Bad Company: Final Thoughts - 8

I wrapped up the single player campaign of Battlefield: Bad Company after giving it a long rest and focusing on the multiplayer battles.  The multiplayer is fast paced, has (limited) character progression, stat tracking, etc.  The fast pace is what really made it enjoyable, because there was always some new opponent with some different tactic coming to try and kill you before you killed them.  The single player campaign lacked this for the most part.

In my review of the game I would have to say that if the other chapters were anything like the pace of the final chapter then it would have earned a higher score.  The 8 was the averaging of a 7 single player campaign with a 9 for multiplayer fun, but the final chapter was also a solid 9.  It changed things up, going from tank battles to artillery to blowing up bridges to riding in a vehicle shooting at enemies... a lot of variety.  It proves that they held back on the creativity trying to stretch out the game earlier and only when they were ready to wrap it up did they put some effort in to the level design for the ending.  Coming after Call of Duty 4 one would say they should have known better than to make long repetitive levels over tight entertaining levels, but some game designers still have not learned their lesson, or simply come from a different school.

As for the multiplayer and the 9 that I would give it, were it stand-alone, the only flaw I see in it is the limited weapon selection available.  The main game had such variety that I was surprised at how few weapons were available and even fewer options to customize your character within whatever class you chose to fight in.  I also question a spawn-on-teammate option that sometimes left me dead shortly after the teammate I spawned on was killed or let me kill 2-3 people that just appeared in front of me as I was tracking down an opponent.  But regardless, the battles were always tough and entertaining.  It was always rewarding to sneak up and take someone out.

It's unfortunately not a must-play, because better experiences can be had in other games, but it's not a waste of time if you enjoy FPS war games and especially if you like Battlefield multiplayer games.