By Michael Ahearne ’14
THE ROUNDUP

PS3, Xbox 360, PC

We fly in low in our attack helicopter, my squad member firing missiles down onto the objective.

Finally, I spot my opportunity. He flies in low, and I jump out of the helicopter, landing almost directly next to the objective.

I see an enemy and take him out easily. I see reinforcements and I try to reload, but it’s too late for me.

This is just one of the many new experiences I had while playing the “Battlefield 3 Back to Karkand DLC.”

This DLC, which came out Dec. 7 for PS3 gamers and Dec. 14 for Xbox and PC gamers, brings back some of the old “Battlefield 2” maps and weapons.

The price is set for $15 for all consoles, but free for owners of “Battlefield 3 Limited Edition.”

The “Back to Karkand DLC” features four new maps, 10 new weapons, three new vehicles, one new game mode and one new feature.

At this point, you may be wondering “Should I go out and spend $15 on this DLC, or is this just a waste of money?”

Well I, owning a PS3 and being a limited edition owner, have been lucky enough to find some time to go and try out the new maps, and here are my takes on them.

The first new map, Strike at Karkand, takes place in what appears to be a town, with little or no open areas.

Because of this, most of the combat happens on the streets of the city. From my experience, this map is very good when it comes to vehicles, but they are exposed.

Also, the streets do leave enemies exposed in the open, but most people tend to veer more into the tightly packed buildings.

The final, but most important aspect, I believe, in this map is the rooftops and their future potential. I didn’t see many people on them, but you can easily access the rooftops of buildings on this map, which not only allow for great sniper positions, but also allow for great aerial attacks on strong armor, such as tanks.

The next map is perhaps my favorite, Wake Island.

Wake Island, which many BF2 players will recognize, is a long U-shaped island that is very small and contains one main road going up and down the island.

From my experience, Wake Island is very vehicle based, and for all those who love driving around tanks or flying helicopters, this is the map for it.

Both sides spawn with jets, helicopters and some mobile AA guns.

I noticed that that is can get very intense, lots of explosions, and very distracting. At one point I just drove along the coast of the island in a boat without being noticed.

As we moved forward, I found it harder and harder to keep ground because there are a lot of areas to just camp and wait for your enemies.

This is why vehicles are very good in this map, because they allow for easier traveling. My introductory experience to this review is from playing on this map.

After that map comes Gulf of Oman.

Gulf of Oman offers some of everything and feels like some of the default maps on BF3.

Open battlegrounds, urban combat, large areas for jets and so on.

This is more suited for player like me, who love to get players from a distance, rather than up in there face.

The map is also like a town, but also has a large construction site, where snipers can climb up and have good sniping positions.

Sometimes, this does get annoying having a bunch of snipers firing at your spawn, but you can just snipe them right back.

Overall this map is fairly decent and I look forward to playing more of it.

The final new map is Sharqi Peninsula.

I favor this map the least out of all of them, but I do see that a lot of other BF3 users prefer this map most

It is a tightly packed peninsula with a lot of urban environment.

You always have to be careful here because it is a pretty small map, with lots of tight turns and corners.

It’s great for weapons such as shotguns and SMG’s, which are what I see mostly while playing this map.

Overall, each map is different in the way you play it, and depending on how you play, it depends on which one you play.

After playing the “Back to Karkand DLC,” I think it is definitely worth it.

The maps are fun and different, there are new secret hidden Easter eggs, and they allow for all different types of game play.

If I were to rate this one a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being must have and 1 being forget it, I would give it around an 8 due to its fun and new maps, but it still lacks that definite feature that makes it stick out.