In The Division 2, the developers say they anticipated the players’ criticism, especially regarding the lack of content and how The Division 2 becomes boring. Massive has prepared for the fact that players would be dissatisfied after the launch phase. They have a plan on how to respond.
Who’s speaking? It’s Yannick Bancherau, the Live Content Manager of The Division 2, speaking in an interview with Kotaku.
This is why Massive knew criticism would come: He says, “When we received very positive feedback at launch, we knew that the moment would come when the honeymoon was over. People would start to scratch the surface.”
Bancherau further states, “We knew all the time, no matter how well we prepare and design The Division 2, people will play it differently and exhaust the game in a way that we cannot simulate. They will find things that need improvement.”
This is how Massive has prepared for the criticism: Bancherau says the team learned a lot from The Division 1, especially from the difficult time before Patch 1.4. At that time, everything was an “emergency” and the community put a lot of pressure on the team.
Before the release of The Division 2, Massive:
- had already allocated resources to make changes
- given more time and higher priority to processing feedback
- learned from Part 1 that content should be better divided and tried to cater to all types of players – they want to offer something for exploratory players with the Expeditions
Nevertheless, one knows that in a PvE game, there are always too few game contents. One cannot create content as quickly as players can complete it.
2. The Raid will be different
This is how they want to implement feedback directly: For the 2nd Raid in autumn, Massive takes players’ criticism of the 1st Raid to heart. There, players felt disadvantaged on PS4 and Xbox One:
- In the 2nd Raid, teamwork should be more important than precise aiming.
- Additionally, Massive promises matchmaking, though they do not want to commit to it.
- However, they do not want to balance differently for PC and consoles.
The Division 2 on the right track
This is how Massive sees the situation: Overall, Bancherau believes they are on the right track with The Division 2: “We have a pretty good idea of what players want, and a lot of the things we want to do with the game overlap there. Now it’s just about putting in the effort to adjust things.”
In the interview, Massive also talks about the new Expeditions. They should provide something for players who enjoy exploration and puzzles.
