It’s late, and I’m clicking through Youtube watching random clips while waiting for the cheese in my chorizo and mushroom toastie to melt. All my neighbours are likely in bed, and no cars drive by on my street this late, so the only sounds are coming from my laptop and the sandwich press. I scroll through the suggested options, pick a video and watch as it takes two seconds to load up the inevitable advertisement. It starts, and I hear it. Six notes that hit me deep in the frontal lobe; the opening riff to the Battlefield series theme.

Duh dun duh duh duh Daaaah!

And suddenly it’s well over a decade ago, and I’m at a mate’s place watching him put a rocket through the hatch of a German tank in the original Battlefield 1942. I’m in high school and internet cafes are a thing, me and the lads are hanging around Burwood Westfields; we watch a movie, we get lunch, maybe we hang in the park, then we disappear into a well-lit room filled with rows of computers to gun each other down in Battlefield 2 or Battlefield Vietnam. I’m at home and killing time on Battlefield Heroes, free-to-play, casual-as-fuck, a-lot-of-fun, and maybe the only time I’ve ever been good at an online multiplayer shooter (funny how much I’m reminded of that goofy browser game, that no-one else remembers, whenever I see Fortnite – makes me happy to see a goofy browser doing so well). Hell, I remember going paintballing for the first time when I was sixteen, at a place over in Rouse Hill with an old decommissioned tank sitting in the parking lot, humming that song as the others laughed and joined in.

I realise that I haven’t played a Battlefield game since Bad Company 2. A mate leant it to my brother so he could play the multiplayer, and I went through the campaign. It was fun. Not amazing, not ground-breaking, but I probably would have played the sequel that was promised at the end (but never came, you dreadful teases). I lost interest with the series (as did everybody else) with the forgettable 2142, all the way back in 2006. I played a bit of 1943 when it came out a few years later, but completely ignored 3, 4, and definitely Hardline. What the fuck even was Hardline? Like yeah, EA has a problem of trying to hop bandwagons with its shooters (think Medal of Honour 2010, and Warfighter), but who were they trying to copy? Maybe Rainbow Six: Siege. I haven’t played Battlefield 1 either. The very concept felt odd to me. That brutal, crawling war of attrition did not seem like the best setting for the fast paced, mechanised fights of a Battlefield multiplayer match. Nor did what I saw of the Single Player campaign appeal to me (not least because it seemed more than a little America-centric – please feel free to correct me if that wasn’t the case).

And really, for all the nostalgia, the Battlefield series was never really that important to me. I played a lot more Age of Empires, Civilization, and Command & Conquer. Even looking at the shooters I played, there was a lot more Medal of Honor and Call of Duty in the house. But that was back when single player mattered.

So I hadn’t put that much thought into Battlefield. I mean, I’d seen a few trailers before, and a few things had caught my eye. One of the campaign gameplay trailers (which I looked for but couldn’t find) ended with a lady with a European accent and a prosthetic arm beating a Nazi to death with a cricket bat, and, if I’m being honest, that is actually a very specific kink of mine. But for all that, I have no interest in any online multiplayer anything, so it just isn’t worth it. And I forgot about it.

But then…

Duh dun duh duh duh Daaaah!

Suddenly I want this game, I actually want this game all. Because I’m remembering shooting down my mate’s helicopter with the main gun of a tank, or playing cat and mouse with another sniper in an otherwise empty section of the map, or watching a good friend put rocket after rocket into panzer after panzer. And I know that those experiences were specific to where me and the mates were at the time, and I know that I can’t re-create those memories, and I do not give a shit about online multiplayer at all, but goddamn I want that game.

I’m not going to buy the game new, at least not at full price. I cannot emphasize enough for some reason that I do not play online multiplayer, but I’d like to play the campaign at some point. Because one-armed lady beating Nazi’s to death with a cricket bat. So I’ll wait for a sale.

Before, I wasn’t going to buy it at all.

The power of a piece of music, aye?