It’s common for gamers to try and make predictions about the future of their favorite franchises. There are many YouTube channels built around exactly that. However, it’s rare for these predictions to be even remotely similar to reality. When guesses are correct, it’s usually a prediction about an already announced game with plenty of information to base it on.
However, a total shot in the dark still manages to hit the mark every once in a while. Such is the case of one YouTube commenter who predicted Battlefield 2042 well before the game’s 2021 announcement.
YouTube user KaiserWilhelmTheInfinite posted the comment, and a screenshot of it has since begun circulating on Reddit. They posted the comment in October 2020, well before Battlefield 2042 was officially announced in June 2021. At the time, fans had only seen a brief glimpse of developers testing the game’s animations. All anyone knew was DICE was developing the next Battlefield game. At the time, the general public didn’t yet know anything about the game’s setting or title.
However, KaiserWilhelmTheInfinite managed a correct guess based on nothing but his desires for the next game in the series. The comment reads, “I’m hoping for a semi futuristic BF game like 2142 but on a lesser scale, Battlefield 2042.” In a later comment, they compared it to a Battlefield take on Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. The initial remark was in response to another comment under a video playing music from the trailer announcing the Battlefield franchise’s return to Steam. Based on that, the name Battlefield 2042 was probably closer to a joke than a serious prediction. They could have just as easily said Battlefield 2035 but was referencing DICE’s original 2006 experiment with science fiction. However, that was probably the exact thought process that led to Battlefield 2042 having that title today.
No one at the time seems to have taken the prediction very seriously. A few people responded with reasons they thought Battlefield 2035 was a bad idea. Most of the other commenters just made jokes. It’s also no surprise it took so long for the wider internet to take notice. The comment was hidden beneath another on a video with less than 42,000 views at the time of writing.
Meanwhile, the Reddit post received the sort of amusement one would expect from this kind of accidental prediction. Multiple commenters made Star Wars references suggesting KaiserWilhelmTheInfinite is a real-life Jedi. Another person theorized they are secretly an EA or DICE employee testing the water or engaging in viral marketing. Although that’s unlikely and probably wasn’t a serious suggestion regardless. Scrolling down reveals another Reddit user who claims to have made a similar prediction only to get downvoted on the Battlefield 6 subreddit. Either way, KaiserWilhelmTheInfinite has got to be feeling good about their predictive capabilities.
Battlefield 2042 releases on November 19th, 2021, for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.