Home Entertainment The Division will work as a single-player experience, but with a few differences

The Division will work as a single-player experience, but with a few differences

2 min read
60

The Division can be played as a single-player game

The Division is a game that I’ve only really started believing in after getting some limited hands-on time with it twice this year. Ubisoft’s idea for their brand new MMO RPG Shooter is a bold one, but one that carries some interesting ideas about how to challenge your trust in other players. It is a game built with multiplayer in mind, but it’s also one you’re going to be able to play alone if you really want to.

That’s according to Community Developer Hamish Bode, who sat down with us at rAge this weekend to answer questions about how The Division would work in solo play. Not too unlike Destiny, The Division won’t bar you from exploring the deserted streets of New York alone, but it will force you to take on a more “jack of all trades” role when it comes to customisation.

Still, it’s an adventure that doesn’t essentially require friends along for the ride.

“For example: I could specialize in a more long range approach and you could be more up close [if playing together]. You’d have to be a little more multitasking if you were alone, or just try what works. That’s what’s interesting about the beta – people are going to find all sorts of ways that work for them.”

Unlike games like Destiny, The Division is going to be a seamless experience. There’s no jumping into lobbies for PvP or having to return to a menu screen when changing regions. Instead, everything is switched on the fly as you play – something demonstrated particularly well with The Dark Zone. Jump a wall, and you’re in an online match. That’s it.

“It is seamless. For example, the Dark Zone. You don’t load into it, you just jump the wall and you’re in. And sometimes [players] are going to do this accidentally. And it’s not always just walls – there are different types of entries and exits [to different zones]. And some only act as entries. So if [players] aren’t sure, maybe don’t jump.”

You can check out the rest of the interview below, where we both jump into some of The Division’s customisation and general response the game has had throughout the year. The Division is getting its own beta this December, ahead of release next March. I’m actually looking forward to it.

Last Updated: October 12, 2015

60 Comments

  1. Good, because no solo-ee, no play-ee.

    But even after reading that I just don’t feel any hype for The Division. On the 1 to 10 excitement scale it rates a “meh”.

    Reply

    • Guild

      October 12, 2015 at 09:43

      If you came with Rince to rAge and got to play it you would be a bit more excited. Was a lot of fun and my pick for rAge

      Reply

      • Alien Emperor Trevor

        October 12, 2015 at 10:00

        It would have to be the best game ever to make me feel even a little bit excited after all those negatives you just listed. 😉

        Reply

      • Grand Admiral Chief

        October 12, 2015 at 10:00

        Pity about that long-ass loading time

        Reply

        • Sageville

          October 12, 2015 at 10:06

          Maybe that’s just these review/expo copies?

          Reply

          • Grand Admiral Chief

            October 12, 2015 at 10:09

            Or possibly the brick they were running on?

          • Sageville

            October 12, 2015 at 10:10

            “Xbox”

  2. Guild

    October 12, 2015 at 09:42

    Really looking forward to this game after getting some hands on time at rAge. Was a lot of fun and the seamless switching between PVE and PVP is another bonus. Now to get beta access.

    Reply

    • Grand Admiral Chief

      October 12, 2015 at 10:01

      Just gimme a KB and MS and I’m ready for this as well, was quite fun

      Reply

    • Alessandro Barbosa

      October 12, 2015 at 10:04

      I’ve seen that after people have actually played, they either love or hate it. But for the most part more people are getting excited about The Division. I know I am 🙂

      Reply

    • Sageville

      October 12, 2015 at 10:09

      I think the biggest things I took away from playing it at rage was:

      It’s not fast paced, i.e. if you expect unreal or quake speed you will probably hate it.
      It’s a lot more of a strategic shooter than an action shooter.
      It did look very grey (I guess that’s just par for NYC)
      Xbox sucks.

      P.S. Also the key mapping could be better.

      Reply

      • Grand Admiral Chief

        October 12, 2015 at 10:09

        Eierdoos sucks, confirmed

        Reply

      • Nikola

        October 12, 2015 at 10:24

        Yip Xbox is crap seriously crap controller!

