Battlefield V finally gets its long-awaited Firestorm battle royale mode

DICE has finally launched its Firestorm battle royale mode on all platforms, four months after releasing Battlefield V. Although it won’t cost any extra for existing players and EA has accompanied its release with a complimentary sale, the paywall could prove detrimental to its longevity when free-to-play games Fortnite: Battle Royale and Apex Legends rule the roost.

Firestorm sees 64 players drop into Halvøy, a map that’s 10 times larger than the biggest map in Battlefield V. Appropriately, the closing ring is made of fire, which, as usual, shrinks the available playable zone until there is just one player/team standing. Vehicles play a large part in Firestorm with 17 different ones to control, including choppers. Fortunately, these are balanced with a range of anti-vehicle weapons and artillery strikes in the form of Reinforcements that can be picked up along the way.

Whether it stacks up against existing battle royale games remains to be seen. It bares resemblance to Apex Legends in some aspects with a dedicated ping button and even has the same destructibility Battlefield is known for. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have the same revival system as its rival, but it does have a last-stand function allowing downed players to hipfire from a pistol, should they have found one with ammo on their travels. Sadly, it also has a paywall that forces players to buy Battlefield V before jumping in.

For those that don’t own Battlefield V, which is required to access Firestorm, EA has temporarily slashed the base game by up to 50%. The base game oddly remains full price on the PlayStation Store, while the Deluxe Edition is the cheapest, down from £79.99 to just £29.99. The same edition on Xbox Live costs £40, while the base game is priced at £30.

Origin currently has Battlefield V at £27.49 here in the UK and the Deluxe Edition at £34.99. The shooter is also available as a part of the Origin Access subscription, with the Basic package costing £3.99 per month (£20 per year) and the Premium priced at £14.99 per month (£90 per year).

The Deluxe Edition includes exclusive Special Assignments “inspired by the British Special Air Service and German Fallschirmjäger troops,” as well as 5 sets of Paratrooper Outfits and 20 weekly customisable items. For Access subscribers, these are only available in the Premium package.

KitGuru Says: It’s tough to break into a steadily oversaturated genre, so it’ll be interesting to see how the introduction of Firestorm affects future sales of Battlefield V. Who knows, it might even push the game into a free-to-play state ahead of the next annual release, but somehow I doubt that.

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