tom clancy's the division - a rogue gamer's opinion
Those of you who know me, know I love a bit of gaming. And I'm always up for some pvp.
Looking at The Division, I thought I'd find myself swept away by its 3rd-person style. I mean, I used to love shooters, but as games got better post-doom, I found myself more and more falling victim to travel sickness and unable to play shooters. But, for some reason, my brain doesn't gunk out when playing 3rd-person.
I've been mostly rocking single-player games this past few years, as my wife's been at uni and unable to devote time to playing the mmos we normally play. I figured we'd try this together. Got a copy for myself first to make sure she'd like it.
And this is, then, my review.
Now, when I first loaded up the game, I wasn't impressed. I was looking at an entirely black screen with a mouse triangle in the centre. Sure, the mouse icon is amazing, but I would have preferred to play the game. A little internet research shows this is a bug which has been around since beta and which ubisoft didn't think was worth fixing. Probably because it's a PC thing and they prefer console "gamers".
Anyway, it's easily avoided with a bit of alt-enter and some editing of setup files, so meh.
Finally, I got to character creation.
Seriously. That's what they call it. It's mildly amusing and has less options than Mortal Kombat. For a game wanting to be an mmo, this is cute. It's the kind of thing you expect from an indie production which could only afford to animate two models and had only one artist to quickly knock up a few extra shirts. So, you rock into the collective area and see everyone's a clone. Even the NPCs.
Also, you can't actually NAME your character. It's an RPG and you can't even name your character. I mean, that's just bizarre beyond bizarre. No customising in any way, and it wants to pretend it's a MULTI-PLAYER RPG?
Sigh.
Well, I'll give.
I logged in.
Sort of.
Eventually got in past the queue. Meh, I forgive them that. I've played plenty of mmos in their first week. But this isn't really an mmo, is it? It's a single-player game with a few multiplayer elements.
Anyways, I find there's a living breathing world. Not. There's some civilians. You can't kill them. Why can't I kill them, ubisoft? I want to kill them. I can kill pigeons, though. I found that out. That's a nice touch. Still can't kill the people. That's disappointing.
Open world, they call this. In other world, it's a large map with 5-10 quests on rails but you can choose where you want to go first. It has a real similar feel to City of Heroes. Which is kind of sad, because that's, like, old.
Also, I discovered that the server sometimes kicks you. Given you're playing a single-player game (haven't got into any multiplayer levels), this is frustrating. More frustrating than you think because when I logged back on again (straight away and confused), I found I was dead and had to respawn and start again. Nice. Real classy.
Not.
Anyway, I'd like to get more in depth, but to sum my experience with this game so far today, I'm going to leave you with a small handful of screenshots I've taken. As you can see, the game has some really immersive graphics...
Looking at The Division, I thought I'd find myself swept away by its 3rd-person style. I mean, I used to love shooters, but as games got better post-doom, I found myself more and more falling victim to travel sickness and unable to play shooters. But, for some reason, my brain doesn't gunk out when playing 3rd-person.
I've been mostly rocking single-player games this past few years, as my wife's been at uni and unable to devote time to playing the mmos we normally play. I figured we'd try this together. Got a copy for myself first to make sure she'd like it.
And this is, then, my review.
Now, when I first loaded up the game, I wasn't impressed. I was looking at an entirely black screen with a mouse triangle in the centre. Sure, the mouse icon is amazing, but I would have preferred to play the game. A little internet research shows this is a bug which has been around since beta and which ubisoft didn't think was worth fixing. Probably because it's a PC thing and they prefer console "gamers".
Anyway, it's easily avoided with a bit of alt-enter and some editing of setup files, so meh.
Finally, I got to character creation.
Seriously. That's what they call it. It's mildly amusing and has less options than Mortal Kombat. For a game wanting to be an mmo, this is cute. It's the kind of thing you expect from an indie production which could only afford to animate two models and had only one artist to quickly knock up a few extra shirts. So, you rock into the collective area and see everyone's a clone. Even the NPCs.
Also, you can't actually NAME your character. It's an RPG and you can't even name your character. I mean, that's just bizarre beyond bizarre. No customising in any way, and it wants to pretend it's a MULTI-PLAYER RPG?
Sigh.
Well, I'll give.
I logged in.
Sort of.
Eventually got in past the queue. Meh, I forgive them that. I've played plenty of mmos in their first week. But this isn't really an mmo, is it? It's a single-player game with a few multiplayer elements.
Anyways, I find there's a living breathing world. Not. There's some civilians. You can't kill them. Why can't I kill them, ubisoft? I want to kill them. I can kill pigeons, though. I found that out. That's a nice touch. Still can't kill the people. That's disappointing.
Open world, they call this. In other world, it's a large map with 5-10 quests on rails but you can choose where you want to go first. It has a real similar feel to City of Heroes. Which is kind of sad, because that's, like, old.
Also, I discovered that the server sometimes kicks you. Given you're playing a single-player game (haven't got into any multiplayer levels), this is frustrating. More frustrating than you think because when I logged back on again (straight away and confused), I found I was dead and had to respawn and start again. Nice. Real classy.
Not.
Anyway, I'd like to get more in depth, but to sum my experience with this game so far today, I'm going to leave you with a small handful of screenshots I've taken. As you can see, the game has some really immersive graphics...
Comments