Battlefield 3

THE BUZZ: What is the most played map in Battlefield 3? How did DICE balance the game’s weapons and vehicles? What does DICE think about Call of Duty? That—and more—answered thanks to DICE’s Alan Kertz.

EGM’s TAKE: Alan Kertz is well know for giving out a great amount of information about Battlefield 3 via Twitter, and recently he asked fans of the game what they’d like to see from him in an upcoming Inside DICE post. Via his asking that question, a number of interesting new tidbits were revealed.

For example, Kertz answered a question about where DICE started with Battlefield 3 in terms of gun balancing. To that, he says that the game started with one gun—the M16—and the game was then built up around that as a base.

As a follow up to that, Kertz then goes into vehicle balancing, which he says “generally starts with the speed and handling of the vehicle, and then builds in a rock paper scissors way.”

In another conversation, Kertz reveals that the most played map in Battlefield 3 at this point is Operation Metro. As for how that answer is calculated, he says that, “It’s measured by us, rounds completed per player. So 64 ppl would mean 64 points. Next is Caspian, Firestorm and Kharg.”

Finally, something very interesting—and also nice—to see from Kertz. In response to his posting of a tweet saying “Even the greatest game in the world is only as good as the playing field you play it on,” somebody asked if that was “directed at you lag of duty?”

To that, Kertz replied, “Nothing of the such. I have too much respect for CODs success to game off that.” So, even if EA and Activision want fans to think it has to be one side or the other, it’s nice to see somebody from DICE showing a little respect for their rivals.