Battlefield 2042 was not the game that most players were expecting, with its radical changes to map design, ditching the class system in favor of catch-all Specialists, doubling the number of players in a map from 64 to 128, and dozens of other smaller updates that quickly soured the game in the eyes of fans and newcomers alike. The developers at DICE have spent more than a year providing patches and updates to address the community’s many issues, and patch 3.2 is set to be one of the largest yet.
We went hands-on with the new update not long ago and tried out the game’s return to the class system and the new features in the update. Today, DICE released full patch notes for 3.2, going into great detail about those classes, the rework to the Breakaway map, and weapons players will get their hands on.
First, classes. All Specialists will now be placed into a class that best fits their kit, and while they’ll still be able to use whatever weapon they choose, using their class’s historical loadout offers a Weapon Proficiency bonus. Class Gadgets have also been reworked, with each Specialist now limited to a much smaller selection based on what their class is best at.
Also coming in 3.2 is a significant rework of the much-maligned Breakaway map. Perhaps most importantly, it’s now smaller than it was previously, with shorter sightlines and distances between control points. Other areas of the map needing addressing — Glacier Top and Snow Caves, for instants — saw changes, and the Oil Rig section of the map was moved wholesale. Hopefully, the map is slightly more enjoyable to play now.
On the weapons and vehicle front, DICE is adding thermal sight options to many of the game’s weaponry, and there is a new suppressor type for the NVK-S22 platform. Both the M1A5 and T28 tanks will now have the Active Protection System, and aerial vehicles less than 30 meters off the ground will no longer be targetable by vehicle-based anti-air weapons.
Three new Portal weapons are also making their way to Battlefield 2042: the E39 EMR, the MTAR, and the PP-2000. Portal weapons have historically been less than stellar on release, but these are some iconic arms, so if they come back wrong, there will be words. Those are the major changes, but there’s also a laundry list of bug fixes and “thank you rewards” for those who played (or didn’t play) Seasons 1 and 2 or the Tier 0 Battle Pass.
