I can't think of a better way to kick off an FPS column than to gush about one of the best historical features of the genre, the server browser, while also lamenting its near extinction. It feels like shooters are ready for a shake up, but at least in this instance, I think publishers ought to look toward the past to guide them.

Before every shooter had a quick match button, server lists were how we got around. If modern matchmaking is a multi-lane freeway, reliably but plainly escorting players in and out of matches curated by developers, server browsers were the scenic route: finding a place you liked to play took more time, but the .

Server browsers were a boon for variety, but as we've learned in the years since their disappearance, they were also crucial tools of preservation. In an age of normalized multiplayer decay where you can't count on your new favorite , it's a small miracle how easy it is to play my favorite FPS from 15 years ago, Battlefield: Bad Company 2.

Officially, Bad Company 2 is a dead game. EA as part of a wave of older Battlefield retirements and delisted it from all storefronts. That was the last nail in the coffin for the console version (where I originally played it), but on the PC, Bad Company 2's tight-knit community hardly felt an interruption. That's because Bad Company 2 had proper third-party server support on PC, and so , a fan patch that unlocks loads of active community servers outside EA's shuttered infrastructure, was born.

Within minutes of dropping one file into my Bad Company 2 install and making a Project Rome account, I was in a full Conquest server running the still gorgeous Arica Harbor. I'm sympathetic to older Battlefield fans who dismissed it for its smaller player count and obvious console limitations back in the day, but man, Bad Company 2 holds up.

It's a quieter, less aggro brand of Battlefield chaos than I've been steeped in with the Battlefield 6 beta and recent returns to 4 and 5—slower movement, fewer explosions, and a lower level of detail that makes it way easier to clock targets from far away (without using as a crutch). At a time when DICE was feeling the squeeze to compete with Call of Duty in a big way, Bad Company 2 was the last Battlefield uninterested in FPS trends. It didn't have loadouts, dozens of attachments, prestige levels, or any other grind designed to keep us on an infinite treadmill. The draw of Bad Company 2 was simply playing it.

ABOVE: Bad Company 2's destruction is pretty lowkey in 2025, but buildings still crumble nicely.

Faux servers

Thanks to Project Rome, we get to enjoy one of the best Battlefields ever made for longer than EA sees an opportunity to make money from it. The tragedy is that Bad Company 2 is an outlier.

Project Rome was only possible in the first place because DICE gave players the keys to host their own servers, tools that were once expected for an FPS and are now nonexistent outside milsims and niche arena shooters. Battlefield, once a bastion of PC server culture in an industry trending toward skill-based matchmaking, hasn't had true server support since 2013's Battlefield 4.

But there's some hope. Battlefield 6's Portal level editor will have its own server browser that'll let folks host community "experiences." The pitch sounds promising: Anyone can spin up a server and set the rules, formats, and maps, and impressively, those servers will persist in the browser even if nobody's currently playing on it.

That last bit solves one big problem with Battlefield 2042's iteration of Portal, which would disband and erase community lobbies once emptied. Keeping servers listed ensures they can become proper places with bespoke communities and regulars.

As high hopes as I have for Battlefield 6's server browser, that label needs a serious asterisk. Yes, anyone can spin up a Portal server for free and use it indefinitely, but players will have no real ownership over them. EA isn't handing out keys to create servers anymore, it's just letting you borrow one until the day it decides to shut it all down. That automatically means Portal fails the most important test of a server browser.

It's no secret why Battlefield Studios chose to do it this way: centralized server hosting means it can more easily moderate Portal creations, track player behavior, and sleep easy knowing external server hosts aren't circumventing its precious progression systems. More control makes EA's job easier, but it also means we can only believe in the longevity of Battlefield 6 as much as we can trust EA. So, not at all.

It's nice that server browsers are back in conversation among the biggest FPSes in the world—you have to wonder if Call of Duty will react somehow—but we should expect even better. At a minimum, we should expect real server tools, because somebody has to pick up the slack when corporations utterly fail to be responsible stewards of their [[link]] own games.