        Reply

    • Nikola

      October 12, 2015 at 10:21

      I really agree with you all of us playing together was a lot of fun and no loading screens between PVP and PVE is great. Looks like a fun game! Yeah we need to get that BETA access!

      Reply

      • Hammersteyn

        October 12, 2015 at 11:01

        You should evac quicker 😛

        Reply

  3. Valenlord

    October 12, 2015 at 09:49

    Ok this is prickling my interest…

    Reply

    • Mabenito

      October 12, 2015 at 11:20

      …, it’s been over a year of straight prickling for me.

      Reply

  4. oVg

    October 12, 2015 at 09:49

    Is the single player option on-line only like Destiny?

    Reply

    • Alessandro Barbosa

      October 12, 2015 at 10:04

      Yeah you’ll still have to be online. Is an MMO after all

      Reply

      • Sageville

        October 12, 2015 at 10:13

        I’ve come back to this question: Is Destiny actually an MMO?

        Massive? You can only ever see 12 people at one time, does that count as massively.

        Reply

        • Alessandro Barbosa

          October 12, 2015 at 10:19

          MMO for anyone not willing to call it a “Shared World Shooter” 😛

          Reply

          • Grand Admiral Chief

            October 12, 2015 at 10:32

            Shared World Shooter. So MMO became SWS

        • Nikola

          October 12, 2015 at 10:25

          Dammit Sage it is an MMO!

          Reply

        • Hammersteyn

          October 12, 2015 at 11:01

          Miniature Multiplayer Online?

          Reply

        • Her Highness the Hipster

          October 12, 2015 at 11:03

          … it’s not the size that counts but how you use it?

          Reply

          • Sageville

            October 12, 2015 at 12:04

            Meh, now that I’ve actually met Dean I can’t use him in butt of “That’s what he said…” jokes….

            Oh wait, nwm…

      • oVg

        October 12, 2015 at 10:19

        In other words single player DRM. Pre-order cancelled.

        Reply

  5. WitWolfy

    October 12, 2015 at 09:54

    Still not sold on this… Saw dudes play it from outside the booth and it look okay-ish… Was def downgraded from the visuals we saw last year, thats for sure!

    My pick from Rage was Rise of the Tomb Raider. Sure it doesnt look as great visually as what Uncharted 4 will, but felt solid!

    Reply

    • Alessandro Barbosa

      October 12, 2015 at 10:03

      I would take ALL visuals from rAge with massive heaps of salt. Don’t think I came across a single stand where display were setup correctly. Most games looked terrible 🙁

      Reply

      • Nikola

        October 12, 2015 at 10:27

        Yeah I agree play AC Syndicate and it actually looked worse than AC Black Flag graphics wise which makes no sense there was something seriously wrong with the monitors (TV’s) they were using!

        Reply

        • Sageville

          October 12, 2015 at 12:02

          Saw a few Unity-level glitches….

          Reply

          • Nikola

            October 12, 2015 at 13:55

            So did I pretty funny I didnt have any in my gameplay but I saw a guy playing and his character started “swimming up the wall” !

      • WitWolfy

        October 12, 2015 at 11:56

        Even Tomb raider looked average at best. don’t get me wrong I know its cross gen.. But my eyes bled a bit with those 900P visuals.

        Reply

  6. Sageville

    October 12, 2015 at 10:14

    Seamless game mode jumping looked interesting, hard to tell who was AI and who was Player.

    Reply

    • Hammersteyn

      October 12, 2015 at 11:00

      The game loaded longer than Destiny though… or maybe it was the console 😛

      Reply

      • Sageville

        October 12, 2015 at 12:00

        Well, they did have “Connection Issues” in the beginning.

        I blame microsoft.

        Reply

      • Nikola

        October 12, 2015 at 13:54

        It was the Xbox!!!

        Reply

  7. Jonah Cash

    October 12, 2015 at 10:21

    I want to play this Beta so badly. Even if just to convince or deter me…

    Reply

    • Nikola

      October 12, 2015 at 10:31

      From what I saw at Rage very good game man, I need to find out how to get BETA access will kill for it no problem;)

      Reply

      • Her Highness the Hipster

        October 12, 2015 at 11:01

        normally i would laugh at people saying they’d kill for access, but I believe it from you… 😛

        Reply

        • Nikola

          October 12, 2015 at 11:08

          hahaha!! Well am glad I left that opinion on people that, I am a murderer;)… Not really hahaha

          Reply

          • Her Highness the Hipster

            October 12, 2015 at 11:13

            nah, no worries. I know you only kill people in games, like the rest of us 🙂 but agreed – we all need to get in on the Beta. needs to happen!

