Battlefield 2142 hands-on

Then there's the APC, heavily armoured and kitted out with a nifty way of deploying infantry - each passenger sits in a special pod that the APC can launch high into the air to reach elevated positions or just crash-land the unharmed soldier straight into the action.

There are 14 vehicles in total, although we've not seen them all in detail. But while DICE showed the game off to us we caught a glimpse of a sort of hover-copter decked out with air-to-ground missiles, and an airborne troop transporter.

Infantry get their techno-fix in the form of active camouflage. Switch on this ability to go invisible and you can stalk your enemies unseen, with only a liquid-like shimmer to give away your position, although you can't use any weapons while undercover. More importantly though, squad leaders now have access to a remote control, machine gun-touting hover drone and portable spawn beacons - enabling squad members to respawn together wherever it's activated, even if the squad leader is cut down.

Battlefield's magic is in the finely tuned combat, and DICE has worked hard on enhancing the 'paper-scissors-stone' style balance of previous games in the series. So, although Battle Walkers might sound invincible, foot soldiers can stock up on EMP grenades, which will temporarily disable any and all uber vehicles in their electrically explosive range - work together with your squad and it's possible to turn the tide in any situation.