Battlefield 4 Winter Update brings about “more exact” man-shooting via netcode upgrade

Battlefield 4

Accuracy is as important to DICE as it is to the snipers holed up in the skyscrapers of Battlefield 4 and the lady counting your change at the takeaway. The Swedish studio are determined to match up the experience you’re having with the one h3isenb0rg is having at the other end of the internet, and finally put to rest the frownsome business of being killed when behind cover.

To that end, DICE have made “major improvements” to Battlefield 4’s network layer in their Winter Update – and say better netcode will clear the way for “more exact” multiplayer on all sides.

Battlefield 4’s network layer will now do a more satisfying job of filtering happenings in-game – prioritising health, damage, enemy players and vehicles above everything else.

A cone of prioritisation in front of the player, meanwhile, will make for more accurate target acquisition at a distance and more predictable collision on vehicles.

Best of all for players with iffy network connections is a nearly-halved bandwidth requirement. That should enable more of us to make use of Battlefield’s High Frequency Network option, which updates the game client at a faster rate with new information about goings-on around the player.

Elsewhere in the Winter Update, DICE have added a new competitive mode that scales back Obliteration to a more accessible five vs five. And Quickmatch will benefit from new pre-level 10 training servers, ranked servers, and three premium playlists to cater to specific playstyles.

“We believe these updates and changes will make Battlefield 4 even more enjoyable in multiplayer, and we’d like to thank you once again for suggesting these tweaks to us,” wrote the developers. “DICE is committed to constantly improving Battlefield 4 to make your multiplayer experience as entertaining, intuitive, and reliable as possible.”

How reliable have you found Battlefield 4 to be of late?