While a Battlefield: Bad Company sequel was inevitable EA officially confirmed it today, along with a surprising new addition to the franchise - Battlefield 1943. While some fans will be disappointed that it’s not a whole new edition to the series it still sounds pretty interesting.

Battlefield 1943 is basically a revamp of Battlefield 1942, the original game that became immensely popular. Along with brand spanking new graphics the game will be available as a download on PSN, XBLA and PC. Think of it as ‘Battlefield Light Edition’, that will apparently only weigh in at around 350MB and have pricing along the same lines as Braid.

Up to 24 players will be able to duke it out in three different locales; Wake Island (a remake of the fan favourite), Guadalcanal and Iwo Jima. The usual assortment of period weapons and vehicles will also be along for the ride.

Bad Company 2, meanwhile, will return with the same humour and story driven combat; except it will take place in a much wider range of locales. B Company will be fighting their way through thick jungles, snowy mountains and dusty deserts. As usual they’ll also be blowing up everything in their way, which is where your handy trigger finger and a grenade launcher comes in use.

My personal favourite of the Battlefield franchise is Battlefield 2 (you can get the complete Battlefield 2 collection here), followed closely by Battlefield 2142. Some may hate the bugs and the Titans in the latter, but I’ve always been quite fond of the futuristic shooter. That is, until, I crash my aircraft into the very Titan I was trying to land on.

Those players that have finished Mirror’s Edge will be happy to know that the game is getting downloadable content sometime in January. The new content will be in the form of Time Trials, so this may leave players aching for more story disappointed.

There will be seven maps in total, with nine races, with the Playstation 3 getting a free map as part of an exclusive content deal. The map pack will also cost players 800 MS Points (for the Xbox 360), or about £7. Apparently the PC version may be out around the same time, but don’t quote me on that one.

Players will leave the city behind and instead be confronted with totally abstract crazy designs (see the video above);

“We deliberately chose a more abstract aesthetic that is still within our distinct art style,” said DICE senior producer Owen O’Brien, “and then focused on flow and gameplay to create an experience and challenge very different from the main game.” -1up.com

Seems like a good deal for those wanting to get more out of the game, although I would have preferred to get more story.