Graev showed me this picture last night. It perfectly shows how the minimap in Battlefield games has regressed over the years. Since the first battlefield game, minimaps have been getting progressively worse, save for maybe some redeeming qualities in BF2’s.
(Click to enlarge)
Interestingly, this picture represents, to me, more than just how minimaps have changed over time. It speaks strongly to the games themselves in many ways.
Yeah the BF3 minimap is largely useless, except for seeing your most immediate area. I think the most ideal set up would’ve been Battlefield 2’s minimap, with Vietnam’s grid lines and topography lines.
My biggest complaint is that when you go to respawn, there’s not an easy way to tell which spot you’re spawning on. The spawn points all have letter designations, but they aren’t marked on the minimap.
“Looks like an orgy or glow worms.”
Until I read it on the forums I had no idea that you can adjust the Minimap’s zoom level by pressing “N”. Now I always maximize the map (default M) and use the second zoom level. I find it more useful that way. But it always resets when you spawn.
Binding the map zoom and the maximize map buttons to ones I can reach while in combat I have found makes a huge difference. As a vehicle driver I will often leave the map maximized on medium zoom and as infantry I will switch between maximizing and zoom levels when fighting.
Seeing the BF2 minimap makes me want to play it again sooo bad. 🙁
This Anderz guy has also done a really nice mockup of what he thinks the spawn screen should look like: http://imgur.com/eUoVU. He also did a standalone squad menu mockup and a guy from DICE liked it: http://imgur.com/xVPKP.
If they just made the zoom level save and made “M” bring up the whole map every time it might be useful. As it stands I don’t really use the mini-map for anything, although back in 2142 I didn’t either. The scale of most Battlefield maps doesn’t lend itself to the mini-map very well but the full scale map that comes up with “M” is huge.
Anyway besides the problems with zoom, I think the squad system is more broken than the map.
Also the chatbox from hell needs to go
They need to hire that guy.
What are the best BF 3 gaming sites out there? Looking for some strategy help.
Feel free to ask any questions here. A lot of knowledgeable BF3 players around.
Rank 44 and climbing! Can answer detailed questions about pretty much anything besides the recon kit.
And the Spec Ops Camo is amazing o.0
Yeah, they really blew it in terms of the UI. I like Battlelog, and visually the game is awesome. The infantry combat is better. Everything else from lag, to small gameplay details, to this UI garbage. I just don’t understand how a company who has made so many Battlefield games and collected so much feedback on each one could make such terrible decisions.
lol…..Agreed, they seem to have lost the plot, regarding player feedback. Playability has always made better gaming improvements (imo) and good maps can really lessen frustration for nothing.