Tom Clancy’s The Division is a well-created RPG and 3rd person shooter that takes you to a chaotic dark New York City filled with body bags and bodies without the bags… Society as we know it fell hard when a certain pandemic divides the hunters from the hunted and the survivors from the killers. Humanity’s last hope rest on the shoulders of members of the Division to save what remains of the victims of the green poison and make one last stand in the dark zone.
The Division was highly anticipated by console gamers as the game showed itself to be “the next big thing…” unfortunately, this anticipation quickly faded because the game disappeared into the shadows as it got delayed over and over again. Then all of the sudden, the game reappeared into the light by releasing a beta version of the game and people couldn’t believe their eyes… After all these months of anticipation and seeing that awesome trailer at E3, the “next big thing” was just the next thing… People were disappointed because Ubisoft downgraded the visuals of one of their upcoming action game AGAIN and the content seemed blunt. All hope seemed lost…
Now, should these reasons break down the game? Actually no, it shouldn’t and in this review I’ll give you my honest opinion about the game.
The urban jungle dragged into chaos!
New York city, one of the greatest places on earth changes into a dark desolated environment where all rules but one has been thrown overboard: survival of the fittest. This majestic city is struck by the “green poison” and we’re not talking about some green poisonous gas, the Joker would throw at Batman’s face but we’re talking about something smaller and has yet a bigger radius than any other biological weapon, the dollar immersed in a sickening cocktail which includes bird flu, smallpox, … and any other sickness that can be added.
Sections of New York closed down quick as people tried their best to escape these hazardous environments or stayed behind and try their best to survive the best they can within this rock solid jungle. Not only trying to survive the sickness but surviving the madness of the “left behind” kind of people. With no rules or even a sense of control, society fails and eventually, people fail. People unleashing their inner instincts to become a fierce predator grabbing everything they can and doing everything in their power to survive, even if it means killing their beloved neighbor. Surviving is the number one priority in this “fallen” kingdom. As people try to adapt to these new grounds, they’re easily being divided into two kinds of groups: the harmless roamers and the harmful raiders.
This is where you come in, a member of this secretively and heavily armed police force called “The Division”. Your mission is to infiltrate this urban chaotic jungle, re-establishing a base to keep the peace and progressively clear out groups of raiders to collect precious data to figure out the missing pieces to this unsolved mysterious puzzle. You’ve been activated, agent!
You won’t even notice the graphical downgrade!
Even if the first E3 reveal trailer of the game looked absolutely gorgeous, the game still is a graphical beauty, especially since it’s an action packed MMO action game that has very few loading screens. The atmosphere in this game is top notch and the graphics on consoles are really not that bad. The game looks even more amazing on a top notch gaming desktop running at 60 frames per second without any kind of stuttering. The game runs smoothly on the Xbox One and looks good but I can’t shake this feeling that they could have easily amped up the graphical quality, if they really wanted to. I mean most of the time when you’re running through Manhattan, there are some phenomenal bits of sightseeing and panoramic views, but sometimes the game can give you that feeling of “almost but not yet”. I did have some graphical issues like textures not loading right, a bit of stuttering, black character models, … but they didn’t kill the vibe. Overall, the game looks good and runs smoothly.
Taking back the city, alone or together.
Whether you like it or not, the game can be compared to “Destiny”. The game mechanics are very familiar and yet different. Like Destiny, your part of group online community that roams the streets of the Division’s New York to gain experience to level up your agent. You gain experience by completing different missions, killing enemies, collecting key data and exploring dark corners of this open world. There aren’t any real classes in the game, as you would suspect from an MMO but you do get the chance to customize your play style by choosing your weapons and modifying them, equipping armor with certain stats or bonuses and earning action abilities and perks. These abilities/ perks/ bonuses unlock as you re-establish your main base of operations which is divided into three main wings: medical, technical and security. Alongside the fact that you earn experience (earned through missions) to develop your main character’s abilities, you also gain supply points to develop your base wings and earn money to upgrade your equipment.
The game world looks like a big instance with some “get together” waypoints. Within these waypoints (small base) you have the chance to get an overview of all the missions in your surroundings, different vendors and a matchmaking laptop. This laptop opens a door to matchmaking where you can find teammates to join your squad and roam New York together as a team. The game can be played solo, since the game changes the difficulty of the game based on the number of characters in your team. Of course, it’s much more fun to tackle a mission with friends or strangers instead of playing the game alone. Don’t get me wrong, it’s fun to play alone for the first hours but if you want better loot, you’ll have to replay missions on a higher difficulty and it can be a pain in the ass since you can’t be revived by yourself, there has to be another player in your team to revive you. Missions have checkpoints but some sections of the missions are a “no respawn” zone, so if you die, it’s game over.
