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Mayhem in Onslaught Land

I had what I hoped would be a quick game of Bad Company 2 Onslaught this morning. It was hardcore, on Isla, and turned into a 28 minute bloodbath! I joined a great squad who pushed hard and we did well until the very last base. Our resident sniper was invaluable. Despite there being 2 engineers on the team he shot the pilot out of the enemy helicopter! I got a kill assist for my RPG hit however.

The sniper was well placed too as the rest of us had our asses handed to us on many an occasion. He was the sole survivor until after our 4th or 5th assault on the last base when we were all killed. Pity really as we were doing quite well. Earlier I changed to medic and with another player camped on the flag behind the stone barriers taking points off the flag. We even took down the enemy one and our flag was half raised when we were flanked and both of us taken down! ARGH!

On hardcore the enemy AI is much better at flanking, although they flank the same way each time so it’s only a matter of learning the patterns. A medic or two always flanked around by where Alpha would be, one medic was almost always sitting in the dirt by the front-middle of the base. Watch out for him.

That last base probably needs a two pronged attack, from left and right with the guys on the left capping the flag while the guys on the right push up and stop the enemy flanking.
Oh yeah, on hardcore you need at least one medic and he should run with at least one of the medic pack enhancements. I used both and they helped a lot. The iron sight on the 249 is good enough that I’ll sacrifice the RDS.

A few days ago Mike and I jumped into a game on easy to practice our flying skills. The heli got knocked out eventually but we had it up in the air for a good 15 minutes! Got a good number of kills as the gunner with Mike easing the vehicle around and around the base.

PS. Hands up who knows where I got the title of this post? It’s C64 related so if you’re a young fella you probably won’t have a clue!

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Had quite a bit of fun in Bad Company 2 …

Had quite a bit of fun in Bad Company 2 Onslaught tonight. Played easy difficulty with strangers. Some games were great, some downright terrible. Had loads of fun in the heli on Atacama Desert and even kept the bird flying for quite some time!

I almost always came out with the highest number of kills simply because my squad didn’t always know how to play Onslaught. They didn’t push hard enough, taking cover metres away from the flag instead of camping on it. Other times they downright ignored my calls for help.

TexasGhost who was afk for the game below flew in the heli with me as a gunner in one game and had his mic on and proved to be good company flying over the enemy.

Guess who was playing as recon on Nelson Bay? His one saving grace was as a (rear) spawn point when b-man and myself got taken out at the same time.

Beat a few of my best times tonight too. Good fun!

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There aren’t many times I can gloat abo…

There aren’t many times I can gloat about my score in any game. Yes, they probably joined the game late replacing people who were playing at the start of the round of Onslaught but just let me have my moment will you?

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47-0 on Atacama Desert

I think the highest number of kills I got in Bad Company 2 Onslaught is 79, in one of my first games with Mike last week. It was only the two of us playing, and it was on easy difficulty so the enemy practically stand in the middle of the road for you to shoot.

Here’s a screenshot of the scores from a game this weekend. It was on Atacama Desert, on hard difficulty and I had the tank most of the time. We crushed all who opposed us. I got 47 kills and I didn’t die once!

I have to give credit to Mike who can land a tracer on a speeding bullet. Without his skills those Havoc helicopters would have been a lot more deadly.

For more tracer hell, check out this video David created of a Rush game on Isla. Mike helped take down helicopter after helicopter. Madness!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBmEs7xzGik

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Bored of Bad Company 2 Onslaught already?

So I went online last night to play 20 minutes of Bad Company 2 as Mike had said he’d be on. We dived into a game of Onslaught because you can be sure that the game will last 15 minutes or so.

22 minutes later we finished Atacama Desert on hard difficulty. My best time there is 14 minutes so it was a really sucky game. Mike expressed his boredom with the DLC and as a competitive game mode I have to agree. I don’t mind, and enjoy playing it with random players but when I join any friends online it’s to be competitive and go for the win, in a meaningful manner. A better completion time is an incentive, but only a small one. With a little more imagination, DICE could have made the mode a lot more exciting and competitive. We’re all stats freaks aren’t we?

One part of the problem is that each game is much the same as the previous game on the same level. For example on Atacama Desert there are always 2 enemy tanks at the start, then 1 tank rolls up from the left, and a heli attacks. On Isla there’s always a sniper on the building next to the B flag. On Nelson Bay there’s always a medic and assault guy upstairs where Alpha 2 is. It’s predictable where Rush or any game played against humans can’t be.

It speaks volumes when swordsmanx75’s review of Onslaught suggests self imposed rules (only use shotguns) to make the game more interesting. Check out his review here:

Onslaught is fun, it’s lots of fun actually, but rush beats it hands down.

