‘Battlefield 2042’ zombie mode removed as “review process” changes

EA has removed the community-created zombie survival mode from Battlefield 2042 due to issues with XP farming.

The change was confirmed by Ripple Effect Studios (formerly DICE LA) senior design director Justin Wiebe on Twitter, who said the mode had an issue with “standard game progression.”

​​”We’ve removed the Zombies mode and replaced it with Gun Game,” wrote Wiebe. “Hopefully we can fix it in the future and keep it in alignment with standard game progression. We’ve also tightened our review process to make sure this doesn’t happen again. Thanks for your patience and understanding.”

The Portal mode was allowing players to farm XP for other parts of the game, as the mode had squads of four to fight off waves of zombies. Wiebe also responded to a player comment on how reactions to the zombies mode were mixed between the XP farming being an issue and the mode being fun in-and-of-itself.

“I think there was potential for the mode but needs to go back into the workshop for a bit,” he said in response. “Regardless, we need to be focusing on more important issues like improving core XP progression for Battlefield Portal.”

Despite a rocky launch for Battlefield 2042, it was recently revealed that Respawn’s Vince Zampella would be heading the franchise to restructure and expand it. This comes off the back of EA’s desire to create a “connected Battlefield universe” of other titles in the future.

In other news, the employees at Activision Blizzard have ended their strike, pending recognition of the new Game Workers Alliance union. What the GWA will do next remains to be seen, but the strike and recent unionisation have both proved to be effective methods of change so far.