Hardcore players of Battlefield 2 and Battlefield 2142 will remember the Commander role during combat. The Commander (usually the highest ranked player in the game) was able to issue orders, deploy resources like airstrikes or UAVs, and perhaps most importantly, have access to the Commander View, which offered a full view of the battlefield, including enemy locations. Battlefield 3 will not be featuring Commanders and general manager at DICE, Karl Magnus Troedsson explains why.

Having any kind of advantage on the battlefield, virtual or not, is always very important, and the Commander in BF2 was able to provide those advantages for his team. However, players who took on that role often relegated themselves to camping in hard to find areas of the maps to increase their survivability and just point at enemies and order resources. Battlefield 3's lack of the feature is explained away in a realistic fashion by Troedsson and frankly, it makes a lot of sense.

This decision might not impact the already 1.5 million pre-orders Battlefield 3 has garnered, but some old school fans might find themselves frowning at the decision. This is what Troedsson said regarding the matter:

"Everyone agrees that that actual role of the Commander is very, very cool. But the problem is that only one person per team could play it, and it was always the highest ranking one.

"But even for the people that played as a Commander, the first thing they did was what? They ran off to a corner somewhere and lay down there and tried to hide so the Spec Ops guy wouldn't find them when he was going to blow up the installations.

"They basically spent the whole match lying on the ground on some obscure corner of the map, hoping not to get knifed in the back and trying to support people."

Commanders were able to also take part in the fight, but should they die, how can they support their team? Hiding and providing intelligence might be something some players might enjoy, but DICE has different plans for it. The multiplayer doesn't look any less amazing to play and the single player, even if it's running on the Xbox 360 looks fantastic.

What do you guys think? Is the lack of Commander Mode a downfall for you in terms of your particular play style for Battlefield or do you think it will give everyone an even playing field?

Battlefield 3 releases October 25, 2011 for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

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Source: Eurogamer