          • Nikola

            October 12, 2015 at 11:20

            haha all cool:) Yeah we all liked the game a lot so it’s a total no brainier! And when the games comes out we going to have a nice large team to play with:)

          • Sageville

            October 12, 2015 at 12:31

            Nikola is essentially the Radovan Krejir of gaming.

      • Jonah Cash

        October 12, 2015 at 13:30

        I am just glad to hear that it can be played on my own… I will be the all round guy.

        Reply

  8. Nikola

    October 12, 2015 at 10:23

    Definitely best game at Rage for me by far had sooo much fun with that short demo will be picking it up for sure, love that you can customize the way you play different skills armor and so on.

    Only problem was we had to play the demo on Xbox daaaamn that controller sucks so much it’s bloody terrible!

    Reply

    • Ir0nseraph

      October 12, 2015 at 10:27

      You still on about that, but it was game of show for me, and can’t wait when our team gets this.

      Reply

      • Nikola

        October 12, 2015 at 10:31

        I know hahaha but I was shocked how much it sucked! Yeah will be lot of fun when we all play together.

        Reply

        • Ir0nseraph

          October 12, 2015 at 10:32

          Yeah yeah, I think you just don’t like it cause at least you have an excuse that your team couldn’t finish the extraction in time 😛

          Reply

          • Nikola

            October 12, 2015 at 10:36

            We were 3 seconds short of extracting flip!!! Your team didn’t even know how to extract;) But I understand you had Hammersteyn in your team:))))

          • Ir0nseraph

            October 12, 2015 at 10:36

            XD

      • Sageville

        October 12, 2015 at 12:05

        Almost broke my thumb on D-pad!

        Reply

  9. HairyEwok

    October 12, 2015 at 10:38

    So first stress test is on Xbone in December….. This should be interesting. So bleak I couldn’t make it to rAge, had things to sort out.

    Reply

  10. Hammersteyn

    October 12, 2015 at 11:00

    I want to know more!

    Reply

  11. Her Highness the Hipster

    October 12, 2015 at 11:04

    i really want this game. wanted it for so long now, and every time i see/play more, the need intensifies.

    Reply

  12. Hvd

    October 12, 2015 at 17:56

    i think people get the wrong idea about this game.its not the next dayz.its a cover shooter like gears of war.which is fine if you like that.why do you hink no twitch streamer has had access t it,they have keeped it quite and not shown any real game play just their scripted events.this isnt i think they know they will get lots of back lash if they show real gameplay.people are expecting this game to be dayz like and its not.we will have to wait for the beta in a few months then we can see.

    Reply

  13. Hvd

    October 12, 2015 at 20:18

    this game isnt dayz fyi.its a cover shooter like gears of war.thstd why there hasnt be hardly any gameplay footage except their scripted gameplay i think they fear the back lash if its a cover shooter.this is not dayz or arma III.we will find out in a few months in beta unless they push it back for SOME reason.it wouldnt surprise me tho.

    Reply

  14. VenomSnake421

    October 12, 2015 at 22:29

    Looks so good, I’m getting it on day one.

    Reply

  15. LordCancer Kain

    October 13, 2015 at 04:40

    alot of games pass a sad excuse for single player like destiny and call of duty.

    Reply

  16. Loptr

    March 24, 2016 at 01:24

    Yeah, you can play the division in single player mode, but be prepared to have your arse handed to you once you get to level 6 or 7… No way a single player can survive the onslaught of bad guys in single player, which means you HAVE TO have a team or use the matchmaker feature to team up with others… Something I do not like and will most likely cause me to shelve this title, soon, even though I bought the season pass…

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Check Also

Xbox Series X Restock Update Today: Track on Twitter, Walmart, Best Buy and More

New consoles are on the horizon, and while Sony and Microsoft have spoken plenty about wha…