Edit: David has his own review of Onslaught. He pulls no punches:

I gave it a go with Donncha and Mike on hard and to be honest, I was not impressed. As a game mode it’s Squad Rush meets Conquest with AI. And as always the AI is stupid. I’m not expecting total consciousness from AI, but I’d be impressed if the level of intelligence had moved on from that of the original Tom Clancy Ghost Recon games from the beginning of the decade.

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Onslaught is great for practising. Fire …

Onslaught is great for practising. Fire up a private game and you can fly a Hind, or shoot enemies with your M24 and learn how distance affects bullet drop. It doesn’t matter if you die because you’ll respawn if there’s only one player.

I played a game on Isla, and figured out that the bullet drop on the M24 wasn’t as great as I imagined before. The Hind that appeared shortly afterwards was very annoying but I made short work of it after I respawned as an engineer. Good opportunity to try the M1 Garand too.

Mike brushed up on his heli skills last night while he waited for us to finish a game. Good thing too as in our first game on Atacama Desert I piloted the Hind out of our base and promptly crashed, with the Hind landing upside down! We both got out unscathed.

I don’t think I or anyone will obsess about Onslaught like we do about Rush because it’s like playing a single player game, but with your friends. There is the leaderboard, and I noticed that I had the best time for at least one maplast night among my friends. It’s competitive that way, but more than anything it’s a great diversion and just what I need for a quick 5 minute blast.

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Bad Company 2 Onslaught of Death

I played a few games of Onslaught after work there. On easy difficulty level because I want a nice gentle introduction to the mode. First of all on Isla I joined 3 others and completed it in about 8 minutes. Worked out well and yes, it was easy.

Then Mike got online and I set up a private match. We played Atacama Desert and there are a lot of vehicles on this level! We got into the Hind which was a bad mistake. Didn’t last long and had to contend with 2 or 3 tanks on the first flag without armour. Luckily I was an engineer, took out one with an RPG and another with my repair tool. Mike respawned as an assault class to supply us with ammo.

The enemy hinds are really annoying! Luckily they’re pretty dumb too. They’ll hover overhead after bombing us so it’s an easy kill with the RPG. On to the last base where we took out a few tanks, rolled in there, rolled out to repair and in again and sat on the flag until the game ended.

Final score? I got 79 kills, Mike got 96. Both of us died 3 times. One of those deaths for both of us was changing class. Me from assault to engineer, and Mike from medic to assault. In retrospect we should have just looked for appropriate kits from fallen enemies but we did have 2 tanks breathing down our throats! Besides, what a KDR! 🙂

Once the sheen wears off I can see myself playing Onslaught mode when I’m too tired to go up against human players. On easy difficulty the enemy will fall with just a few rounds from a UMP, without magnum ammo.

The aim of the game is to complete it with the best time. Mike and myself finished in Atacama Desert in 23 minutes which we’ll probably destroy in the coming days. There’s a leaderboard made up from your friendslist and I see Geoff and Gary completed it in 9 minutes. So, plenty of room for improvement.

Oh yes, to repeat something that was said in a video below, the best squad needs one or two engineers, and assault guys, and probably a medic too. Medic isn’t so important as you have infinite tickets but if all the team die it’s game over. I don’t think there’s any point in a recon player in Onslaught is there?

So, is Onslaught worth getting? Hell yeah. It should have been included in the original game as it uses much the same assets as the regular multiplayer game. It wasn’t, and EA have spotted an opportunity to make more money. Suck it up and buy it. It’s fun.

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Bad Company 2 Onslaught Gameplay

Gameplay video by 6Larinro9 showing Bad Company 2 Onslaught on Isla Inocentes. Looks like it’s set at dusk and you have to capture the flag in each base. Looks great!

And this is what it looks like on Nelson Bay! Oooh, sunlight!

Valparaiso at night.

Atacama Desert, low light, perhaps at dusk.

The guys at Reddit are playing it too but one person has had serious problems with assault rifles unfortunately.

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Bad Company 2 Onslaught

Onslaught has just been announced. It’s a coop game for Battlefield Bad Company which sounds really interesting.

Onslaught is bringing co-op gameplay to Battlefield for the first time on console. The new game mode puts you and up to three friends against the enemy on Valparaiso, Atacama Desert, Isla Inocentes and Nelson Bay – redesigned with new lighting, time of day, added vehicles and other effects. Each map has a dedicated gameplay focus, requiring different levels of teamwork in order to complete the objectives against an onslaught of enemy AI. Vehicle warfare comes to the forefront in Atacama Desert while Nelson Bay focuses squarely on infantry assault. Players can compete in squads and check individual progress via the dedicated Onslaught leaderboards.


(The video is nothing special, 1/3 of it is company logos!)

The one fly in the ointment is that it won’t be free. If it gets good reviews and if my friends on PSN and Xbox Live want to buy it I’ll probably pick it up.

Unfortunately if you’re on PC, you’re out of luck due to the way they’ve deployed/designed their servers.