As the launch of Battlefield 6 draws near, the development team at DICE has released a new blog post detailing significant changes implemented since the August open beta. Players can look forward to more “responsive” movement, increased recoil that harks back to previous titles, and a much-needed second pass on those widely criticized Rush map layouts.
While many of these updates are welcome news for the Digital Tech Explorer community, there’s one area that continues to spark debate: the game’s new “Open Weapons” default. This controversial ruleset allows any class to wield any weapon, a design choice reminiscent of Call of Duty, and one that many Battlefield 6 beta players found divisive.
DICE dedicated a substantial portion of their blog to a post-mortem on player behavior during the open beta, analyzing an astounding 92,351,578 total hours played. When comparing Open vs. Closed playlists (where “Closed” refers to class-locked weapons), DICE noted that class pick rates were “mostly identical.” Interestingly, Closed Weapon matches tended to last slightly longer on average, leading to a modest 2-3% increase in revives.
Regarding weapon usage, the studio stated, “more players played with non-signature weapons in Open Weapon playlists. However, Recon players still favored Sniper Rifles over other weapons, and their pick rate was identical between both playlist types.” From my own experience, this aligns with observations that in open weapons, engineers frequently swapped their signature SMGs for the generally superior assault rifles. Despite this, DICE maintains that gun picks were quite balanced.
“There was not a single dominant weapon archetype, and we observed a consistent and well-distributed pick rate between them,” DICE commented. “This balance shows that even with different playlist types, players explored a wide variety of options without one class standing out above the rest.” As a tech enthusiast and storyteller, it’s worth noting that “well-distributed” is open to interpretation. Without further clarification from DICE, it could imply that while a single weapon type might be dominant (my guess would be assault rifles or carbines), it still fell within the studio’s expected usage parameters.
The decisive blow for proponents of Closed Weapons arrived at the end of this section. DICE reiterated its conviction that open weapons offers the optimal Battlefield 6 experience, primarily because it garnered more playtime in the beta.
“Lastly, another key insight from the Open Beta was that the vast majority of players, after trying both playlist types, chose to stick with Open Weapons,” the blog concluded. “This reinforces our belief that Open Weapons is the right path forward for Battlefield 6. At the same time, we recognize that some players prefer the Closed Weapons experience. To support them, official Closed Weapons playlists will be available at launch.”
As someone who meticulously analyzes gaming trends for Digital Tech Explorer, I find clear logical gaps in this reasoning. From the beta’s very first day, it was evident that the Open Weapons playlist was destined to be the most popular choice for Battlefield 6, precisely because of how DICE presented it. The setup inherently stacked the odds against Closed Weapons from the outset.
DICE’s Flawed Rationale for Open Weapons
Consider these examples:
- Open Weapons was the default, presented as the “normal” Battlefield 6 mode. The “Closed Weapons” option, in contrast, was labeled as an alternative; it wasn’t even called “Open Weapons Conquest,” just “Conquest.”
- For the initial days of the beta, the Closed Weapons playlist was practically hidden, requiring an inconvenient horizontal scroll from the main menu to even locate it.
- DICE did not offer Closed Weapons versions of all game modes in the beta. If players wanted to engage in Rush, for instance, they had no choice but to use Open Weapons.
Therefore, claiming that players preferred Open Weapons due to higher playtime is akin to suggesting a gigantic billboard saying “PLAY BATTLEFIELD 6 HERE” received more attention than an ad buried in the back of a phonebook. The data was clearly skewed towards the behavior DICE hoped to cultivate: players getting accustomed to open weapons and moving past the discussion of classic class restrictions. And now, they have their desired outcome.
This is a significant disappointment, particularly because the Closed Weapons experience truly shone in the Battlefield 6 beta. In my own matches, I observed a more balanced distribution of classes (thankfully, fewer engineers and snipers), greater weapon variety, and a noticeable reduction in revive spamming. It truly felt like a more strategic and classic Battlefield experience.
The silver lining is that this superior ruleset won’t be entirely absent from Battlefield 6; official Closed Weapons playlists will be available at launch. However, I’m increasingly convinced these will be treated as an afterthought, much as they were during the beta.
Ultimately, it seems that dedicated Battlefield fans, including those of us at Digital Tech Explorer, will likely need to rely on the community server browser to unearth the full-featured, classic playlists we seek. That’s where you’ll find TechTalesLeo – perhaps even running a Digital Tech Explorer server dedicated to classic Conquest 24/7.