The dates for Battlefield 2042's Open Beta have recently been announced, giving fans of the franchise something to look forward to in the first few weeks of October. Unfortunately, while the Beta is technically free to play, it still requires Xbox owners to have Xbox Live Gold despite not requiring those on PlayStation to have a PS Plus subscription.
According to Twitter account @BravoIntel, Dexerto's Battlefield-focused news Twitter account, the upcoming Beta for Battlefield 2042 requires an Xbox Live Gold membership to play but doesn't require a PS Plus subscription. This is a little odd as earlier this year Xbox announced that free-to-play games such as Fortnite, Call of Duty: Warzone, or Apex Legends will no longer require Xbox Live Gold to play.
This might potentially be the result of a mixup based on the fact that Battlefield 2042 isn't a free-to-play shooter. There has been speculation that it might end up on Xbox Game Pass because of Xbox's deal with EA Play at some point down the road, but it was made clear that the title won't be a day one Game Pass addition.
There's a possibility that Xbox might fix this and make Battlefield 2042's Open Beta not require Xbox Live Gold, however, as many people trying out the Beta will likely end up purchasing the final game, they'll need to have it anyway when the game officially releases later this year. What's more, many Xbox owners already have Xbox Live Gold as the result of being subscribed to Game Pass, so it's most likely that this issue won't impact too many people.
There are two ways for fans to get into the Beta that starts on October 6: by pre-ordering Battlefield 2042 or by being an EA Play member. Luckily, anyone with Game Pass Ultimate is already an EA Play member, so subscribers who are still on the fence about buying the game before it's been released can still give it a try without committing to a purchase.
Battlefield 2042 was recently delayed from its planned October release date to November 19. DICE promises that the team is hard at work polishing the game, however, now that it's been pushed to November, it's in direct competition with other major titles like Call of Duty: Vanguard and Halo Infinite. The three first-person shooters have done plenty to distinguish themselves, however, there's still plenty of overlap between fans of each series who now have to choose which games to devote their attention to.
Battlefield 2042 releases on November 19 for PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
Source: Dextero