The stronger the enemy, the better the loot.
It’s also possible to adventure alone and get a group of strangers before entering a certain mission. Each mission gives you the opportunity to get a group of people (by a matchmaking feature) and adjusting the difficulty before entering. It’s a cool feature and I have to admit that the matchmaking featuring does a great job in finding those strong and reliable teammates. I’ve had no issues so far, besides some server crashing issues that have been fixed thanks to a recent patch.
Say hello to your new best friend in “The Division”, Mr. Cover!
The Division is a third-person action shooter that allows you to use cover on the streets of New York. Every wall, car or corner can be used to take cover. This cover significantly lowers the damage you take from enemy bullets. The Tom Clancy games are known for their cover based game mechanics and just like “The Division”, this game mechanic stands out from any other game based shooter. Moving from cover to cover or just slipping around the corner has never been this easy. The whole mechanic runs fluently and without any hiccups. The only thing that did bother me was the “dodging”, this skill doesn’t run smoothly as it normally should. Instead of saving your life, it actually helps the grunts to score a kill. Shooting out of cover is good but some of the covers can disturb your view. A tip to have a wonderful time: use cover as much as possible. You don’t want to become a bullet filled sponge.
Finding better loot is addicting…
The game is loot based, so expect a numerous amount of hours to grind your way to the best gear the world can offer. Missions, enemies and certain challenges drop items such as weapons, weapon parts, specialized ammo, armor and money. Within the game there are different kind of enemies which vary from simple grunts to armored badasses. The stronger the enemy, the better the loot. It’s also good to know that all of the dropped loot is personal, you’re the only one who can pick up the loot. It’s a small but important mechanic.
Players can also craft different weapons and armor with specific stats. It’s a quick way to make your agent even more powerful. Of course, you do need different things to craft a certain item. You’ll have to find blueprints and the crafting materials that are required by the blue prints. There’s also a “recalibration” activity that lets you modify the bonuses and attributes of your existing gear in exchange for currency.
The game world looks like a big instance with some “get together” waypoints.
Not only do enemies drop loot with different stats and bonuses but they can also drop “appearance” kind of loot that only changes the way you look. These “looks” can be found throughout the whole world. There’s something addicting about finding more powerful and better-looking loot in this kind of games.
I do miss the feature where you can check up on the equipment of other players. Hopefully, they will add this in the future as a next feature patch or something.
Behind those walls, there’s a far worse enemy… and it’s YOU!
The Division also offers an exciting co-op PVE and even a PVP kind of place (max. 24 players in one instance), where shits about to get real and it’s called “The Dark Zone”. The Dark Zone is a place where the virus hit the hardest. This dark place has some of the best loot to upgrade your character but it needs to be extracted by a helicopter, since all of this loot has been heavily contaminated by the virus. It needs to be “cleaned” before these items can be used by your character. Of course, it sounds a lot easier in theory than it is on the field.
From the moment you shoot out a flare to call in an extraction helicopter, every single player will be notified that’s in the Dark Zone. Players can run up to you, help you defend the extraction point so that they can ask you politely to use your extraction helicopter because that’s what players do in an online world… No? Not convincing? Well, you’re probably right! The Division offers you a whole other opportunity. Most of the agents will probably run towards you to kill you, rob you of all of your tasteful loot and hijack your helicopter. Jup, it’s just that cold-blooded and brutal. No time for weeping!
Once the helicopter arrives, you’ll have about 30 seconds to attach all of your contaminated gear to it. Only 5 agents can attach their gear to the rope at the same time. The “cleaned” equipment will be collected in your stash boxes at your base and in safe houses. Watch your back, as other agents, will be able to see if you’ve been collecting loot in the Dark Zone or not. Once you’ve received contaminated loot, your character wears a yellow “quarantine” bag. The game basically tags you as a potential victim for other agents.
The dark zone is a place full of elite thugs trying to get whatever it is they want. Killing these thugs will drop “specialized” loot that can be extracted or Dark Zone keys. These Dark Zone keys can be used on different loot crates found all over the Dark Zone. Of course, you need a certain Dark Zone rank to open certain crates. Talking about this “ Dark Zone” rank you earn additional Dark Zone experience by participating in “Dark Zone” events and killing thugs within the Dark Zone. This rank gives you the opportunity to buy superior loot and crafting recipes in specialized vendors located in the Dark Zone. The max. level cap is level 99. You quickly start to build up another rank as you play within the Dark Zone but once you go Rogue (by killing other agents) and die as a Rogue, you’ll lose experience. Next to this “experience”, you’ll also earn another form of currency that can be used in specialized Dark Zone vendors.
