At the time of this writing I’ve played about a dozen hours of The Division 2, am currently sitting at level 9, and have barely broken into my second zone after completing just about everything on the map in the first zone.
The Division 2 is the newest entry in the ever-expanding always online looter-shooter (I know, I hate that term as much as you do) genre of games. After being called away from your post to help your allies in Washington D.C., you’ll be greeted with a sprawling map full of a variety of enemies, objectives, and missions. It should be noted that other than the nearly post-apocalyptic conditions of the District, it feels remarkably similar to actually standing in our nation’s capitol.
The world is alive with allies and enemies alike. While most of the time the NPCs around you are nearly clueless and non-responsive, it’s obvious that some time was sunk into the characters who do have any life to them. Enemies are terrifying and believable. Even the bad guys who rush at you have a crazed sense about them that seems to simply work.
Your main objective as an agent of The Division is to restore peace (good luck) to the once great city. You’ll do this by capturing zones taken over by enemies of the state as well as saving and recruiting allies to help out at The White House – the epicenter and safe zone with the most to offer in the scenario. The map is populated with markers to identify missions and objectives. Even though this can sometimes encourage players to be lazy and simply go directly to their next event, almost anything can happen at any point on the map, anytime. Whether it’s a public execution, a raid, or simply a roving band of bad guys, you’ll always need to be on your toes to survive.
Story missions are extremely important for the sake of progression, but you’ll never level up and grab enough gear fast enough if you strictly stick to them. Instead, hitting side missions and roaming the streets looking for trouble seems much more expedient if you’re looking to rank up quickly. Even though I’ve sunk a fair amount of time into the game so far, I would bet I’m nowhere near as far in the story as many others with a similar amount of time invested due to exploring every single opportunity.
Unfortunately, for some, The Division 2 seems to be a lot of shooting repetitive enemies and grabbing their loot. Missions are fairly similar from one to the next. Go there. Rush through a set amount of guards. Progress through a bunch more environments. Reach the objective. Take out a highly armored bad guy. Get what you came for. Loot. Distribute loot to friendlies. Upgrade your gear.
Fortunately, for me, I love checking boxes and crossing things off a list. This makes the game great for me in the sense that it’s pretty hard to get bored. You’ll always have something to do, and there’s probably going to be some sort of payout at the end. Sure, great, high tier loot drops are not incredibly plentiful. However, with a game where you can sell off or disassemble your goods for future improvements, it’s well worth the time. Plus, there is always the XP – and who can say no to that?
The one thing that The Division 2 doesn’t do as well as I would like is set up more of the story and fill you in on what’s going on in a more narrative way. This seems to be an overall deficiency in the genre as a whole. As a newcomer to the series (though I watched LOTS of hours of gameplay of the first title), I could really use some additional context. I’m not a fan of handholding, but maybe a tad more direction wouldn’t hurt.
I’ve played nearly all of my time thus far solo. In the few random match-ups I’ve jumped into and the overall feel of the game – it’s incredibly obvious that The Division 2 is much better when played with some friends. Playing alone hasn’t hindered me thus far, but I guarantee I’d be flying through at a much faster pace playing co-op and will likely have some difficulty moving forward.
According to Ubisoft, “While it is possible to play through The Division 2’s campaign completely solo, you will not only experience it in the best light while playing with teammates, you will move through the game much faster. If you are able to find teammates who are closer to your XP level, you will have an easier time navigating The Division 2’s campaign storyline than with squad leaders who are already much further along than you. By the time you reach end game, co-op play is an absolute must to survive the brutal waves of Black Tusk forces.”
This is disappointing in a sense. I love that you can play with people, but I hate the idea that if no one I normally squad up with is online, I’ll either need to squad up with some randos or get butchered by the bad guys.
So far, I haven’t played anything outside of the campaign. I’m looking forward to Endgame and seeing what it has to offer.
Overall, even though The Division 2 has some less exciting points and enemies are essentially just re-skinned and buffed up as you progress, I’m having a ton of fun with it. It feels complete and like it was ready to be released. We’ll keep you updated the further we progress.
The Division 2 was provided to the reviewer by the publishing company but this fact did not alter the reviewer’s opinion.
