Tom Clancy's: The Division - First Impressions
Tom Clancy's: The Division was a largely anticipated video game release for a lot of gamers around the world since its announcement. After Alpha and Beta testing it's finally released in full around the whole world.
At midnight on the 8th of March 2016, many Australians took to New York with their pre-loaded digital copies after paying the premium price for such a privilege. The servers took a knock but powered on with sound connections which lead the way for a flawless launch.
With the time differences around the world, Aussies continued on for around 20+ hours of uninterrupted game play while others like North America eagerly awaited their calendars and clocks to catch up. I even received a message from a friend in the US, asking me "How are you playing already". That's the advantage of being nearly a day ahead of our US counterparts.
As the time hit around 5pm (Sydney time) on launch day there was a massive issue. As the servers surged with over 6 million people trying to log onto the hottest game of the moment, they crashed into a burning heap on the floor. Slowly but surely everyone got booted from their games and there have also been reports that some people lost their character progress up until that point.
The internet went into meltdown with upset gamers that spent their hard earned on what is supposed to be the biggest, greatest and best game this side of the new generation of gaming. Thankfully, this was short lived at people slowly started getting connected back onto their games within the hour of the big crash.
Since this initial issue, the servers have been playing nicely and there hasn't been much anguish other than those getting their asses handed to them in the Dark Zone or by the AI in hard mode missions.
So far after around 10 hours of play I have by character levelled up to level 9 and I have enjoyed the progression so far. The game play and the story elements seem to be everything that I was expecting which makes me pretty damn content with what I have received. Joining up with friends is super easy and it's just as easy to break off and go it alone.
As for a launch is totality, it wasn't exactly perfect, but with all things considered things are going well and I very much look forward to the next 100+ hours playing The Division.
Check back here or on the Aussie Gamers Express Facebook site a little later for our full review of The Division.
Have your say here (below) or on our Facebook page. We would like to hear about your experiences in the first 24 hours of The Division. Has it been great or are you ready to return the game to your retailer already.
Lucas Aurelius.