Battlefield 1 Easter egg teases a new Battlefield reveal later this month
The 'Isolement' door has been opened. There was a painting of a horse inside.
EA's Battlefield games are well-known for their Easter eggs, some relatively simple and others ridiculously complex. Unraveling their mysteries has become something of a cottage industry among Battlefield fans (there's an active Discord, if you're interested in that sort of thing), who recently discovered the secret behind a Battlefield 1 door that's remained locked for a year.
Found in the Fort de Vaux map of the They Shall Not Pass expansion, the door is labeled "Isolement"—French for "Isolation." But what makes it noteworthy are the sounds coming from behind it, which you can hear in the video below. Creepy stuff.
The BFEE team eventually figured out how to open the door by activating a series of hidden switches in a specific order. It leads into a cell, containing a painting of a horse, four bunks, some books and papers scattered along the floor, a splash of blood on the wall and floor, and two valves. Further horsing around makes the valves interactive, and after turning them back and forth in a certain way, an overhead pipe will begin to drip. That drip-drip-drip is actually Morse code, spelling out "Never be the same."
That leads to the final step in this convoluted ritual: Head over to www.ea.com/neverbethesame, and you will see this:
So it seems that there will be some sort of Battlefield reveal on May 23, a couple of weeks ahead of the big E3 show. I wouldn't expect a full reveal of the next Battlefield, but a teaser or maybe some information about the setting, would make perfect sense as a lead-in to EA's press event. There's also speculation about a zombie mode of some sort, driven by the sounds emanating from behind the door. But that's a very big Call of Duty thing, and I really can't see EA trying to muscle in on that very specific bit of turn (or fans reacting well to the attempt).
Previous rumors have set the new Battlefield in World War Two, and EA said earlier this year that it will be out in October.
A video breaking down the process of making all this happen, courtesy of Captain Eggcellent, is below.
The biggest gaming news, reviews and hardware deals
Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.
Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.