A complaint often levelled at the Modern Warfare series is that while nothing quite gets you a-bubble with glee like Killstreaking another team to rubble, nothing quite gets you gnawing the controller like being on the receiving end of said Killstreaking. Under EA and DICE, the Battlefield series is taking a less divisive approach, ensuring that even brutalised players have something to smile about.
"It's a different mindset - again, it's all about personalities," Battlefield 3 executive producer Patrick Bach told OXM when asked what separated the two games. "We want our game to be enjoyable even when you're losing.
"If it's not fun when you lose, then you only have 50 per cent of the players enjoying the game. If it's fun to lose, though, then you can end up last in the scoreboard and still feel like it was a great round."
Commenting more broadly on the split between shooters, Bach termed Battlefield a "gourmet meal" to Call of Duty's "hotdog". We're struggling to keep track of all these food analogies. Rage is steak, in case you'd forgotten, and Duke Nukem Forever is a big greasy hamburger.
"You might make more money on the hotdog," Bach added, in a tacit admission that Call of Duty's sales crown is likely to remain the property of Call of Duty, at least for the moment. "But why would I want to work making hotdogs? If it's only for the money, is it really worth it? We wouldn't make Battlefield it couldn't be the game that we're building."
For more on Battlefield 3 (and Modern Warfare 3), pick up a copy of issue 77 when it romps into newsagents on 2nd September.