Last night Battlefield: Hardline launched in the US.
Most of us don’t have to strain too hard to remember the launch issues surrounding Battlefield 4, and as a result many people were baiting their breath to see if Hardline would run smoothly from day one
…and it’s fair to say some people (mainly those with the maturity and pragmatism of a Yorkshire Terrier) were hoping to draw some schadenfreude from another EA catastrophe.
Well, to the disappointment of several 12 yr olds (with an abundance of free time reflecting directly their social skills and real-world popularity), Hardline actually worked really well from the moment it went live.
…so a few of these prepubescent keyboard warriors attempted to break it.
The launch in general was lauded as a huge success -especially considering that the game simultaneously went live over 5 different platforms (PS4, Xbox One, PS3, Xbox 360, and PC). In fact, we’re sad to say the Xbox One was the only platform that suffered any significant issues at all. But before you go lighting torches and grabbing your pitchforks, make sure you’re marching on the right castle.
Visceral games were quick to take to the interwebs to confirm (by Twitter and then on the Battlelog) that the studio has identified a DDoS attack as the culprit behind the connectivity issues on Xbox One – but they did of course apologise for the inconvenience while they resolved it.
quote:
We’ve identified the connectivity issues on Xbox One are due to DDoS attack and working to resolve. Apologies for the inconvenience.
— Battlefield (@Battlefield) March 18, 2015
That’s right. Unfortunately some sad, strange little kids felt the inexplicable need to try to spoil other peoples’ fun… -via the “hacking” equivalent of using a Leapfrog Leap pad as a tablet PC.
I think Matthew Castle (editor of Official Xbox Magazine) said it best:
“Hardline held up well in our ten hours of pre-release play through EA Access, so it’s a real shame to see the proper launch targeted by a malicious few. That said, it smacks of desperate attention seeking, so the best medicine – as always – is to ignore them. I imagine whoever did is is pretty embarrassed that they’ve already been upstaged by a motorised couch.”
No doubt Visceral will make best efforts to ensure it doesn’t happen again.
Failing that, we suggest trying to play after 9pm, which is reported to be the hackers’ bedtime.
So good news/bad news, really. On the one hand it’s a shame that there are still a few people like this out there, ruining games for everyone else. On a FAR more positive note, at least we know it wasn’t the game itself. From all reports so far, when not being the target of hormonal angst, apparently this netcode is holding up well and providing a great experience.
As always, feel free to share your own experiences below.
^HooksaN(@HooksaN)
David Hook (HooksaN) contributed 26 articles to ICXM between 2014–2015, covering game reviews, and Xbox news with a focus on hands-on impressions and verified-source reporting. Their bylines on the site span the Xbox One’s first full year of post-launch coverage, including the early days of Backwards Compatibility and Windows 10 gaming. They post on X as @Hooksan.