Battlefield Hardline is the next game in the well like Battlefield series, developed by a studio some might be surprised to see, Visceral Games. This is surprising because any fan of the series will know that DICE, or EA Digital Illusions CE, has been lead developer in games prior to this. Nevertheless, Visceral Games has made the Dead Space series and helped work on Battlefield 3 and 4 so they have more than proven that they are a great company.

Hardline has a very unique story line in so many ways. First of it’s not a military shooter, for once it’s not one military fighting another like almost every other game in this genre. Instead of like a war on terror or something like that you’re taking part in the “war” on crime. You’re a detective with the Miami police force and they’re having a huge drug war problem.

This campaign is unlike many others; it’s run like a T.V. show called episodes. Each episode runs a central theme and has plot development. It starts throwing you right into the action of it.  Your name is Nick Mendoza you’re a detective on the Miami Police department and you and your partner, Detective Stoddard, are doing a drug bust on a hotel room and once they bust into the room things take a turn for the worse.

This game is unlike every other Battlefield to date, with a new publisher and a new way to play plus playing on next generation consoles, the differences are insane. Multiplayer is the biggest change, Battlefield has always been a military game, just a chaotic huge fight full of tanks, helicopters, and other assorted vehicles. With Hardline it’s just police/swat against criminals so the weapons and vehicles in game are not military standards. Each team has their own weapons to use to that pertain to each factions cops use like M16’s and HCAR’s while criminals use like AKM’s and Uzi’s which all make sense.

The multiplayer also features civilian style vehicles with the main vehicles being unarmed squad cars and what the game calls “muscle cars” which just look to be the 2015 Ford Mustang. Since most vehicles been unarmed, and the ones that do have guns usually are not armed well enough to kill people like a tank could, this puts almost all emphasis on foot combat unlike games before.

The leveloution, or changing of the map during a match, of multiplayer is great too. It does things like drop a construction crane onto a skyscapper on the downtown L.A. map taking a huge chunk of the building down, or dropping of mobile homes in a map in the Miami swamps. This leads to an ever changing experience that leaves every game feeling exciting and new.

The only downside is the unbalanced use of guns in multiplayer; it seems that some guns are worlds better than others. No matter how you play they’re guns are better and you need to use them, which leaves the player feeling like they cannot play the way that they want.  This also means that there are not many guns to choose from, leaving three guns for everyone to use.

Overall though Battlefield Hardline is a great game in the battlefield series, it’s a much needed change to the shooter genre. I would recommend this game to any fan of the series or anyone tired of the same old shooter over and over.