What you need to know
- Battlefield 2042 is a first-person shooter and the 12th in the Battlefield series of games which are published by Electronic Arts (EA)
- EA and DICE announced today that Season 3 of the game will bring the game to EA Play, which is included with Xbox Game Pass subscriptions.
- Season 3 of Battlefield 2042 is expected to start on November 22, 2022 but has not been confirmed by official sources.
Battlefield 2024 launched in November 2021 with less than stellar reviews. We at Windows Central gave it perhaps a generous 3.5 stars due to the number of launch issues, such as bugs and questionable design choices. Today in what perhaps isn't so surprising a move considering the speculation over the past six months, EA has announced that Season 3 which is penned for the end of November, will bring the game to the Xbox Game Pass library. Xbox Game Pass gives full EA Play membership, and Battlefield 2042 is being added to the EA Play roster. The Battlefield 2042 official Youtube channel also released a video with a development update for Season 3 which you can watch below.
The maps and reworks coming with the Season 3 update, and the addition to the Xbox Game Pass and EA Play libraries could be a last ditch attempt from the developers to save what has been a fledgling game. EA have previously blamed the disappointing launch of Battlefield 2042 on both COVID-19 development woes and the surprise launch of Halo Infinite multiplayer which came just days before their own launch. The statements made about teething problems with Battlefield 2042's launch did little to quell the anger of the player base, as by February 2022 over 100,000 players had signed a petition demanding refunds from EA due to their frustrations with the state of the game at the time. That number has doubled since.
In todays development update, along with announcement of the addition of Battlefield 2042 to Xbox Game Pass, EA and developer DICE have teased a few things for players to look forward to in Season 3.
- Classes are returning - as part of the 3.2 update. They say they have listened to the overwhelming feedback from the playerbase and a commited to bringing the classic and familiar class system back. Community members have been consulted and have been testing the classes. Each class will receive their unique equipment and gadget of choice, alongside weapon proficiences. The work on this will need balancing and will continue throughout Season 3 and 4.
- More vault weapons - Bad Company 2's XM8 will be added to the LMG category, as well as Battlefield 3's A-91, with even more weapons to arrive in future updates during the season.
- Reworked Maps - overhauls of Manifest and Breakaway are coming withing Season 3. This will bring these maps in line with the reworks already done on Renewal, Kaleidoscope and Orbital. Huge visual enhancements have been made including Ice and Snow shader changes.
In addition to the announcements today, developer DICE were keen to emphasise that they have an ongoing commitment to improving quality of life and performance improvements in all of their updates. Work on Season 4 is already well underway, and more details about Season 3 will be coming later this month. For players who do not have Xbox Game Pass, there will be an opportunity to play the game for free in December depending on your platform.
- Xbox Dec 1-4
- Steam Dec 1-5
- Playstation Dec 16-23
Could this be the breath of life Battlefield 2042 so desperately needs? We'll have to wait for Season 3 start to find out. EA and DICE have so far penned the release for "End of November" but other sources widely report the season to start on November 22, 2022.
