Guns are one of the most common weapons in video games. They are everywhere. But despite their ubiquitous presence, developers still struggle with how to represent their behavior in a virtual world. For Battlefield V, DICE is changing how its weapons work, and that means that bullets will always go exactly where you aim. The studio is dropping RBV, or “random bullet deviation,” from its physics model.
For its return to World War II, DICE wants players to experience predictable and understandable weapons. If you aim at something with your reticle, the bullet is going to hit that spot exactly. The idea is that a predictable weapon enables players to learn a gun and acquire proficiency with it.
This is different from Battlefield 1 or other popular shooters like Overwatch. In those games, a player can do everything right, but an invisible dice roll in the background will cause a bullet to take a random trajectory that misses the intended target. That is frustrating, and it’s something that Fortnite developer Epic has removed from that game’s battle royale mode.
Now, while RBV is gone, players will still get bonuses for slowing down and taking aim with their guns. Instead of reducing bullet deviation, however, deliberate aiming or certain weapon attachments will reduce recoil or improve the time it takes to aim down sights. DICE also wants to put a lot of the focus on a variety of weapons that are all distinct from one another but are also equally viable. Instead of spending time figuring out if a weapon is accurate, players can now spend time deciding if they like the way the weapon fires and how much damage it does versus the recoil.
This will, of course, result in a Battlefield that values skill above luck, but that is the trend in the shooter space right now. It will also force DICE to find interesting ways for players to contribute if they don’t have steady aim. That’s where support classes and building resupply stations come into play.