The Division 2 has many secrets and puzzles to offer. Apparently, these were kept secret even from the creators of the game and were designed in secret.
This is what these secrets are about: In the world of The Division 2, several messages with cryptic symbols are scattered. You can find them in various locations. These puzzles reveal, for example, where to find the 12 Hunters and their masks.
In an email interview with Kotaku.com, the Creative Director of The Division 2, Julian Gerighty, explained how the secrets were developed during the game’s creation.
Even the developers didn’t know the solution
This is how these secrets came to be: According to Gerighty, the puzzles were designed by a small group.
The alphabet and the characters of the Hunter puzzles were developed by only 4 people. These puzzles were meant to be challenging.
They were integrated to be strange and required several people to solve. It is possible to solve them alone, but very hard.
Julian Gerighty, Source: Kotaku
No one outside of this small group knew exactly what these puzzles were about.
These puzzles introduce some puzzle elements into the game, which is otherwise mainly a loot shooter.
A detail led to cracking the puzzles
How are the puzzles structured? The strange symbols on the wall were decrypted and translated into a corresponding text.
These texts were then clues to locations and the tasks that must be found and fulfilled to spawn one of the Hunters.
In fact, the puzzles are challenging and were not easy to crack. A specific code is required for this. However, this code was cracked weeks before the release, during the beta of The Division 2.
This is how the code was cracked: In the beta, there were spaces between the characters. This allowed the user Zinfinion to decode one of the locations early on.
Due to the spaces, certain words like “The” or “to” could be determined, as he confirmed to Kotaku.
I suspected that a word with three letters had to be “THE” and one with two letters “TO”. This led to 2 different cases of ?O?TH and ?O?TH, which quickly became SOUTH and NORTH. Then the remaining letters became obvious.
Zinfinion, Kotaku
From this, the developers learned that they should not use spaces to make the encryption harder.
“We wanted to create something that intrigues the player.”
This is why the puzzles were developed: According to Gerighty, it was important for the creators to bring something into The Division 2 that feels different from the rest of the game. Something that players can investigate and figure out.
The reward was important as it comes in multiple forms.
A puzzle, a riddle to solve, a cool street-art look to admire, gameplay challenges, and ultimately an in-game item [The Masks].
Julian Gerighty
As The Division 2 usually makes it quite clear to the player what to do and where to go, the secrets provide a good balance.
They wanted to give players a reason to “pause, breathe, and look at the places themselves, rather than just following ISAC’s instructions… . By using these large, obvious hints […], we hoped to open their eyes to the hidden treasures and stories in the game world.”
As our user test of The Division 2 shows, it seems to have worked. Because the game world is one of the parts of the game that received the highest ratings.
If one of the puzzles is bugged, it can still be frustrating.
What do you think of the puzzles and secrets of The Division 2? Do you think they are successful?
