During E3, EA and DICE announced their new player stat-tracking system for “Battlefield 3.” Called Battlelog, the online service is obviously a direct competitor to Activision’s “Call of Duty Elite” program. While there was quite a bit of focus on “Elite” today – beta invitations started arriving in select applicant’s email inboxes – an alleged brief glimpse at Battlelog certainly warrants some attention.
According to “Battlefield” fan-site Battlefieldo (via 1UP), images of the stat-tracking service suddenly appeared on the German “Battlefield” site. Apparently, the blog has since been taken down, but the fan site managed to grab the pics before they disappeared.
There’s no confirmation that these images are real, but they’re certainly convincing. Moreover, I have to believe it’s awfully convenient timing that this post just “accidentally” appeared on the same day Activision is touting their own “Elite” beta. While there’s no direct way of proving it, there’s definitely a fair amount of competitive poking going on leading up to the fall releases of “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3″ and “Battlefield 3.” Just last week, it was discovered that the web url ModernWarfare3.com actually redirected to the “Battlefield 3″ site. Sarcastic fans, or clever marketing jab? We don’t know.
Battlelog will allow you to post on your “Battlefield 3″ friends’ profile – much like Facebook – and join their matches directly through a handy interface built into the system. Obviously, the larger portion of Battlelog is devoted to stat-tracking, allowing you to brag to your friends about your amazing kill-to-death ratio. The biggest difference between Battlelog and Elite? Battlelog is completely free. Elite is “somewhat” free, but also offers premium subscription options.
Michael McWhertor — Battlefield 3 players will their own social network and stat-tracking site—just like Activision’s Call of Duty: Elite—when the DICE developed shooter hits later this year. First shots of the “Battlelog” interface have sneaked out, offering us our first glimpse at how we’ll connect with other Battlefield fans.
Battlefield 3′s Battlelog got an early showing thanks to the German Battlefield Blog which posted—then pulled, but not before Battlefieldo grabbed them—images of the social network’s chat system, player stat-tracking interface and profile pages. It appears that players can keep track of other players’ unlocked weapons and awards, as well as monitor their own kill/death ratio, accuracy, experience progress and much more.
DICE has gone on record about what Battlelog is capable of previously, writing that the service will let players “manage your friends lists, squad up, create platoons, use voice chat and follow your friends’ progress in real-time, and more.”
It also appears that Battlelog will have ties to older Battlefield games, showing a player’s “Veteran Status” from games like Battlefield 2, Battlefield 2142 and Battlefield: Bad Company 2. News, notifications, forum messages, comments… all appear to flesh out Battlefield 3′s subscription-free networking offering.
Battlefield 3 hits PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 this October. Expect more confirmed details on the game’s Battlelog soon.
Just as the Call of Duty series is getting free social networking features with Call of Duty Elite (the beta of which begins today), Battlefield 3 will bring with it something similar in Battlelog.
As announced during E3, Battlelog provides players with a place to check out statistics, track unlocks and awards, communicate with other players, and so on.
The German Battlefield blog seems to have jumped the gun by posting several pictures of Battlelog from an alpha trial version. The post, originally located here, has since been pulled, but not before fansite Battlefieldo noticed.
Anyone familiar with Facebook should be right at home with Battlelog. It features a news feed (called a Friends Battle Feed) that shows friends’ discussions with each other, forum posts, and notifications for when they reach a new rank or earn new items. There’s also a friends list and chat system that features voice chat and allows you to join a friend who’s already playing multiplayer online on PC.
A statistics page also highlights everything you’d expect: time played, score per minute, accuracy, kill-to-death ratio, time spent with each kit, level up progress, awards, etc. The one image of this page doesn’t reveal if it will offer something as deep as what Bungie has provided Halo players for years, like heatmaps.
Battlefield 3 will be out on October 25. While we’ll definitely learn more about Battlelog before then, there has been no indication that players will get to try it out before the game launches.
Check out the next page for more pictures of Battlelog. Click on any of the pictures to view its full-size version.
Tags: battlefield 3, battlelog, bf3, leaked
