Battalion 1944 was destined to be the next fast paced first person shooter to blow up, a Call of Duty 2 inspired title featuring super fun barebones gameplay in a world war 2 environment.
For the most part this goal was achieved, the gameplay was amazing and gamers agreed as its early access launch in 2018 drew in over 16,000 concurrent players. However the game was plagued by server lag among other issues, making it unplayable for many.
So, people just left and Battalion 1944 died, so with that said how is it possible that its coming back now in 2022, thats what we’re looking at today.
Now this death was definitely not a slow one, February 2018 was the peak, by May it was 235 concurrent players and by November it was only 40. That’s nothing compared to the single digit player counts we’ve seen in 2022, so it seemed like this game’s fate was sealed.
There was some hope however when triple A publisher Square Enix bought a 20% stake in Bulkhead, the games developers, and things were looking up in late 2018. However this partnership never went anywhere, the game’s playerbase didn’t come back, the promised console release never happened, it was a complete mess.
So it makes sense when Bulkhead announced a few days ago that they have formally ended their relationship with Square Enix, saying “we want to start this exciting new chapter where we began, focusing on the players”.
When game companies make these types of announcements they’re generally lying, but I think Bulkhead is the real deal here.
Firstly they’re releasing a new version called BATTALION: Legacy, the revisited and final version of Battalion 1944. With this they have taken the best aspects of Battalion 1944 and honed in on these to create a fluid bug free experience, featuring a working server browser, an added faction, new weapons, the classic Search & Destroy game mode with all weapons available along with a complete UI rework and visual overhaul. Simply, Battalion: Legacy is the culmination of all their work consolidated into one old school experience for all to enjoy.
But why are they doing this now? Simply, Bulkhead is working on another FPS called ProMod and a completely new FPS called Wardogs.
It’s their last hurrah, and best of all it’s going to be completely free when it’s released on august the 16th 2022. Not free to play with micro transactions, just completely free for everybody to play, and I’m genuinely so excited to try this out especially as I’ve never played the original
