Recently, Massive announced the new Summit mode for The Division 2, on which many players are pinning their last hopes for the game. The fight in the skyscraper has been playable on the PTS for a few days. How is it received so far?
This is The Summit: Recently, the developers from Massive introduced “The Summit”, a new mode for The Division 2. This is replayable and is intended to provide an action-packed experience that changes with each run – similar to the popular Underground mode from The Division 1.
In The Summit, you fight your way alone or in groups through a 100-story skyscraper in New York – with varying environments, enemies, objectives, modifiers, and bosses.
The mode aims to save the struggling Division and finally bring what many loyal players have been wishing for a long time – more replay value and long-term motivation. For some agents, The Summit is the last straw to cling to in the hope that The Division 2 can still turn things around.
Here’s how the first The Summit can be tested: Ideally, The Summit, just like the 3 new Exotics or new Gear Sets, is supposed to be introduced with Title Update 11. However, it has not been released yet, and there is currently no official release date for TU11.
However, it is suspected that it will come in September, as TU11 along with Summit is currently being tested on the PTS. There, numerous agents were already able to get their first impression of the new mode.
Hope bearer or placeholder? How The Summit is received so far
After the first players have fought their way through the skyscraper on the test servers, there is a lot of feedback for the developers. And it seems to be predominantly negative.
What is praised: After the announcement, many agents were initially excited about the new mode. In the beginning, it is indeed fun and entertaining for a while, according to the general tone.
Finally, the developers listened to the players and developed at least in a direction that many had wished and demanded since shortly after the launch of The Division 2.
However, that’s where the praise almost completely ends.
What is criticized: The mode revealed numerous problems and weaknesses on the PTS. Even if one overlooks the many bugs (some even game-breaking), very few seem satisfied with its current form – and are not very optimistic about the future, at least in the near term.
These are the biggest issues currently being criticized:
- The lack of replay value. Although the mode is supposed to bring exactly that, many feel it is lacking the most. Once you have fought through the 100 floors, there are hardly any incentives to do it again.
- The long-term motivation that The Summit is supposed to improve is also lacking for many or is not present at all.
- As a solo player, The Summit becomes very monotonous very quickly.
- For endgame players, 75% of Summit is essentially a waste of time, as they first need to clear “beginner” content and cannot adjust the difficulty themselves.
- The loot and rewards system is still a huge problem. There is simply nothing special and not enough else to motivate, which you can’t already get elsewhere (somewhat easier). A new mode doesn’t change that as long as this issue isn’t fixed.
- It lacks a dedicated progression system like the one that existed in Underground from The Division 1 to truly motivate in the long term.
- There is a lack of variety. Tasks and the environment offer little diversity and quickly become boring. There are always the familiar enemies to fight. The randomly assembled environment becomes stale quickly and doesn’t come close to the Underground experience from part 1. There’s nothing that really stands out as special.
- The developers noted that Underground served as an inspiration for The Summit. However, in the crucial points, you hardly notice that at all.
In short: The Summit fails in its current form to bring replayability and long-term motivation into the game. It has potential, but feels to many like a mere skeleton or framework before all the cool and fun elements are added – something that could really be a lot of fun.
It currently does not reach the level of the popular Underground from part 1, against which many measure The Summit. The developers still have a lot of work to do, that’s the general consensus.
This is what the developers say: The many feedback does not go unheard by the developers. They are aware of the numerous issues and problems with The Summit and want to improve many of them in TU11 and beyond.
Gameplay and rewards need to be interesting for Summit to maintain engagement in the long term. Also, the variety in room design must improve. This is part of what still needs to be improved and will be improved in the future, according to Massive.
Will Summit be able to save The Division 2?
Conclusion: I, Sven Galitzki, shooter expert at MeinMMO, love The Division 2 and sincerely hope that Massive can turn things around here. Unfortunately, I see it quite similarly to the vocal part of the community on Reddit and in social media.
While The Summit has a lot of potential, it currently fails exactly in what it is supposed to achieve – namely to ensure more long-term motivation and replayability.
The new mode now has to be measured against Underground due to the similarities, but it does not come close to the quality and especially the fun level of its spiritual predecessor from part 1.
Sure, a test build is being played on the PTS, and many issues can and will be fixed by the release of Title Update 11 – but not the most serious ones, such as lack of variety or loot.
Here, once again, the biggest problem of The Division 2 becomes clear: the developers are adding new content again without addressing the most serious core issues of The Division 2, such as loot or build diversity.
Thus, there is a fresh mode, but in its current form, it only entertains briefly and is almost automatically condemned from the outset because it primarily fails not even on itself, but rather on the fundamental problems of the game, and can at most only partially realize its potential. Even though The Summit has a lot of it.
As the hope bearer touted by some, I do not see The Summit at the moment – at least not in its current form and not as long as the fundamental issues of the game are not resolved. As long as I believe neither Summit nor another mode like the new raid will provide the hoped-for breakthrough for The Division 2, let alone save the game. Because these problems are primarily responsible for the fact that new content of any kind in The Division 2 rarely shines and can truly enrich the game.
By the way, you can tell us what you think of The Summit here in our survey: New Summit mode should revive The Division 2 – will you return for it?
