MGS4 OT spawned this mess.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=449552&page=1
I hated BF3 for so long because people stopped playing the infinitely superior BF:BC2 when it came out.
Gotta disagree with you there friend.
The shooting is pretty imvproved in BF3, though BC2 is obviously where BF shooting got good.
And while it took until the DLC for the maps to get good, when they did there were far superior. I've never liked the maps in BC2. Few control points(mostly always three), that were always close together and basically in a straight line. Always funneling the players and never having the game spread out. While Battlefields since then have obviously tried to funnel players into the action and taken influence from Rush mode, it was extra worse in BC2. BF3's DLC had larger maps with spread out control points.
BC2 didn't need a lot of control points, since the environments were fully destructible. I agree with anyone who thinks BF:BC2 was the best shooter in the past decade. No contest.
Control points spread the battle out and make maps not feel small or like funnels into instant action. Before Battlefield BC2 maps felt big and did have a lot of traversal, you could have battles going on organically in plenty of different parts of the map. Controlling certain control points mattered and influenced the flow of battle. This is something that was lost in BC2. Control points were super close together, so really the idea of taking and maintaining while pushing the line was lost. By the time you were taking one, the previous one was already taken. Also they were mostly in a straight line, so battles were not spread out at all. Why even venture around the map when everything was focused on one specific area? Might as well just head there. I mean it makes sense why they took this direction for a modern online shooter, but the map size and scale of BF games was lost in BC2 and well thats why I dislike it.
Also control points were largely uninteresting, just kind of thrown on the map and whatever. In BF2, control points could be in a tv station where you could get on top with Helios, maybe fight up the stairs, or assault the front. I loved the intense battles that would happen at these more involved control points. Something missing in BC2.
My point is that from BC2 and on honestly map design in Dice game has not favored size and scale, but rather making sure the player has things to shoot. Which makes sense as it become console inclusive.