Battlefield 2042 has received a considerable amount of backlash from series fans both new and old since its release in November 2021. Plagued with performance issues and lacking basic features such as a proper scoreboard—integration of a scoreboard in Battlefield 2042 has been delayed until March—the game is hemorrhaging players, and a continued focus on its controversial specialists only seems to advance communal ire. On February 10, the official Battlefield Twitter account announced a new “Tactical Beanie” headgear for Angel, and fans haven’t taken kindly to it.

Requiring players to earn 30 kills or assists, disrupt or spot 100 total enemies, and earn 15 total intel or wingman ribbons, the requirements for the new loot aren’t outrageous, but, given the completely uninspired appearance of the item, barring it behind gameplay requirements seems strange. Fans replying to the Twitter thread come across as nonplused, to say the least, with a recurring sentiment concluding that a gray beanie does little to make up for the lack of in-game content. This could also be a dire first look at the content expected to debut during Battlefield 2042's cosmetics-heavy first season.

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Beyond that, many fans believe that the specialist system is antithetical to the tone traditionally taken by Battlefield games. Titles like Battlefield 1 and Battlefield 1942 subtly highlighted the struggles of nameless grunts in massive conflicts. Even Battlefield 2042 establishes an air of desperation in a near-future wracked by global warfare and environmental catastrophes. In contrast, these quippy, one-dimensional specialists feel to many like something out of a much more lighthearted experience like Team Fortress 2.

What’s more, with Battlefield 2042's first content season delayed for several months, fans are eager to see more content introduced to the game, and a tactical beanie seems like an excessively poor way to placate burnt-out players. Unlocking new items, skins, and accessories and grinding out special seasonal challenges are part of the appeal of many live service games, and a single new item likely won’t entice many to continue to populate Battlefield 2042 multiplayer lobbies.

Recently, a fan-made petition asking for EA and DICE to issue refunds to dissatisfied Battlefield buyers earned over 120,000 signatures, and the game is still listed as one of the most disliked games of all time on Valve’s Steam platform. With myriad issues that may not be fixed for quite some time and an increasingly disenfranchised community, a quote-unquote “epic” tactical beanie seems an uninspired stopgap. DICE has promised a slew of updates and fixes in the near future, but it’s hard to know if the Battlefield community will be willing to return once the game has become more stable.

Battlefield 2042 is available for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

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