The online action RPG The Division has reached the heart of our author Schuhmann, but somehow in an unusual way.
It’s a bit like going to a pizzeria wanting pizza, but then you end up liking the bread more. That’s how I feel about The Division: the filler content is excellent.
Huge parallels between The Division and Assassin’s Creed Syndicate
I played another Ubisoft title in my life, which was “Assassin’s Creed Syndicate.” I didn’t buy it; instead, I got it a few months ago with the graphics card I ironically bought to play something like “The Division.”
And if you only know these two Ubisoft games, you see huge parallels. The world is divided into small portions, and there’s basically the same to do in each one.
There are “small missions” that follow the same patterns repeatedly, then there are medium missions that follow other but still similar patterns, and there are story missions: Those are varied, you can tell they put some thought into them.
And then in these open-world games following the Ubisoft formula, there are “collectibles,” which are little scraps you can pick up. Usually, they are a bit hidden and aim to reward the player for really exploring the “open worlds.”
Okay, the game follows a formula… but so does basically everything
These things have a pretty bad reputation: They are just “fillers” to make the world feel full, people say.
Just like on a CD that contains other songs alongside the hits, and how potatoes are a side dish to a steak, the game contains a lot of small stuff to keep players busy alongside the “exciting main missions.” In the end, no one should say: “20 missions? I was done in 4 hours? That’s not worth my money!”
This entire “Ubisoft” formula is viewed quite critically. The same mission is repeated 8 times; in every district, you have to search a building for viruses, collect a bounty in the same format, and so on. Everyone realizes while playing that this formula aims to stretch a rather short game (the main missions) into a long game (if you collect everything, complete everything, and aim for 100% all around).
As an MMO player, I don’t have much of an issue with this because – let’s be honest – this system was invented by RPGs and later MMORPGs. Before you can advance to the next part of the main story, you first have to kill 300 creatures to become strong enough to continue.
One could say harshly: Most MMORPGs consist only of these fillers. The mechanics repeat across games. Whether I’m killing 15 creatures for a quest NPC and then returning to him or have to fend off exactly 4 waves of enemies at 3 different points in an area, when looked at closely, it’s pretty much the same. I’m quite immune to this “filler material.”
But this collecting of every little thing, every scrap I chase after, to jump from the exact “wire” at the right moment to hit the secret point from below – that annoyed me in Assassin’s Creed. That’s not really my drive to fill bars to the edge.
The collectibles, the filler material, are really well told
In “The Division,” that’s really well done. Because the collectibles are wonderfully tied to the story. Especially the phone call recordings are truly great. You can think of it as a collection of short stories, fully voiced, in which one can catch tiny glimpses of people during the catastrophe.
Here are all phone calls in The Division:
Some of these stories stand on their own, some are interlinked. They often provide heartbreaking narratives. A woman calls her mother, has accepted her fate, and tearfully confesses that she is a lesbian. She wants to get this off her chest before her imminent end. A father calls his daughter and explains how she should take care of his bees. You can tell: That was the center of his life for the last few years. Is everything about to change now? Two hockey fans are utterly astonished that due to this pesky pandemic, the hockey game is now canceled.
It’s like a surprise egg; you never know what kind of story you’re getting now, but they are wonderfully made and taste great every time. They don’t exaggerate; they respect the situation, and they ask, “How would people really deal with something like this?” And that helps – much more than the missions themselves – to give the game depth and dignity. By the way: This applies to the English voices. The German dubbing, from what I’ve heard, cannot compete with the acting aspect – but that’s another topic.
The German translation can’t really keep up:
The actual story with punchy lines and “cynically tough” characters also has its highlights: When the cranky ultraliberal explains that “The Division” is an absolutely terrible idea, which idiot could create such an elite unit outside the “checks and balances” power structure, it cleverly questions the actually absurd power fantasy behind the game. But too often, this power fantasy is fully realized, and the subtle cracks you sometimes feel just aren’t enough.
In fact, it’s the usually dull “collectibles” that give the world of The Division warmth and tension. And that is truly worth a lot.
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