I've played Battlefield 6 - this is what makes it the best in years

Advancing down a hill towards an objective during a round of Conquest on Liberation Peak during my very first game of Battlefield 6 at a preview event in London, an enemy unexpectedly completely blew the roof off a building I was heading towards a few metres away from me.

Playing as Recon, at first, I thought my planned sniping spot had been destroyed. But I went to it anyway and found it had actually created the perfect, small opening for me to go prone and pick players off.

I had the biggest smile on my face all through this - first at the level of destruction and detail that was shown and then at the opportunity the opposing team presented me.

I was able to get a nice streak going until someone eventually spotted me and sniped me themselves. This was in my very first match and I had already been given a taste of the fantastic, unscripted moments Battlefield 6 allows players to have.

Yes, a lot has been made about tactical destruction, being able to manipulate the environment around you to gain an advantage or to expose the enemy, like blowing up floors to bring the enemy down to your level or dropping in on them with a sledgehammer.

And yes, while these moments will no doubt be memorable, the ones that will stick with players and resonate even more are the ones that are completely unexpected.

Destruction is huge and of course, not everything can be destroyed - there has to be some rigidity otherwise everything could just be blown flat and every map would feel the same.

But the level of it is still impressive and the attention to detail is astounding - in one match, when a vehicle blew up near me, I noticed that one of its springs flew from the wreckage.

Battlefield 6 is undeniably a return to the roots of Battlefield 3 and 4 - admittedly, even though combat has been rebuilt from the ground up according to developers, it doesn't reinvent the wheel, but given that fans have wanted a return to these kind of games for years, it doesn't need to. It refines rather than revolutionise.

As well as Conquest, I got to play games of Breakthrough, Squad Deathmatch and Domination.

Battlefield 6 is releasing on October 10 / Image from Jake Brigstock, indy100

Whereas Domination feels like a much grander mode in Call of Duty titles, it felt comparatively small in Battlefield 6 because of Conquest. That's not a bad thing as it encourages changes in approach, as do Team and Squad Deathmatch.

These modes take place in smaller portions of the maps and focus on much more close-quarters combat. It's fun experimenting with different classes across different modes.

These smaller scale modes felt a lot more tactical and working properly together as a team bore more fruit than Conquest where it could descend into all out chaos - but there's no denying I'll personally be spending most of my time in Conquest because of the increased opportunity of those crazy moments.

On classes, Assault, Engineer, Support and Recon all return and while players are encouraged to stick to the loadout options each class is designed to use, such as assault rifles for Assault or sniper rifles for Recon, players do have the freedom to choose the loadout they want - at the expense of gaining XP as quickly.

In other words, a mixed loadout will earn XP at a much slower rate than a designated Assault loadout for example.

The gameplay is really good and the gunplay is tight. Some weapons do feel a bit more overpowered than others, with the SMG for example having a much longer range than expected with barely any recoil and its natural rate of fire making it a deadly option.

There were a couple of cases during those modes specifically where I'd respawn and immediately get mowed down but it didn't happen often enough to detract from the experience.

Movement is great - it feels a lot heavier than Call of Duty games but still a lot lighter than older Battlefield games. There's a good middle ground that's been found.

A welcome new addition is the ability to revive team-mates and drag them away from the line of fire while doing so. This never grew tiresome and the ability to save someone by dragging them around a corner to safety for them to then successfully execute what they originally set out to do felt rewarding.

The maps played through so far felt good and varied as well. I played on Empire State, Iberian Offensive, Liberation Peak and Siege of Cairo across the aforementioned game modes and they truly did feel varied in terms of the best approach to combat to be successful in each one.

In the build I played, it wasn't perfect though.

There was a bug where every time I got behind the wheel of a ground vehicle, it looked like I was trying to do the Harlem Shake or something.

Also, on some occasions when enemies were killed, they would be flung high into the air like a rag doll. This is more understandable with frag grenades but seeing this happen after someone was killed with an assault rifle was odd.

Despite those minor grievances, Battlefield 6 is shaping up to be the Battlefield game fans have been waiting years for. It doesn't appear to be massively revolutionary but it doesn't need to be. It just needs to be a solid Battlefield game that faithfully recaptures and refines the magic of Battlefield 3 and 4.

And on that front, with its fantastic unscripted moments being the standout, it's very much on the right track.

Battlefield 6 releases on 10 October on PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC.

Elsewhere from indy100:

• Battlefield 6 CEO update is what everyone wants to hear - but haven't we been here before?
• Battlefield 6 obliterates Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 key milestone in just one hour

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