I'm one of the lucky few invited to the Battlefield 1 closed alpha. Launch day destroyed me. I played from afternoon to 7 the next morning with nary a break in between. My productivity was lost to say the least. There are things I like and don't like.
The first thing that jumped out to me was how hard it was to see. Sunlight, smoke, fog, and all sorts of visual noise get in the way frequently. Since spotting is nerfed, I don't have as many markers to help me sort foe from friendlies.
In BF4, I spent half my time staring at the radar. Hardly anything shows up on it in BF1 -- at least when I first jumped in. My teammates seem to have gotten better at spotting as the days passed, but the minimap still lacks a lot of information that I'm used to seeing. Since live fire no longer shows up on the map, I have to use my eyes and ears to get a bead on the situation.
Map knowledge is paramount. I'm a lot better at checking the usual hiding spots but for those uninitiated, prepare to be killed from every conceivable angle. It took a lot of deaths to acquire familiarity with the terrain, and even then, I'll get flanked from some random direction every now and then.
One thing I don't like is the increased auto aim. It's almost Call of Duty levels of snap on. As a longtime console BF veteran, I'm used to no aim assist. Hell, I got my start in online console gaming with Socom, so I'm disappointed with the level of aim assist in BF1. It levels the skill gap significantly. Before, I would routinely take out guys who get the drop on me only because my aim is superior, but I no longer have that advantage.
So far I like it, but I don't love it. I hope things will be tweaked for a smoother game experience when the beta releases.