The moment you hurt another player or kill one, your status and the team’s status will change into “Rogue”. You will be marked with a skull symbol on so that every player in the Dark Zone can get your head for a certain bounty. Also, the orange circle on your back will be turned red. This “Rogue” status can be removed, if you stop friendly fire for about 5 minutes. The more agents you kill as a “Rogue”, the bigger your bounty. If you survive the bounty and the manhunt, you’ll get your own bounty.
What to do after hitting the level cap?
The PVE maximum level cap in The Division is level 30 and this is where some of these MMO start to break down. A lot of MMO games can’t offer you a lot, after your first play through of the game and it’s definitely difficult for developers to create a reasonable and fun end game content that grabs onto those players and never let go.
The player will quickly be familiarized with the Dark Zone since some missions can only be played within the Dark Zone. The moment you hit max level, the whole Dark Zone changes into a bigger and tougher playground. The Dark Zone will get new content and challenges. You’ll always be able to replay missions on a higher difficulty to find the gear/ crafting materials or weapon parts you want. Crafting won’t be closed done since the Dark Zone offers better crafting recipes. In other words, there’s always a way to improve your current combat state to prepare yourself for what’s coming next. Ubisoft plans to release free and paid DLC content from this moment on.
Let’s have the “other” talk…
The Division is definitely an enjoyable game but you can’t just accept the good stuff and leave behind all the bad stuff, that’s just not the way the cookie crumbles. First of all, the game’s launch had some big server issues as well as the matchmaking mechanic. It was really frustrating to play a certain mission and having to lose all of your progress and experience by “a connection issue”. Ubisoft noticed the problem and made a patch almost instantly. After a couple of days, Ubisoft seemed to fix most of the connection issues and the matchmaking mechanic has never been better but the matchmaking mechanic does need some “customizing” since it can be unclear sometimes. When you match make before you enter a mission, it can spawn you on the other side of the map or too close to enemy lines. The matchmaking “console” should also be tweaked since it’s a small laptop and when a lot of players gather around the laptop, it’s hard to actually press the “matchmaking” button. I mean people can block doorways and paths, so there has to be another way to access the console.But then again it’s good to “have a choice” whether to tackle on a mission (on a difficulty of your choice) solo or by a group without killing your own gameplay session.
You also shouldn’t overlook the fact that it’s a grindy game. The game’s based on loot, so replaying missions on a different difficulty is necessary to achieve some awesome firepower. Eventually, the grindy part wouldn’t matter that much if the game’s combat system wasn’t that simple but it is. It’s just a cover based shooter with some RPG-elements. The missions are varied but eventually you’ll start to see through those missions as you’ll start noticing the same mechanics over and over again. There aren’t any kind of vehicles, there aren’t many tactics within the game, you can’t crouch or jump, … it’s just run and gun.
You also have to have a constant online connection which sucks in a lot of countries and if you’re the kind of solo player, you’ll probably be bored very quickly. This game can be enjoyable alone but it’s much more fun to form up a team with your friends and create some memorable moments. The game also gets harder and harder with each level (which gives you a really good challenge) but completing some missions solo will be tough since you can’t rely on a helping hand to get your back or revive you as soon as you go down.
Some other small but important things: the story probably won’t win an Oscar for “best game story”, since it’s pretty much forgettable and the character customization in the beginning of the game is pretty much bland. I would like to see some more options in the near future.
Conclusion:
Ubisoft’s employees can walk out their office with their head held up high as they actually fulfilled their promises from a couple of years ago. The Division is a fun and solid game to play solo but I do recommend to play it with friends. The game’s based on loot so expect a certain amount of hours put into the grind. The cover based mechanics are exemplary for other third person shooters, and even with the graphical downgrade, the game still looks beautiful. The shooting and abilities perform smoothly and there’s a decent amount of RPG- elements to “form” your own play style. The Dark Zone is absolutely a mode that everyone should take a look at, it’s a well created PVP environment that offers a lot of challenge and an exciting feeling of “watch your back” as strangers or even well-known team members easily can point the gun towards you and “accidentally” pull the trigger.
8,5/10
