OK, "most of the weekend" with Battlefield: Bad Company is probably an understatement. We're pretty hooked on this game, even though there are a few things that still nag at us.
We did find that you can adjust many of the game and controller settings, so we were able to up the sensitivity of the controller, BUT it still feels a little sluggish compared to other games that we've been playing.
There are actually quite a few vehicles in the demo that you can try out. Our biggest headache with the vehicles is other gamers hopping in and taking off before you can ride shotgun! Hoofing it around on foot gets tiresome.
One of the other minor annoyances is that we haven't been able to find a way to see our ranking progress. It seems that the only way you can see it is if you win the match. We're hoping that this is just an issue with the demo.
There is only one mode of gameplay available, and that's the new "Gold Rush" mode they're introducing. Basically one team defends several gold crates from the other team, who are the "Attackers". They're whole goal is to blow up the gold crates so that they can take over the base, and begin attacking the next set of gold crates.
Gold Rush is pretty fun, although we noticed that the ranked matches tend to be a little more organized and strategic, as well as have quite a few more players than the unranked matches.
The lag is still an issue, but it seems to depend on the server that you happen to land on. Regardless of the lag, knifing an opponent is a tricky thing, but we like the dog tag collection system.
After spending the weekend with the Bad Company demo, the graphics don't really bother us anymore. They're not as nice as other games, but it's secondary to scoping in the enemy to get that headshot, or firing the heavy artillery on the enemey's location.
Really, the biggest thing that has us hooked is trying to reach level four so that we can get the unique unlockable for the full-version of the game. The regular unlockables are nice as well, although we were dissapointed that you only get them at levels one, two, and four (we REALLY wanted the mortars at level three).
Needless to say, we're in love with the game so far, and have even whent as far as pre-ordering the gold edition (which gives us several unlockables that aren't available until level 25).
If you have the extra $10, Buy Battlefield: Bad Company Gold Edition
should put you ahead of the curve.