‘Battlefield 2042’: EA reportedly recognizes game’s issues, says surprise ‘Halo: Infinite’ release contributed to its underwhelming launch

EA leaders have reportedly addressed the lukewarm reception to “Battlefield 2042” in a recently held town hall meeting with employees. The publisher recognized what caused the problematic launch, and interestingly mentioned the surprise release of “Halo: Infinite” as one of the reasons for the negative feedback to its own first-person shooter.

Discussions from the said meeting were leaked in a report on Xfire. EA chief operating officer Laura Miele reportedly noted that one of the key factors that caused the launch issues was the Frostbite engine’s old tech. It is said to have required massive updates that the developers practically used a new engine for “Battlefield 2042.”

EA also mentioned the pandemic and the developers’ remote work setting as one of the factors that affected the quality of “Battlefield 2042” at launch. As for the gameplay issues, Miele noted that the bug count was within the level they expected in comparison with previous DICE game releases. Another factor the EA exec reportedly mentioned was the sudden release of the free-to-play “Halo Infinite” multiplayer.

Leaker Tom Henderson, who reported about the town hall meeting, later provided more context on why EA partly blamed “Halo Infinite” for the “Battlefield 2042” launch issues. Henderson shared a quote of what Miele supposedly said during the meeting. The EA exec said “the game was stable” upon releasing it on early access on late Nov. 11 and that they saw good numbers in the daily player retention through the following weekend.

“But then things started to turn,” Miele reportedly said. “The following Monday, ‘Halo’ did a surprise release of their multiplayer mode. … It was very polished and it was not a favorable comparison to our experience given some of the bugs and polish issues we had.”

Miele was likely referring to the surprise release of “Halo Infinite” open beta last Nov. 15. It was four days before the “Battlefield 2042” general availability and coincided with Xbox’s 20th-anniversary celebrations.

The same report said EA also tackled ongoing “Battlefield 2042” issues in terms of content. To the surprise of many, the game was released without a scoreboard and VOIP functions. And the publisher has recognized their absence as one of the game’s launch issues in terms of content. The good news is DICE has already announced these features are already in the works and will be released as part of future updates.