. The increasing improvement in the world of DLC promises to make the used game market much more interesting. Why would you sell a game if you knew something like “Vietnam” was going to be released in less than a year’s time to make it feel new again?

Battlefield: Bad Company 2: Vietnam
Photo credit: EA

While “BBC2” may have never delivered the multiplayer maps we had hoped would come in the summer of 2010, it turns out that the wait was worth it. “Vietnam” features five new maps playable across all modes of the game — Rush, Conquest, Squad Rush, and Squad Deathmatch. And, unlike the free basic game maps released near the end of 2010, they are all simply spectacular. Honestly, even one of these maps playable across all four modes would be worth the $10 purchase price and, as all gamers know, multiplayer DLC is all about map design. These are the best DLC maps ever released.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2: Vietnam Photo credit: EA

Part of the success of this release comes down to variety. Each of the five maps has a distinct personality, whether it be the more-flat landscape of Phu Bai Valley, the direct line of Vantage Point (God help you if you get trapped on the low ground in Conquest with a well-ranked squad above you), or the enormous variety found on a map like Operation Hastings. A wide selection of terrain choices from dense jungle to deep rivers to ashen rice paddies keep the game consistently fresh. Half of the battle in terms of multiplayer shooters comes down to map design and I can’t say enough about these maps. They are phenomenal.

Five maps this well-conceived and executed would be enough but DICE didn’t stop there. To enhance the idea that this game takes place in Vietnam, they added a ’60s soundtrack (along with a musical nod to “Apocalypse Now”) along with weapons from the era including a flamethrower and war-torn weapons like the M16 and the M60. DICE has also recorded all new voice-over work including new dialogue. It’s the little things like this — things that weren’t necessary at all to get players to buy the game but enhance it nonetheless — that have allowed the team behind “BBC2” to stand tall next to the beloved folks who made “Call of Duty: Black Ops.”

Our “Best Games of 2010” feature won’t post till next week but we can tell you now that if we gave an award for the best DLC add-on for an already-released game, “Battlefield: Bad Company 2: Vietnam” would win without much of a contest.

By BRIAN TALLERICO Content Director HollywoodChicago.com [email protected]