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Battlefield 6 released on October 10th, garnering 747,000 concurrent players on Steam. It became the best-selling game of 2025. This wasn't just the biggest Battlefield launch, but one of the biggest video game launches, shattering records with over 7 million copies sold in just 3 days. 3 DAYS! WHIP out that calculator, Pointdexter, because that's uh on average 27 copies sold per second. Assuming the number of sales is exactly 7 million and that each person purchased the base edition of the game, we're looking at gross revenue of at least $490 million. And despite the game's massive otherworldly budget of $400 million, that still leaves EA with 90 million in net revenue, at least. Even more impressive, Battlefield 6 is one of only
four games released since 2009 that outsold Call of Duty in its respective year. And out of these four, Battlefield 6 is the only title to successfully beat Call of Duty in its own genre. you. By all metrics, Battlefield 6 was a massive success. So, you would think only a fool could squander such a golden opportunity. Have you met my friend Electronic Arts? Folks, I hate to say it, Battlefield 6 has fallen off, at least by the outrageous standards it set. While the game is currently hovering around 50,000 daily active users on Steam, judging purely by the numbers, Battlefield 6 has had an overall player retention rate of just 6.7%.
Why does everyone laugh when I say that? And yeah, obsessing over Steam chart numbers never gives the full picture, but this is why I asked if the hype was real for Battlefield 6, because although I found it pretty enjoyable, there was something missing. It's why I called it a confusing success, because despite all the issues I had, sometimes you just can't argue with the numbers or the results. Had a ton of fun with this game, recently played a few matches, but didn't really want to play anymore. It felt like a bright flame that went out too fast. And player drop-off happens with most games that break into the mainstream this hard. Just look at Palworld. Speaking of, where are we at in the Pokémon rip-off saga?
Pickman? Okay, yeah, this is just Breath of the Wild Pokémon, but here's the question of the day. Why did Battlefield 6 fall off? It's undeniable it has. Was its fate predetermined, written in the Elder Scrolls? Could this have been avoided? Or perhaps does Occam's razor slice true once more? Battlefield 6 did not instill doesn't have enough content or a robust live service to maintain that casual player base it first attracted. But that's the TLDR version, the simplest answer. The truth is more complicated. And a better question to ask might be, how the does the studio who made the best-selling game of last year get hit with layoffs? The oldest reason in the world, money. All these questions and
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chance to win $500 in Whatnot credit. If you follow me on Whatnot, and thank you, Whatnot, for sponsoring this video. And now for something completely different. I've seen many comments calling Battlefield 6 a rug pull. They call him Mr. Bait and Switch. Many were led to believe that lessons had been learned from 2042. By the Nine Divines! It felt like DICE had looked back at 2042 and said to us, That was something, right? DICE and EA definitely wanted to give off this impression that BF6 would be a return to form for the series and the modern
military shooter. Uh no, we're not putting any of those Fortnite skins in our game. This is we're going for grounded realism. That's what we're all about here. So, we have this new skin for sale. I know it's been 2 weeks since the game came out, but we got to make money somehow. During the beta, many fans also noticed how small the maps were. A lot of fans voiced their concern, so many that DICE actually responded and assured us that the full game would have much larger maps. This was just a small slice, you know, we chose the smallest maps so we could get better data in the beta. But then the game came out and it seemed that players were right to be skeptical. Map design left a lot to
be desired compared to previous entries, with the biggest problems being their very compact size, how little breathing room there was. A lot of the maps are too symmetrical and don't really fulfill any particular fantasy or war scenario. You pick any map from Battlefield 1 and I think it stands above the selection here. Look at Monte Grappa, where you're storming a mountain or defending it. Mountain warfare, that's the fantasy. Now, the newest map, Contaminated, is solid, but this game still feels like it's missing that X factor, that secret spice, you know, Battlefield 4 had insane levelution and destructibility.
