Had a blast playing last night. I had my doubts about hardcore servers but after playing for 3 hours in one it seems really well balanced compared to BF:BC2
By the way, for those that have issues distinguishing enemy from background/foliage/environment like I do, I turned down all my settings to low/medium with the exception of AA and it still looked great without all the annoying dust and laser lights that come with high/ultra settings. But you still get to see warnings like sniper glare and grenade red flashes so you are not at a disadvantage.