When I first heard about EA and Battlefield Studios’ plan to implement an open weapon system in the upcoming Battlefield 6, I scoffed! And playing the game in Los Angeles for an event last month didn’t sell me on it, either; I still worried it would make classes feel less unique. Now, after playing the open beta for nearly 20 hours, I’m here to say: I was wrong.
Let’s back up for a moment and explain, briefly, open and closed weapon class systems in Battlefield. (I promise this won’t be too boring.) Basically, for nearly as long as the franchise has been around, classes were locked to certain weapons. Recon, for example, had to use a sniper rifle. Over time, developers at Dice tweaked this and added “neutral” weapons that could be picked by multiple classes, or they spread specific types of weapons across a few classes. Battlefield 2042 threw a lot of this out the window when it launched without classes and let players essentially build custom heroes who could use any gadget or gun. It then added classes back in when people got angry. Anyway, Battlefield 6 is trying to find a happy balance between 2042‘s total, unbalanced openness and the classic closed weapon system of the past games. And I think, despite being nervous about the change and all the debate raging online among players on both sides, Battlefield Studios has mostly nailed it.
In Battlefield 6, any class can use any weapon. So you can spawn in as a recon soldier, but instead of a sniper rifle, you could bring an SMG. Engineers, traditionally a class that uses SMGs, can rock snipers and LMGs. At first, this seemed like a bad idea to me. I worried that players would just pick the class with the best abilities and pick the best assault rifle, and you’d lose all the uniqueness that comes from BF’s old-school class system. And in some smaller, more combat-focused modes, this is indeed the case. But in bigger, more Battlefield-y modes, like Conquest and Rush, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how things have worked out.
In my hours with the beta, I found that in many matches players were spread all around the four classes. In some past games (looking at you, Battlefield 3), people would pick whatever class had the best assault rifle, and that was that. During a Q&A with the devs last month in LA, they talked about this and said that the open weapon system was partly designed to combat this. The idea is that now people will pick classes based on what the team needs and their unique abilities and tools, rather than the weapons they can and can’t use.
And yeah, that’s exactly what I saw happening in many BF6 open beta matches. If the enemy team, for example, brought in a bunch of vehicles or tanks, I’d see players swap to engineers to use that class’s RPG to take all those machines out. Likewise, I saw players and friends swap to the support class to help hold a point and revive people, or swap to recon to help pin down a target. It seems now that weapons can be freely equipped on any class, people are far more open to playing different classes and helping out the team. Sure, maybe some of these players have just equipped the same assault rifle on all of the classes, but if it helps my team stop a tank from destroying us, I’m fine with it. That’s a much better scenario than in past BF games, where a whole team might be assault soldiers and you’d be unable to get ammo resupplies or fight back against helis.
Battlefield 6 also rewards players for choosing a weapon that is more aligned with their class. Recon soldiers get a ton of exclusive sniper perks that make it almost silly to use a sniper rifle on any other class. But you can do it, if that makes you happy. And this is where I’d suggest some tweaks.
I think rewarding players who pick class-specific weapons is a smart idea, but I almost feel like the devs could do more to make sure picking an assault rifle on every class isn’t an easy option. Perhaps class-specific weapon punishments could work? An assault class soldier picking a sniper rifle might mean they don’t get the recon benefits, and perhaps they also reload the big rifles more slowly. Or an engineer picking an assault rifle has more kick and can’t carry as much ammo for it. These tweaks would reward people playing classes more traditionally, could be overcome with skill or teamwork, and would still allow for the weapon freedom the devs want in BF6.
But even if Battlefield 6 devs don’t steal my totally-awesome-and-perfect idea, I think the open weapon system is a good change. It lets players enjoy all the classes without forcing them to play with specific guns. This leads to matches in which all the classes are used, and that leads to more enjoyable Battlefield action. And that’s what I’m looking for. Sure, maybe it means that I’ll be killed a lot by a few popular assault rifles, but it might also mean that there will be more medics running around who can heal me. That would be nice. And don’t worry; if you hate the open weapon system, EA is going to offer playlists and modes that feature locked weapons, too. Everyone wins.