The way a game looks is based on how the developers want to make it. Some times you get pretty artwork that you're excited about while other times it makes you want to barf. Take for instance Minecraft, I get bored of the default theme so I switch over to texture packs like Sphax or the Painterly pack. Some games however, don't like it when you do stuff like that to them.
In comes Battlefield 3, a lot of fans where none too happy about the color palette that came with the game. So, the only logical thing to do was to install a hack that swapped it out with another one. That my friends is where everything went wrong. Since said color palette swap is a hack the game will think that you are cheating and will ban you. Unfair but that's how EA rolls I guess.
It's quite sad really that in an attempt to prevent cheaters/hackers, the game stops itself from truly expanding. The developers won't give you changes to the game, and if they did said changes would be overpriced DLC. Modders are more than happy to make wonderful changes to games that would never be available otherwise, so why not let them mod your game EA? Or are you too busy counting the wads of cash you get from all of your overpriced and underrated DLC?
If you want to try out the color palette swap the link is here: Colour Tweak
Just don't forget to heed this warning.
Source: Kotaku