Battlefield 1 and 5 had big operations, fighting over battle lines with giant behemoth vehicles that you could not ignore. And even 2042 had its 128 player count to distinguish it from the other games. It's as if the devs felt that having some quiet or slow areas might be too boring for the Call of Duty fans they were trying to appeal to, and I think that is reason number one the game fell off. It tried too hard to cater to Battlefield fans. I meant to say Call of Duty fans, but I have permanent and irreversible brain damage. Well, that's the second reason. First one's content and map design. It seems that Redacted was meant to be the X factor, but a battle royale mode, uh just the design
of it has very little to do with Battlefield's core identity. You know, you just you got two massive armies just smashing each other for control of land. You know, it's a tactical squad-based war game. You know, it's not a scavenger hunt for supplies and resources. So, Redacted was clearly envisioned as a competitor to Call of Duty's Warzone. And here's where we start to see the main problem. Battlefield 6 tried to compete with Call of Duty on every front, core multiplayer, PvE, and battle royale. The thing is, they were successful. They actually stole the COD audience who came for the multiplayer, and all you should have done is hook
them on what makes Battlefield special. You see, that's what all those people bought the game for, was the core multiplayer. Instead, for whatever reason, Redacted was given priority and it took away resources and time that might have been better spent on improving the core multiplayer. They also tied Redacted to weekly challenges, which made people feel like EA was pushing fans away from the style of Battlefield game that they wanted to play in favor of the shiny new battle royale. I think the fast-paced close-quarters combat drew in many people, but it wasn't the complete package of what hardcore Battlefield fans wanted, which realistically is just a spiritual successor to Battlefield 4. And when it comes to Portal, EA had
promised that this mode would be a chill place for players to grind XP against bots with access to the full progression trees. But there's too many bot farms, so you all suffer reduced XP gains now. Also, don't you dare try to recreate maps from other FPS games and play them in ours. Who do you think we are, Valve? Portal is an ambitious feature, sure, but as far as I'm aware, the quality of it has only been nerfed since launch. And that's the opposite of what you expect from a game that's trying to be a live service. No part of Battlefield 6 really feels like it has improved since I last played it. Granted, it's still like it's not a bad game. I think it's
great, but I do feel like my uh expectations were not met, especially compared to how other live service games are being handled. Like Arc Raiders came out around the same time and has a much more consistent player base. Even Helldivers 2 is still going strong with all the updates and content. And it certainly doesn't help when EA has to delay season 2 content. It just seems like EA's strategy revolved around stealing or siphoning off as much of COD's audience as possible, a fan base who has been pretty disgruntled with recent games and looking for something new. Then, when they succeeded, EA was like, "All right, well, let's just give them more COD." No, they came for Battlefield. This game had to
destroy Call of Duty. And it seems EA bit off more than they could chew. Battlefield 6 is the victim of unrealistic expectations and an unhealthy amount of investment. The budget ballooned to over $400 million. Like, to put into perspective how ridiculous that is, there are only five movies in existence that have ever had a higher budget. Like this is this stupid. Why would you put that much money in? How do you put that much money in? Regardless, we're not in control of these decisions. And if you're a corporate guy who's who's funding this and putting this much money in, you expect to get a return. Now, what
were EA's goals again? EA reportedly expects Battlefield 6 to have million players. Yeah. Are you high right now? What? It's Dr. Evil numbers. 100 billion dollars. Dude, Mr. Beast doesn't even get 100 million views on each one of his videos. Like what you're talking insane numbers. Now, here's the thing. Their game plan could have worked. We're making a faster Battlefield. You see, you can have a faster Battlefield game with a vibrant PvE mode, a solid campaign, and a Battle Royale. I don't think the strategy is
the problem, but it's like the motivations behind it. You have to start from your base. If you want to branch out and appeal to Call of Duty fans, then you at least got to give the core fans that experience they're hoping for. Here's the thing, expecting 100 million players is so unrealistic. What does that do to the devs? You better make this much money. It's a completely absurd amount. It's three times higher than the best-selling game in the franchise, but you've got to do triple. Now, despite all of the criticisms of Battlefield 6, like it still has a very solid player base. Look, if you're not happy with 50,000 people like playing your game at the same time, I feel like
any developer would be happy with 50,000 people playing their game like 6 months after release. And with the right updates and content, maybe a shift in focus, I bet loads of people would come back to this game, and it could easily stabilize with a player count of six digits. So, what is EA's latest game plan to strengthen Battlefield 6? Surely there's some massive new content update in the works. Let's Battlefield 6 was the biggest launch in franchise history. 6 months later, EA is laying off the people who made it. What's that?
Layoffs? Don't talk about layoffs. You kidding me? Layoffs? I must have something in my ears. Come again, Noble One. Did you say layoffs? You heard that correctly. EA has confirmed that an unknown number of employees have been laid off from the studios that made the game, including Criterion, DICE, Ripple Effect, and Motive. Battlefield 6, more like Slaughterhouse 6. Jesus. So, clearly there's like no way to justify this or spin it in a good light. And this is the funny part where we have to read exactly that corporate statement. Here is EA's official statement. [clears throat] We've made select changes within our Battlefield organization to better align our teams around what matters most to our community.
