The Battlefield series is a classic for a reason. Battlefield multiplayer has always been its strongest element, even if DICE squandered the built-in potential or fumbled with something that seemed unnecessary. However, despite its long history, it never really faced any proper competition.
Delta Force: Eagle may be a bit of a silly game, but spend just a few minutes and you’ll see how seriously it takes Battlefield. After a period of delay, the game’s alpha test began in the West this week, giving players access to select modes, maps, vehicles, and operators.
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Let’s get this out of the way real quick: Beyond the name, this is indeed Battlefield 2042. Its appearance is so unique that it’s difficult to tell the two apart at a casual glance. The menus, HUD design/elements, icons, and even some lighting quirks are pretty much the same. Even one of the alpha maps bears a striking resemblance to a certain classic map from Bad Company 2 (which itself inspired the recent BF2042 map).
It’s shameless indeed, but when you actually play it, you’ll find that developer Team Jade has been more successful at copying BF2042’s aesthetics than its mechanics and feel. what it did What is done well, however, is creating an effect that is very close to a general battlefield atmosphere.
Hawk Ops multiplayer offers combined arms operations. Infantrymen fight alongside air, sea and land vehicles. Some buildings are destructible. There is a hierarchy. There are also Battlefield 2042-style operators and more. This game will definitely be a success.
While every moment feels like a high-level Battlefield, both the micro and macro aspects struggle to match DICE’s design. The gunplay in Hawk Ops is more inspired by Call of Duty than Battlefield. The weapons kicked wildly and their sights bounced around, but this felt random rather than representative of their weight and power. You can tell the visual recoil is exaggerated, and it feels like it’s pretending to be something rather than trying to cross the line between real and arcade.
The campaign also has roots in tactical shooters and Call of Duty clones. It often feels erratic and lacks the speed and precision of recent CoD or even BF2042. The animations simply don’t keep up with the pace of combat, and you can’t perform multiple actions while running. You can take cues from Hawk Ops, which further pulls it towards a more realistic side, but the pace of the action encourages you to think of it as an arcade shooter.
This anachronism is evident elsewhere, such as in the game’s vehicles. Operation Eagle positions them as precision tools designed to fill certain roles, but they’re armored killing machines that stop instantly and don’t quite obey the laws of physics. This is a bit silly.
Many of the decisions seem to be in response to problems faced by other games, and not necessarily problems with Operation Eagle itself. For example, enemy soldiers are very easy to see—sometimes even through smoke. Aircraft, in particular, can quickly and easily identify hordes of enemies from a distance, making them feel like CoD’s killstreaks.
Recent Battlefield games have had well-known issues with player visibility, and Hawk Ops’ “a light above each player” solution seems to work exactly the same as Battlefield 2042, considering the former’s The natural brightness I find a bit unusual is that the map is. It seems someone copied the recipe but didn’t quite understand that certain ingredients can be substituted if you don’t have what the recipe calls for.
All these misgivings aside, Hawk Ops is generally pretty successful at tricking you into thinking it’s a failed Battlefield game. Alpha Test doesn’t have the classic Conquest mode, but it does have an attack/defense mode that’s basically Breakout. course Do exists, but the restrictions on who can use what seem unclear.
Typically, Battlefield games restrict certain weapon types to certain categories. This isn’t always the case in Hawk Ops, where I’ve found that some of the weapons (such as the assault rifle class) are locked into certain classes. It’s unclear if this was a bug or intentional design, but it never made much sense.
Yes, there are operators below the level system – BF2042 Experts, basically. They’re characters with unique personalities, looks, etc., but they each also have an outfit. Just like how I feel about the heroes of BF2042, I can live without them. There weren’t that many of them in this test, and they all seemed to carry more or less gear that could exist without them (and have in past Battlefield games), so that at least tells me they won’t Get weird.
Because this test was limited, I encountered a lot of AI bots. That’s fine, sure, but Hawk Ops doesn’t expose them. In fact, you’ll often see them with normal names – including some with “TTV” at the end to indicate they’re a Twitch streamer! While bots may be necessary to keep servers full, I don’t think it does anyone any good to obfuscate their nature.
The alpha runs quite well on my PC (7800X3D/RTX 4080), certainly better than Battlefield 2042. Part of this is due to the game’s limited destructibility and slightly smaller player count. Destruction is another element that feels unnatural. And it’s not as dynamic as what you’re used to in Warzone. It’s almost as if it’s predetermined; walls are reasonable game, but palm trees and light poles often are not.
Aside from a few odd omissions, such as the inability to edit equipment during a match, Hawk Ops offers a compelling Battlefield alternative. It won’t replace it, but for the low price of $0, I don’t think anyone can pass it up.
“Delta Force: Eagle” is a free-to-play first-person shooter developed by Team Jade and published by Timi Studio Group. It’s set to release on PC, consoles, and mobile devices sometime this year.
