If you've yet to play the latest installment of EA's Battlefield franchise, today is your lucky day. For a limited time (until Aug. 14 to be exact) you can download Battlefield 4 on PC and play for free in a sort of "trial" period for the game.
Installing Battlefield 4 through EA's Origin service before Aug. 14 will get you access. As a result, this trial doesn't extend to console players. After launching the game you will be allowed to play for free during a 168 hour period. That isn't 168 hours of play time, it is 168 real-time hours, also known as a week's worth of free Battlefield. In other words, don't launch the game when you are about to go on a week long beach vacation, as your free trial will be going to waste.
If you just so happen to purchase the game after giving it a spin, all of your in-game progress like rank and weapon unlocks will be saved, allowing you to start again right where you left off.
For several months after Battlefield 4's launch last holiday season all the way to as late as April last year, the game was plagued with game crashing bugs, poor system performance and under-equipped servers. Developer DICE has worked tirelessly over the past several months to repair the game, resulting in EA CEO Andrew Wilson stating that the game's launch was "unacceptable" and that the team has worked endlessly to get the game up to where it should have been at launch.
The free Battlefied 4 trial then looks to be an olive branch to players who might have held out of purchasing the game due to its problems, and is just the latest strategy by an EA that is looking at more ways to attract gamers to its games and services. Earlier this year EA launched the "On the house" promotion, which for a limited time allows players to get older EA games for free. Previous promotions include the action-horror title Dead Space and the classic Popcap time-sink Peggle. The latest game on the house is Wing Commander III: Heart of the Tiger, a 20-year-old game that is often regarded as one of the best space combat games ever made, featuring none other than Luke Skywalker himself, Mark Hamill, in live action space opera cut scenes.
EA also recently launched the EA Access program, an Xbox One exclusive service that allows users to pay $30 a year of $4.99 a month to have unlimited access to a variety of older EA games, including Battlefield 4. The service also grants subscribers discounts on new EA games and DLC, along with the ability to play free trial versions of new EA titles up to five days before they are released to the public.
