YES!
And even though it's been almost 2 years since then, coming back to the game now is the same. 50 updates later and they only improved balanced loot, hit boxes, matching up, server ping stability, visual glitches, bot A.I. etc - the usual. Game is exactly the same. Pay close attention to this man.
However as I mentioned before, personal taste is everything. If Sakura Swim Club is your best game ever, immersing yourself with hours of gameplay - than perfect for you. Games are too be loved and played....including the Sakura series
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@aliovalio you know how the npc's in Hitman 2: Silent Assassin (2002) are? Yeah they are the same in Hitman 2 2018 edition. I really wanted to get back to Hitman in 2016, but it was horrible.
Well, it goes to show Angry Joe can't review games for shit, because Division got major expansions with a crapload of endgame content. You're saying that the game should be fundamentally different in concept because it received 50 updates. That's like saying Diablo 3 should've become Call of Duty after two expansions. In fact, apart from balance, the game has gained fantastic itemization over time, exactly what it needed to keep the end game interesting. Almost every gear set is viable now and there are several other options too (such as running a full exotic or hybrid exotic 'hexo' setup). Weapons are balanced and yet still have different uses, a very hard balancing trick that took many tries to get right (seen em all...).
This game was never just a coverbased shooter, its a coverbased RPG with guns. With ditto progression and stat mechanics. There is no trigger finger required in The Division, in fact, most skills are quite slow to use. This game is not paced like a Ghost Recon Wildlands either. You don't need superb aim and there is no sandbox. Missions are linear, with lots of triggered events.
What you need is a well balanced team setup for the hardest missions, with good timing and placement of skills, a min-maxed gear setup and knowledge of each mission you play and the enemy types you encounter. Good use of consumables and grenades. That is what the Division is about. When you play endgame right with a good team, none of the enemies really feel like bullet sponges - they go down quickly and effectively. If you have to sit there behind cover shooting at an NPC for two minutes, you're undergeared or lack the right setup. Most of my gameplay is spent running cover to cover and mowing down enemies along the way, with a grenade here or there for good measure. Or I pick up a D3 FNC set with a shield and go straight up melee.
Two things I don't like about Division:
1) Game feels soulless/grindy. DAI/MEA/FC4/FCP/general MMO kind of grind. World is kind of empty and stale with fodder in the way. Missions and main story are forgettable. It's a whole lot of "meh."
2) Gameplay is fundamentally a cover shooter and the damage system is arcade (one sniper headshot won't kill unless they're leveled well below you). The latter is a deal breaker for me. If you take the time to line up a headshot, the game should reward you in kind. They don't even stagger.
I'm told Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Wildlands is a much better game but I haven't played it yet (and they keep releasing more content for it so it's gonna be a while yet).
I'm still regrettably playing Primal. I must be a masochist. :C
The game is a grindy game and was always presented as one, not sure what you had in your mind going into it. The whole premise of The Division was PVP in the Dark Zone, which has the core concept of hauling loot to extract out of there. And it also offered PVE, with a simple campaign, yes. But PVP was the bread and butter. Over time, it appeared the PVE part of the game landed a lot better and thus was expanded, but to suddenly expect that to offer a deep narrative is rather strange IMO. The whole setting is just there for immersion, not so much a gripping story. And I do think it nails the immersion... the city really has a distinct atmosphere to it that sets the tone nicely.
The game does reward headshots by the way, but under max level the difference isn't that noticeable. Once you can gear and improve the power of headshots and get reliable crit chances, the game gets a lot more flexible with builds and how quickly you can down enemies. Weapons like sniper rifles also have a much higher headshot bonus. While levelling, however, the use of grenades and skills is very similar to endgame in effectiveness. The gunplay, while arcadey, is very fine grained in terms of recoil and other characteristics of weapons. Things like burst fire and how your reticle responds to movement and shooting introduce a decent level of skillbased gameplay.
As for the soul of the game - again, you can only
truly find that in the Dark Zone. Clearing a few NPCs for some loot, having to carry it to an extraction point, waiting for the heli to arrive which creates a blip on the map for everyone to see 'hey look, someone with full bags waiting to get shot at'... and then the high-intensity standoffs waiting to see which team makes a move and turns Rogue, usually followed by a chase through buildings and alleys. Or, playing the agressor yourself and getting hunted by 2-3 other parties who can also turn on each other, great fun. Thát is where the soul of this game comes out - and not in the dull comfort zone of single player exploration. (Although even a single player can go into the DZ and play stealthy).
If you go into The Division for the single player or an open-world experience a'la Wildlands, you didn't get it
As for Wildlands, its a completely different concept that is equally stale and grindy once you've played a dozen hours and the novelty wears off. But Wildlands lacks the endgame and progression. What it offers is the tactical / sandboxy aspects which are fun to play around with.
Both are pretty decent games overall, but it seems very important to understand each game's concept before drawing conclusions
Which incidentally was the downside of Fallout NV: you could actually max out characters, and did so by level 60. Is that the case with Fallout 4 as well.
Or respeccing.
