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Over the weekend, Battlefield Studios launched a fresh game mode titled Casual Breakthrough. In essence, this mode resembles the regular Breakthrough format but includes a few key changes:

• Every squad has only eight human participants, with the remaining filled by 32 bots.
• Actions done by human gamers award full XP, while bot actions offer reduced XP.
• Just a pair of maps can be played: Siege of Cairo and Empire State.
• Elements like Player tags, accolades, and stat tracking are disabled.

So essentially, this mode lives up to its name: it offers a casual version of Breakthrough. On the surface, you might think there's nothing wrong, since it gives more options for gamers seeking different methods to have fun with the title. However, if video games has shown one thing, it's that not everyone will be happy. In other words, many BF6 players are mad.

Player Responses: Anger to Praise

"Gamers prefer real players. Avoid making the mistakes of your rivals," states a response to the mode reveal. "Truly disappointing concept," says another. Meanwhile, in community forums, one user notes, "I have no idea where we are going with this title," and another details everything they believe to be broken in Battlefield 6: "Resolve glitches, address drone issues, correct rocket mechanics, fix [the] bloom after sprinting bug, fix awful hit registration. We do not require this bot mode."

On the other hand, amid the criticism, there are players explaining how much they're enjoying the recent addition. "It's very fun to warm up, real players keep it from being a total farmfest but it's quite laid-back," says a forum post. "The community doesn't understand that there are players who actually go outside and don't play this game all the time. Let them strike a balance," states a different comment. A response via social media explains that as they're "a parent gamer with limited time, this is perfect for me," and someone else applauds the mode for "avoiding intense competition."

Constructive Concerns and Community Input

All that said, players have constructive reasons to complain about Casual Breakthrough. Some users have pointed out that it will make queue times even longer for different playlists due to the large amount of playlists in the game already. On a similar note, certain regions already encounter mostly bots in the existing playlists. Additionally, it appears somewhat counterintuitive that the mode won't start without a required amount of human gamers, even though it primarily centers on fighting AI opponents.

Lastly, a major grievances is that Battlefield Portal was meant to offer full XP, including AI matches, but that got canned when they tried to remove XP farming from the mode. Thus this new playlist seems like the player base meeting them in the middle, as per a Reddit comment. A different user describes this addition as the devs "making a mistake significantly, I experienced so much fun in the first couple of days, why did they feel the need to change it?"

Looking Ahead: Will Changes Be Made?

If the development team has demonstrated something to date with Battlefield 6, it's that they're listening and acting on player input. Assignments being too difficult were adjusted rapidly, just like the specific battle pass objectives. Chances are that, if their data shows this recent mode isn't performing to their standards, they will not hesitate to change it again.