Gamers dress in military garb for release of 'Battlefield 3'

"Battlefield 3" has been called one of the most anticipated first-person shooter video games of 2011. And looking at all the folks lined up at the GameStop on East Brandon Boulevard for its midnight release Tuesday, it's easy to believe that's no exaggeration.

While this particular store had several hundred pre-sales of the game, the worldwide pre-sale of EA's "Battlefield 3" reportedly hit 2 million a week ago while another 12 million people took advantage of a limited "beta" or test version of the game earlier this month.

At GameStop in Brandon, some of the people waiting in line looked as if they had walked straight out of the online warfare game that, offers breathtaking visuals and hair-raising audio where you can hear every bullet whizzing by your head and feel buildings crumbling around you.

The game's big rival, Activision's "Call of Duty 3," will be released in two weeks. But the hardcore gamers in the midnight crowd – ones who dressed in military garb and carrying Airsoft (BB gun) replica weapons so incredibly real-looking they made sure to have clearance to carry them from the local authorities – say "Battlefield 3" is superior in nearly all aspects of gaming.

" 'Battlefield 3' is team-based tactics with so many different types of vehicles involved in the game play with these massive maps (battle areas) and destructible worlds," said Matt Farmer, owner of Battlegrounds, an indoor Airsoft arena in Tampa. "To me, 'Call of Duty' is more of an individual, fast-paced, tournament-based game where score matters. But in 'Battlefield,' there's multi-player objectives where you have to work with other players as a team to achieve them. I just think that's a lot more entertaining and challenging."

By the time GameStop began selling the game for $60 at midnight, more than 100 buyers were lined up down the sidewalk waiting for their copy. To contrast Farmer and his friends decked out in military garb, two unarmed waitresses from the new Wing House in Brandon, Allison Bowsher and Allison Gates, served up samples of their wings to those waiting in line.

Apart from the Wing House women, everyone in line wanted a copy of "Battlefield 3," either on Xbox, PlayStation 3 or PC. The big advantage of the PC version is the ability to have as many as 64 players in a single online campaign, as opposed to a maximum of 24 on the other platforms.

No matter how they planned to play it, most of the people who bought the "M" (mature rating) game Tuesday night say they were planning to go home and play it throughout the night. And many of those were teenagers and even pre-teens.

So if you don't see someone at work or school today, there's a chance they're at home right now playing "Battlefield 3."