When is Battlefield 2042 Season 1 coming out? Release date, leaks, new map, specialists, more

It's safe to say that Battlefield 2042 was probably one of the biggest video game disappointments of 2021. The game that was supposed to be a grand return to glory for one of the biggest first-person shooter franchises in the history of gaming, ended up being so poorly received that developers quickly published a timetable to explain their path to fixing the troubled title.

Those updates have been and gone and not much has changed for fans of the title, Battlefield 2042 is one of the lowest-rated Battlefield games on Metacritic and it's currently sitting with a "Mostly Negative" score on Steam.

Honestly, we could write a book on why the game failed, but for the purpose of this article we will boil it down to several key factors - countless bugs and glitches, various questionable design choices, and numerous missing features from previous Battlefield games that were a part of the core Battlefield experience.

And while DICE is committed to working on fixing the game, many fans are afraid that the roots of these issues are so deep that the game fundamentally can not be saved. Those who are more optimistic are hoping that a huge update for Season 1 will come with much-needed improvements as well as bring back all the missing features.

But when will Battlefield 2042 Season 1 come out? Let's see what we know about it.

Battlefield 2042 Season 1 - release date

DICE hasn't officially shared the studio's plans for the first season of Battlefield 2042, asides from brief mentions of it in their "Road Ahead" blog post, where they noted that more info about Season 1 will be revealed in early 2022.

If you were hoping that this means we can expect Season 1 in late January or early February, we have some bad news for you. A reputable Battlefield dataminer, known as Temporyal, has revealed that Battlefield 2042 Season 1 is most likely scheduled for March 2022.

This is based on the fact that the Battlefield 2042 client currently has weekly missions for 12 preseason weeks, which should end in late February of 2022.

Temporyal also noted that, while unlikely, a few of these weeks could be placeholders in case if something goes wrong and they need to prolong the preseason.

Season 1 leaks

There is currently no official information on what can we expect in Season 1 in terms of new content, but it is safe to assume that each new season will bring one new map, at least one new specialist, several new weapons, and probably new mods and assets for Portal.

Season 1 will also introduce the battle pass system in Battlefield 2042 and bring both purchasable and unlockable cosmetics. 

Thanks to Temporyal, we have some leaked info about the new map as well, previously known as "Ridge", and currently named "Exposure".

The map is set in British Columbia, Canada, and it is centred around the Black Ridge facility in the Canadian Rockies. There's currently no other info (nor images) about the map, aside from small lore entries which tell us a bit more about why are the US and Russia fighting in this location.

Other possible things that could be added are other natural disasters like an earthquake, a volcano, and a tsunami. According to Tom Henderson, a well-known industry insider, these were supposed to be included in Battlefield 2042 but were cut due to lack of time, and only tornadoes were left in the final version of the game.

For now, that's about everything we know about Battlefield 2042 Season 1. If the leak is correct, we are still a few months away from it, but we expect DICE to start sharing more details about Season 1 in January 2022, and we will update the article as soon as we learn new details, be it official announcements or more leaks.

• Read more: Battlefield 2042 black screen after update error: How to fix

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Featured image courtesy of Electronic Arts / DICE.