Tom Clancy's The Division

[Surlyboi]

Destiny only went into maintenance mode only recently. And it's probably because they've pulled resources for Destiny 2.

As for this one, it'll be the first game I've actually payed for in about 18 months. I'm ok with throwing some dough at it.

[01101010]

Destiny only went into maintenance mode only recently. And it's probably because they've pulled resources for Destiny 2.

As for this one, it'll be the first game I've actually payed for in about 18 months. I'm ok with throwing some dough at it.

You are not helping me NOT buy this.

[Falconeer]

Destiny 2?! Wasn't Destiny shit at launch because it was a work in progress for the ages?

[Surlyboi]

No, Destiny was shit at launch because people had built it up to be Robot Jesus and it was merely a solid shooter with a lot of MMO elements thrown in.

[Evildrider]

From what I've seen I'm still going to give it a go.  It also gave me an excuse to finally upgrade my vid card.   

[Surlyboi]

If for no other reason, I'll buy it because they managed to work in the Talking Heads' "Life During Wartime" and they did it beautifully.

[Strazos]

Destiny had a lot of potential that was just not followed up on at launch. It got a bit better with the DLCs, but Taken King was actually pretty great - interesting environments, a coherent story, nice set pieces, and boss fights that required actual thought and coordination. My group and I actually ended up doing all the challenges in the King's Fall raid, so we definitely got our money's worth.

It will forever pain me, however, that Bungee never did anything with the ships - they could have made a minigame or something out of them like they did with sparrow racing. Maybe they're saving actual ship content for Destiny 2. 

[Falconeer]

Just found out that this and Black Desert are getting released 5 days apart. Poop. 

[Falconeer]

Another worrysome trend for me is not that the Dark Zones are a KOS mayhem, but actually quite the opposite. Basically, it doesn't pay to attack other players because a) you don't know what they are carrying and if it's worth getting 'rogue' over what could be a silly green weapon. b) it's easier to get said loot from mobs than players. c) when you attack another player you become a HUGE target visible everywhere across the map and when you get killed for it d) you lose money and XP. So in short, after the initial chaos of the beta, I tend to see it becoming a place where people just go get loot from mobs and rarely attack each other simply becaue the risk does not ever justify the reward. I hope I am wrong because the afore mentioned paranoid chaos is what makes the Dark Zones special, but I am afraid there won't be enough incentives to kill each other as opposed to simply get in line for your mob run and quietly deliver at an extraction point where everyone else is doing the same.

[Furiously]

You must have been in different dark zones than I was... It was pretty split between rogues and people waiting for a good opportunity to go rogue.

I didnt have near the amount of fun playing I thought I was going to. I was considering pre-ordering but I'm not so sure anymore.

[Falconeer]

No I am sure it was split. I am just saying there's usually a very different behaviour in betas and released games, especially after the first week madness is over. The Path of least resistance usually emerges, and in this case I am not sure it is "try to kill everything with some loot" as the consequences for failure are potentially bigger than the loot (you can even de-level and lose access to your already equipped gear).

[Kageru]

One review mentioned that the best PvP loot is on vendors using dark zone currency and levels. Since you lose both of these when you die as a rogue it's another incentive to hunt rogue agents (which is at least thematic) over becoming one. In practice though once people have extracted any gear they wanted out of the dark zone the player motivation will be boredom and griefing.

It's a pretty threadbare mechanic to keep PvP action flowing in any case.

[01101010]

One review mentioned that the best PvP loot is on vendors using dark zone currency and levels. Since you lose both of these when you die as a rogue it's another incentive to hunt rogue agents (which is at least thematic) over becoming one. In practice though once people have extracted any gear they wanted out of the dark zone the player motivation will be boredom and griefing.

It's a pretty threadbare mechanic to keep PvP action flowing in any case.

How does this work in the game? Do you go into the Dark Zone and if you kill someone just wandering around you become marked? Then if someone finds you and kills you, that someone gets XP and stuff, but is not marked because you were?

Then say that person kills a few more marked people, gets more stuff. Then that person decides to kill my guy, who is not marked, for the laffs then that person loses that stuff?

[Surlyboi]

If you kill a rogue agent or a manhunt target, there's no repercussions on you. So go ahead and kill all the rogues you want. The second you kill a non-hostile agent though, you're marked.

