Ubisoft doesn’t give up on games. If a title stumbles out of the gate, its studios work to improve it. They make sure the project finds an audience, and because of that, many of the company’s efforts succeed.
“Tom Clancy’s The Division” was one of these games. At launch it had problems, but over time, Massive Entertainment polished it, making big changes that ultimately made it first-rate. The turnaround was one of the bigger success stories for the loot shooter genre. It showed that a good game can become great with enough time.
Learning from their initial mistakes, Massive Entertainment and other Ubisoft studios already had a leg up with “Tom Clancy’s The Division 2.” The sequel brings many of the upgrades introduced over the original’s lifespan and moves the story forward seven months after the Green Poison outbreak devastated New York. The epidemic has infested America and chaos has fallen on Washington, D.C., as gangs and paramilitary groups take over the capital.
Players create a Division agent called the Sheriff, who answers a distress call from the White House. The Strategic Homeland Division, which is an secret agency meant to keep the government going in emergencies, is in trouble. Air Force One has been shot down with the president aboard. Raiders and rogue commandos control different parts of the city.
As the Sheriff, players restore order to the capital. They enter a post-apocalyptic world, where their elite Division training and gadgets give them an edge. Players explore hostile territories, in which most encounters end up in a gunfight.
It may sound repetitive, but “The Division 2” uses the locale and combat system to its fullest advantage. This is an online shooter that’s meant to be played cooperatively with a four-person squad.
The gameplay loop works like this: Players take on a mission in which they must eliminate their foes by hiding behind cover and shooting them down. Teamwork is needed to flank an opponent. Someone with a machine gun can suppress foes with fire and that lets an ally carrying a shield to rush up and shoot them.
Other tactics could include seeker mines for an ambush or drawing enemies into the line of a fire of a teammate’s turret. Whatever the case, “The Division 2” presents players with several different types of encounters. Some fights are in open air courtyards with wide-open lanes for sniper fire. Others are in claustrophobic hotel hallways where submachine guns or shotguns are perfect for close-quarters combat.
During the mission and afterward, players are rewarded with loot in the form of better guns and armor. It’s a role-playing game element that gives “The Division 2,” an addictively satisfying quality. Better gear is desirable because it opens up new ways to play and explore the deep combat system.
Along with this, the developers bring back the refinements that made the original fun to play after its launch. Players have plenty of quality-of-life improvements such as loadouts and mod systems. Developers tweaked enemies so that they aren’t just bullet sponges. Players can target different parts of their body destroying their armor, making tougher enemies easier to kill.
The bigger changes come from the dynamic environment of Washington, D.C., and the endgame content. The studios added the concept of settlements that spring to life as players make headway into the campaign. They take on projects and tasks that improve the lives of survivors. It also unlocks mods and other helpful upgrades.
As players take over control points, they’ll notice more allies patrolling the streets and ferrying supplies between friendly zones. Elsewhere, players can run into activities, which are ambient missions where they’re asked to rescue hostages or stop a propaganda broadcast. These elements make Washington, D.C., feel more alive and active compared to the New York streets of the original. They also make players feel invested in the world.
Lastly, the emphasis of endgame content makes “The Division 2” a project with long legs. After players finish the campaign, they’ll discover what’s essentially a second quest a la “The Legend of Zelda.” This is where the skills players learned through the 30-plus-hour campaign are tested.
After players defeat the last faction’s stronghold, a new adversary called the Black Tusks emerges. Their members take over Washington, D.C., and it’s up to the agents to defeat them. This endgame campaign lets fans go through many of the same levels, but they’re often reworked with tougher enemies. The Black Tusks have cutting edge drones and robots that make gunfights a challenge.
In the previous games, players had to grind through the same missions repeatedly to earn better gear. It quickly made the original monotonous. The fact that players have another campaign with its own storyline makes the task of finding better gear more worthwhile.
In addition, players also have specializations tied to new super weapons: a grenade launcher, crossbow and .50-caliber sniper rifle. These guns each have their own distinct skill tree and introduce a new dimension in postgame combat.
Thrown on top of this is the Dark Zone. This is a shared-world area where players run into some of the toughest enemies of the game. It has some of the best loot, but it’s also a lawless place where players can knock each other off and steal those hard-earned prizes. The Dark Zone retains its tense and paranoid atmosphere, but this time around, Ubisoft evens the playing field so that people with better gear don’t have such an overwhelming advantage.
For those who still want that kind of experience, there will be a place with that no-holds-barred rule set, but it rotates among the three Dark Zones in “The Division 2.”
All this creates one of the most complete packages in the loot shooter genre. Ubisoft stuck to its guns and strived to make a better game, and the franchise and gamers are the better for it.
‘Tom Clancy’s The Division 2’
4 stars
Platform: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC
Rating: Mature
