The Battlefield series is a classic for a reason. Even when DICE squandered built-in potential or seemingly screwed something up needlessly, Battlefield’s multiplayer has always been its strongest element. Yet, despite the game’s long history, it’s never really faced any real competition.
Delta Force: Operation Eagle might have a silly name, but spend a few minutes with it and you’ll see how seriously it takes its Battlefield take. After a delay, the game’s alpha launched in the West this week, giving players access to some of its modes, maps, vehicles, and operators.
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Let’s get this out of the way real quick: this game is, in all but name, Battlefield 2042. The game goes for such a distinct look that it’s hard to tell the two apart at a casual glance. Menus, HUD design/elements, icons, and even some lighting quirks are all nearly identical. Even one of the alpha maps bears a striking resemblance to a classic Bad Company 2 map (which itself inspired the recent BF2042 map).
It’s shameless, but when you actually play it you’ll realise that developer Team Jade has been more successful in cribbing BF2042’s aesthetics than in copying its mechanics and feel. Did What is done very well, however, is creating a very close approximation of the atmosphere of a battlefield.
Hawk Ops multiplayer offers combined arms action. Infantry fights alongside air, sea, and land vehicles. Some buildings are destructible. The game has a class system. There are Battlefield 2042-style operators and more. The game really fits the genre well.
But while the game’s real-time combat feels like a high-water mark of Battlefield, the micro- and macro-design struggles to match DICE’s work. The gunplay in Hawk Ops feels more inspired by Call of Duty than Battlefield. Weapons have a lot of recoil, and sights bounce around, but they feel arbitrary rather than indicative of their weight and power. You can tell the visual recoil is exaggerated, and it feels like it’s faking something, trying to straddle the line between realism and arcade.
Likewise, the action is inspired by tactical shooters and Call of Duty clones. It often feels erratic, lacking the speed and precision of recent Call of Duty games and even Battlefield 2042. Animations simply can’t keep up with the pace of combat, and it’s impossible to perform multiple moves while running. You can try Hawk Ops, which further pulls it toward a more realistic side, but the pace of the action encourages you to treat it as an arcade shooter.
This anachronism is evident elsewhere, too, like with the game’s vehicles. Hawk Ops positions them as precision tools used to accomplish certain tasks, but they’re armored killing machines that stop instantly and don’t quite obey the laws of physics. It’s a bit silly.
Many decisions seem to have been made in response to problems faced by other g ames, rather than necessarily to address Hawk Ops’ own problems. Enemy soldiers, for example, are extremely easy to spot – sometimes even through smoke. Aircraft, in particular, make it so quick and easy to identify clusters of enemies from a distance that they feel like CoD’s killstreak bonuses.
Recent Battlefield games have had issues with player visibility, and Hawk Ops’ “there’s a light above each player’s head” solution seems identical to Battlefield 2042’s, which I find a bit unusual given the former’s naturally brighter maps. It seems like someone copied the recipe without fully understanding that some ingredients can be substituted if you don’t have what the recipe calls for.
Those misgivings aside, Hawk Ops often succeeds in fooling you into thinking it’s a failed Battlefield game. The alpha doesn’t have the classic Conquest mode, but it does have an attack/defend mode that’s basically Breach. Do There are, but the restrictions on who can use what seem unclear.
Typically, Battlefield games restrict certain weapon types to certain levels. This isn’t always the case in Hawk Ops, though, and I found that certain weapons, such as the assault rifle class, were locked to certain levels. It’s unclear if this is a bug or intentional, but it doesn’t seem to make sense.
Yes, underneath the class system there are Operators – basically, BF2042’s Specialists. They’re characters with unique personalities, looks, etc., but they each have their own gear. Just like I felt about BF2042’s Heroes, I could do without them here. There weren’t too many of them in this test, and they all seemed to carry gear that could more or less exist without them (as in previous Battlefield games as well), so that at least tells me they won’t be too weird.
Due to the limited nature of this test, I encountered a lot of AI bots. That’s fine, of course, but Hawk Ops doesn’t expose them. In fact, you’ll often see them with normal names – some with “TTV” at the end to indicate they’re Twitch streamers! While bots are necessary to keep servers running at full capacity, I don’t think hiding their true nature is good for anyone.
On my PC (7800X3D/RTX 4080), the alpha runs pretty well, certainly better than Battlefield 2042. It maintains a solid 100fps+ at 4K resolution. Part of this can be attributed to the game’s limited destructibility and slightly lower player count. Destruction is another element that feels unnatural; and not as dynamic as you’re used to in Battlefield. It almost feels predetermined; walls are attackable objects, but palm trees and lampposts generally aren’t.
Aside from a few odd flaws, like the inability to edit your gear mid-match, Hawk Ops offers a compelling Battlefield alternative. It won’t replace Battlefield, but at $0, I don’t think anyone will turn it down.
Delta Force: Eagle Run is a free-to-play first-person shooter developed by Team Jade and published by Timi Studio Group. The game is expected to be released on PC, consoles, and mobile devices sometime this year.