I can't even do that with a straight face. Lay We're doing these layoffs for you. For you guys. This will better align our fans in our community because one of the biggest complaints is the lack of content, and by getting rid of people, we'll be able to make content faster. Just so we're clear. Crystal clear. As clear as Walter White's math. You're laying off people from the teams that released the best-selling game of 2025 to better serve the community that made it the best-selling game of 2025. What? But you haven't been serving the community already. What It's not even worth pointing out the stupidity of the statement. It's the action itself. Like Battlefield 6 got the gold medal. Is
there anything better in a game industry than like best-selling game of the year? Imagine Bill Belichick going up to Tom Brady after the end of the 2007 season where they went 16 and 0, and he's like, [snorts] "Yeah, Tom, it's it's just not working out. Well, I put I threw 50 touchdowns this season." "Yeah, but you didn't throw 51, now did you? And we lost that Super Bowl. I mean, would you mind cleaning out your locker?" It's just crazy, man. Again, if you run the numbers, over the first 3 days of its launch, Battlefield 6 was literally making $347 per second. Net revenue, not gross. I mean, who knows how much money they would have made by the time this sentence ends, right? Maybe a few
thousand dollars. I'm I'm not happy with that. I didn't make enough money. Game doesn't sell, layoffs. Game does sell, layoffs. We lay them off and then we hire new people to make the sequel. Your team is not efficient, layoffs. Right away. Straight to layoffs. Your team is too efficient, believe it or not, also layoffs. I really am getting tired of this disgusting trend of treating like such highly talented people as disposable pawns, right? It's like all of my favorite studios and the games that they produced, they've all been eviscerated by corporate greed and layoffs and all the upper leadership leaving to the point where companies like Blizzard, DICE, Bungie aren't really recognizable to me
anymore. Or at least I don't feel like the company culture is the same. I mean, it's like layoffs are supposed to happen when a company isn't profitable, right? Or a product flops spectacularly. You know, they laid off people at Wildlife before shutting down Highguard. The real reason for these layoffs is that EA is potentially getting acquired by the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund for $55 billion. What happens when companies get acquired or merge? Layoffs. They want to cut staff to appear lean and efficient to make the purchase and acquisition look better. See how smoothly things are running? It's kind of like saying, "Yeah, I lost 10 lb."
"Oh, that's great." And then you see a picture of this person and they're basically anorexic. I think it's pretty clear that the reason Battlefield 6 fell off is also due in part to how it was managed. What the expectations were. And and now that they're being put in a position where I think it's the juxtaposition of massive success still resulting in mass layoffs. Like no bar is your job safe if you work in a video game industry and you're not in a management position, right? And think of like the mental toll that has on someone. Could you go to work every day and just be chill without having any sense or feeling of job security? The number of times I've had to bring up the Satoru Iwata quote is staggering, but it really shows the difference in
culture between like Japanese game developers who, you know, are all honor-bound and Western game developers who could not give a if you generated billions of dollars for the company. It's like, "What have you done for me recently?" "If we reduce the number of employees for better short-term financial results, employee morale will decrease. I sincerely doubt employees who fear that they may be laid off will be able to develop software titles that could impress people around the world." Why did the developers of Highguard at Wildlife make Highguard? Cuz they were sick of working under EA. At a certain point, these companies will just bleed through the talent that created the magic. I mean, looking back,
it's still silly that Tango Gameworks was shut down by Xbox after they produced the award-winning, critically acclaimed Hi-Fi Rush. But now even being the most profitable game isn't enough. Nobody can win. "I'm the CEO. I need all the money." Speaking of losing top-tier talent, one last thing to mention is the tragic death of Vince Zampella, who died in an avoidable car accident. That must have had a huge effect on DICE's morale and just the feeling in the studio overall. Your leader, a well-respected industry veteran, dying in such a horrific way. I mean, it's bumming me out talking about it. But perhaps because of his status and legacy and position, it could be that he was able to shield DICE
from some of EA's more unscrupulous ideas. Now that he's gone, the relationship isn't quite the same. And I'm sure the people across the Battlefield studios are certainly missing his leadership and guidance, as we all are. So, why did Battlefield 6 fall off? For a variety of reasons. Number one, EA over-invested in this game, over-promised, set expectations way too high, and after they undelivered, they said, "Well, let's cut our losses." They tried fighting a war against CoD on all three fronts and failed to take advantage of the huge momentum swing they had at launch. You could easily assign DICE to blame and the other studios who worked on Battlefield 6 for simply not delivering a robust live
service. But I think the devil's in the details. Why couldn't they produce a robust live service? Battlefield 6 catered to a casual audience and not the hardcore Battlefield fanatics. And now it appears EA is shedding all of the talent that created the first first-person shooter game in 18 years to dethrone Call of Duty. Will lessons be learned? Will upper management be fired at some point? Probably not. It's unfortunate. You know, I wish the best for them and for Battlefield 6. I might still play it occasionally, but uh just got to make more content. But what do you think? Let me know your thoughts and opinions in the comments below. Like the video if you enjoyed it, and don't forget to subscribe to TheActMan for
more awesome content. All right, everyone, that's all I got for today. This is TheActMan signing out. Peace.
