I installed the beta, which is still VERY rough--rougher than I expected, frankly. It reminded me of EA's version of Call of Duty ... smaller maps, so more hectic combat. The two maps in the beta are a standard PvP map (Kabul), and if you're familiar with Bad Company 2, a Rush-style PvP map (Helmand valley) that unlocks other areas of the map as the battle progresses and objectives are achieved (*if* they are achieved since the opposing side is trying to stop it).
But I have mixed feelings about it, not because it's unspectacular at this point, but because it is directly based on US Forces fighting Taliban. In the beta, the OPFOR side is actually called Taliban. Maybe it's just me, and maybe I'm a bit sensitive to this having just returned from Afghanistan, but there's something about creating a game based on a war that's ongoing. It just doesn't sit well with me to be put on the Taliban team and to shoot at US troops. In earlier battlefield games it didn't bother me so much to be on the Russian team, or with the People's Liberation Army (PLA), or the Middle Ease Coalition (MEC) which was was fictitious. Even in CoD, apart from the OPFOR looking and speaking in some Middle Eastern dialect, they were generically Middle Eastern and not attributed to a particular country or ideology that we're at war with.
I suppose the question is whether it would have bothered me before I deployed, since Afghanistan was never really a focus for me before that time. I think it would have bothered me on some level, but I don't know if it would have turned me off the game, especially if it was really well made.
I know the creators are just trying to make a good FPS game, but whether they mean to or not, they will also be glorifying the Taliban and handing them another propaganda tool to use against us. But as it stands, I don't think I can support this game any more.
