Carrier Assault might sound like an innocuous enough mode from the outside – featuring either a baby-snatching or till-side bag grab objective, one of the two – but it’s better than that. Carrier Assault is a playable homage to the Titan mode from the now eight-year-old Battlefield 2142.
DICE call Carrier Assault a “re-imagining” of the well-loved Titan mode – which was named after the ginormous warships players were tasked with bringing down. Conquest’s flags were replaced with missile silos, and the two teams had an unlimited pool of spawn tickets.
Titan mode was won either by capturing and controlling missile silos – allowing the missiles to pummel the enemy ship out of the air – or by boarding the enemy Titan after disabling its shields and destroying its central core.
DICE have offered no explanation as to how the new mode might differ from its 2142 counterpart – though one would suspect the carriers will be pummelled in the sea rather than the air. Naval Strike’s four new maps – Lost Islands, Nansha Strike, Wave Breaker, Operation Mortar – are all set in the South China Sea.
That said, Naval Strike also introduces an amphibious hovercraft vehicle. So I guess we’d better not rule out a touch of science fiction entirely, eh?
A former Battlefield 2142 producer last year doubted DICE “got the balls” to make a sequel, but the game is clearly still on the company’s mind – a Battlefield 2142 easter egg was found bobbing about Battlefield 3’s End Game DLC.
Naval Strike will launch in late March for premium players, and two weeks later for the rest of us.