You may be dismayed if you are looking to download Electronic Arts (EA) Battlefield 3 Aftershock App, or perhaps not so much. EA has removed the App from download and a statement was released recently regarding quality commitment.
In the Battlefield 3: Aftershock App, players had limited options, but the graphics were decent for an iOS App. Only 4 weapons were available to choose from and there was no Single Player mode - a constant internet connection was required to play this game. A single 3-tier map called the Factory pitted United States Marine Corps against Russian Spetsnaz in a Team Deathmatch Mode for 6 minutes, or a score of 2000. I was rather surprised to see how smoothly basic FPS elements worked on a tablet, but the lag was the real killer. In a Multi-Player only iOS App game, the need to have constant internet made playing on a public hotspot a frustrating thing with dropped matches and jumpy enemies. Even with optimum connections, players complained about a host of connection issues.
Like most free Apps, this one featured ads intermittently, particularly promoting the upcoming war movie, Act of Valor. By watching a trailer for the movie, players unlocked a fifth weapon for use in the game. Act of Valor was set to release on February 17th in the US, to coincide with President's Day, but delays have pushed the release to February 24th 2012. As Aftershock was missing many of the elements announced pre-release, and gauging by the general lack of quality and subsequent removal of the download, one can only conclude that Battlefield 3: Aftershock was largely part of a viral marketing campaign for the movie, Act of Valor. Perhaps this explains the "thank you" players received from Electronic Arts:
They released a statement saying, "EA Mobile is committed to delivering mobile entertainment experiences that are on par with the content and quality users have come to expect from their favorite EA gaming brands. To this end, we have decided to remove Battlefield 3: Aftershock from the App Store and are currently re-evaluating the app in response to the consumer feedback we've received. We thank all the fans who have downloaded the game to date."
Electronic Arts is not alone in the viral marketing campaign for Act of Valor. Our own favorite YouTuber, FPSRussian was partnered with the film production, and released a "wideo" with interlaced scenes from the movie, and the full trailer at the end. With spots in the NFC and AFC Championship Games, and even the Super Bowl, Act of Valor has had some serious promotion to date. On the official Battlefield 3 website, players could watch a trailer which offered free dog tags for download and use in any Battlefield 3 game in North America.
Act of Valor was made much in the same way many FPS and military shooter games are today, with actual military personnel as consultants. The movie centers around a squad of Navy SEALs who must rescue a kidnapped CIA agent from anti-American terrorists - a very real and very dangerous mission akin to actual SEALs operations. As a matter of fact, when they realized that only real Navy SEALs could act out the roles convincingly, they became the actors and will be featured in the film (albeit anonymously, unnamed in the credits).
With any luck, more effort will show in Act of Valor than in it's marketing gimmicks, but preliminary reviews are not so hopeful.
by Aaron Semler, Senior Editor VETERANS-GAMING
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