The Division game by Ubisoft was a good game in context. For example, it had a decent story…but it ended terribly. And the content outside of the story was good….up until you got to a certain level. Furthermore, while the expansions were great, they couldn’t mask the problems of the original. So, when Ubisoft decided that they needed to make a sequel, they knew it had to be better in every way. The Division 2 couldn’t repeat the mistakes of the past.
The team at Ubisoft talked with EDGE Magazine to discuss what they did to fulfill that promise with The Division 2, and Lead Designer Keith Evans talk about how it came about:
“It’s definitely been a journey,” said Evans. “I joined the team a little bit before the launch of the first game, so I was involved in leading the design on contributions to endgame over all three years. And the main lesson we’ve learned is that players kind of devour content. So the biggest thing that we’ve done design wise on The Division 2 is to start with that mindset. It’s not just about that level 1-30 journey, it’s not just about reclaiming this beautiful 1:1 version of a city. It’s about making sure there’s a ton of interesting things to discover, and that the world is much more replayable once you hit endgame”
But obviously the game couldn’t just “do better” with what the original had, they had to go and make new things as well, such as the new eight-person raids that will be a big part of the content:
“[Raids are] totally different to what we did in the first game. I can say that it’s something we’ve been working on for a long time. It’s not at the level of a mission, where it’s just about upping the intensity – we want this to be something that even players who own the best gear have to jump in and really discover.”
The game will release on March 15th.
