Developed by Massive Entertainment, The Division is a new game in the Tom Clancy franchise. Using the Snowdrop engine, it is a open world, multiplayer RPG game set in a world devastated by a deadly pathogen. Players will fight enemies factions, loot abandoned buildings and level up their player as they explore a ravaged New York city.
Story
A devastating pandemic sweeps through New York City, and one by one, basic services fail. In only days, without food or water, society collapses into chaos. The Division, a classified unit of self-supported tactical agents, is activated. Leading seemingly ordinary lives among us, The Division agents are trained to operate independently of command, as all else fails.
Fighting to prevent the fall of society, the agents will find themselves caught up in an epic conspiracy, forced to combat not only the effects of a manmade virus, but also the rising threat of those behind it. When everything collapses, your mission begins.
Gameplay
The Division will feature mainline quests that will take you to specific places within this re-imagined New York City.
David Polfeldt, managing director at Massive, says “We wanted a lighter game than World of Warcraft. I’m not calling [The Division] an MMO,” although he’s aware of the similarities. The Division will not, however, feature classes. “We allow you to progress through the skill tree as you refer,” Polfeldt explains. Plus you can do a mulligan on your skill tree progress at any time and switch to custom-built classes with the touch of a button.
Though it’s a role-playing game first and foremost, The Division also draws from the hardcore survivalism of Day Z or State of Decay. When your sleeper agent awakens, their belongings include just three days of food, water, and supplies.
After that, you must scour for resources like ammo and weapons. The whole point is to drive players to explore and discover.
A Companion App
The Division will feature a companion app that allows a tablet-user to become a guardian angel, a good samaritan, or a legendary troll.
In the E3 2013 demo, the tablet-user was privy to a suite of skills that each had their own specific cool-downs. From the vantage of an aerial view of the block currently being explored, the tablet-user could tap a skill to use it, then tap somewhere on the screen to engage the ability in that area.
Many of these skill types are recognizable to a massively multiplayer online (MMO) veteran, with such classic staples as an armor enhancement that boosted party stats, and a healing type drone that can revive injured allies.
The player using the tablet won't be limited to just these support abilities; they can recon and mark enemies so that enemy locations appear on the party's radar, and even summon powerful airstrikes.