Battlefield 4 announces the full list of maps and modes available at launch

In a couple of blog posts seemingly designed to make life easier for Battlefield wiki editors, DICE have provided a complete list of the multiplayer maps and game modes that will launch with Battlefield 4. As well as detailing how each match type will play out, we also get a look at the player counts for each mode, and again get to feel a little bit smug about how many more players the PC version can squeeze in over the current-gen console.

Returning modes include Conquest, Rush, Team Deathmatch and Squad Deathmatch, all of which should be familiar to anyone who's dipped into any of the last few Battlefields. Also returning is BF3: Close Quarters' Domination mode, which plays like a small-scale, faster version of Conquest.

The two new modes are Obliteration and Defuse. Obliteration, as the name suggests, involves capturing a randomly spawning bomb and planting it on one of the enemy team's objective points. Defuse, meanwhile, is a highly competitive 5 vs 5 mode in which each player has only one life, and the goal is to either eliminate the enemy team, or destroy their objective. You can read more about the different modes (and the increased PC and next-gen player counts) over on the Battlefield blog's announcement post .

The game will also launch with ten maps, and those maps will have the following names:

• Siege of Shanghai

• Paracel Storm

• Zavod 311

• Lancang Dam

• Flood Zone

• Rogue Transmission

• Hainan Resort

• Dawnbreaker

• Operation Locker

• Golmud Railway

By all means, speculate wildly about Operation Locker, and whether it's set in and around the changing rooms of a YMCA.

While, for the most part, that list of names will have no real meaning to anyone outside of DICE, the announcement post does offer some details on one of the newly revealed maps. "Zavod 311 puts players in a Soviet tank factory that dates back to the Cold War era. Long abandoned, Mother Nature has completely taken over the facility and now overgrown trees and bushes cover the compound."

Ah, but what about the Levolution™? "Deep within the factory is an active warhead, which players can detonate to send a towering chimney crashing to the ground. Doing this opens up gameplay paths and routes previously not available while closing others, and making the use of ground vehicles extremely difficult in the area."

Battlefield 4 will release November 1st, with the beta kicking off on October 1st. DICE have also confirmed that the beta will be available to pre-load from September 29th, and that you'll need a 64-bit OS to run it.