EA has announced that Battlefield 3 has sold 12 million and that they’re also bringing over three brand new expansions all themed around different ideas.  Patrick Bach the executive producer of the game said that “Instead of delivering piecemeal map packs, we’re giving players a completely new experience with every themed expansion pack to keep the action fresh. Our expansions are designed to excite our large and active fan base while attracting new recruits with gameplay that is dynamic and unpredictable every time.”

In the press release, EA also described the upcoming expansions:

.•Battlefield 3: Close Quarters – In Battlefield 3: Close Quarters, players are dropped into a frantic, infantry-only theatre of war. Frostbite 2 high definition destruction makes the environment come alive as everything from furniture to plaster gets shot to pieces. Players will feel the intensity of the world exploding around them as rubble and broken pieces pile up on the floor, while tight level design and vertical gameplay create a highly competitive environment. Battlefield 3: Close Quarters also introduces new weapons, assignments and unique dog tags to bring back to the base game.

•Battlefield 3: Armored Kill – Following the tight infantry gameplay of Battlefield 3: Close Quarters, DICE will release Battlefield 3: Armored Kill that ups the ante for vehicular mayhem as only Battlefield can do. Featuring new driveable tanks, ATVs, mobile artillery and more, Battlefield 3: Armored Kill also delivers huge battlefields for an all-out vehicle assault, including the biggest map in Battlefield history.

•Battlefield 3: End Game – The fourth expansion pack will ship in the winter but details remain tightly guarded.

The three expansions on the way are Battlefield 3: Close Quarters, Armored Kill and End Game. This means that we’re getting Close Quarters an expansion with a 16 player limit in summer along with a more vehicle themed expansion in Fall which ends with a final end-game expansion in 2012 that has very little details at the moment.

Fans have speculated that Battlefield 3 will either have Dinosaurs as a “Horde mode” or be a recreation of 2142, two things which DICE have hidden in the Back to Karkand expansion maps as references that people have picked up on. Either way, I’ll be picking it up.