I spent most of last night dropping rogues at every chance I got. It netted me enough cash to buy the godly weapon Caduceus. After that, I was a one-man wrecking machine with the few exceptions of ambushes or four-on-one fights against rogues that were equally equipped.

That said, if you think that there's not enough impetus to go rogue, I merely point to this thread and laugh and say, "some men just want to watch the world burn..."

[Gets]

Dark Zone is a PvP zone. When you enter the Dark Zone you know shit got real from your character slightly hunching their shoulders. Dark Zones have rank brackets, which means players are funnelled into the same bracket by means of difficulty and restricting access to DZ loot crates. The keys to open these crates are dropped by DZ mobs. In a group the "Finder's Keepers" rule applies to DZ loot. DZ also has a DZ Rank, which you gain with DZ XP, and its own currency called DZ Funds. DZ Vendors deal in DZ Funds. You lose both by dying as a Rogue Agent.  Friendly fire is not on if you're in a group, so if you want to kill your group members you need to leave party first. If you kill another player you turn into a Rogue Agent. Group members close to you also turn into a Rogue Agent. Rogue Agents turn red and their location marks appear on the map for everyone in the zone. Rogue Agents have a bounty on them. They are also visible through walls if closer than 100m of people. The more people you kill the higher your Rogue Stage, which goes up to 5. If you survive as a Rogue Agent for 5 minutes you get a reward, higher the Rogue Stage the better the reward. The timer starts over if you attack a player. If you reach Rogue Stage 5 a Manhunt side mission starts in the zone for everyone with you as the target. Again, survive for 5 minutes and you get your own bounty as a reward. How much DZ XP and DZ Funds is lost dying as a Rogue Agent depends on your Rogue Stage and how much you have. You also drop all the DZ loot on your person upon death no matter if you're Rogue or not.

Example: Guy defeats a bunch of Rogues ambushing him.
https://youtu.be/vgyFprEMmYY

It's actually all very casual considering you can respawn 150m away in a Safe House and run back to the fight in less than a minute. Death really is a no-big-deal in this game and no one should discouriage themselves from venturing into the DZ. Granted such a PK-flagging mechanic does have expected shortcomings, such as a non-flagged player deliberately standing in the crossfire of his Rogue Group friends so whoever they are shooting at turn Rogue and easily killable. Since you can sprint forever in this game you have the option of running away if you see potential or obvious PKers coming your way. Why sprinting is not limited or linked to the Stamina stat for that added "REELISM!" is a bit mystical, but I reckon it is a consolitis symptom. The beta DZ instance had a player limit of 12 supposedly, but I don't know if that is true. I read that there is a way for two groups to deliberately get in the same instance, but don't ask me how. I know you can get in a fresh instance by using the Matchmaking function (LFG, then leave party).

I got to put 10 hours into the beta. I spent this time wisely by collecting all the intel achievements (Echoes are cool) and talking to random people about how the game is alright. There was no "hot mic" icon to show you if you're broadcasting and Push-To-Talk is off by default. I expect this to be tweaked later. The most positively surprising thing for me, and I haven't heard anyone else mention this, was multiple-monitor setups working out of the box. Triple monitors works without having to go into Video Settings once, with no GUI elements missing, and the fact that you can play with double monitors with the secondary acting as a dedicated map screen is really cool and yet unheard of. The vast majority of devs neglect Eyefinity type resolutions completely. At least the Titanfall people fixed the dissapeared minimap after the second DLC.

[Surlyboi]

I am (sort of) Legend

[01101010]

If you kill a rogue agent or a manhunt target, there's no repercussions on you. So go ahead and kill all the rogues you want. The second you kill a non-hostile agent though, you're marked.

I spent most of last night dropping rogues at every chance I got. It netted me enough cash to buy the godly weapon Caduceus. After that, I was a one-man wrecking machine with the few exceptions of ambushes or four-on-one fights against rogues that were equally equipped.

That said, if you think that there's not enough impetus to go rogue, I merely point to this thread and laugh and say, "some men just want to watch the world burn..."

Younger me thinks this would be fine. Older me doesn't have the patience to put up with griefers and their super toys. It was the main reason I left Vanilla WoW PvP server.

[Gets]

The Safe House respawn area has three exits. Griefers can't camp all of them.

Also there are rumours of an Open Beta in two weeks thanks to a supposed Italian Xbox page leak.

[Nija]

There is going to be a HILARIOUS amount of cheating in this game. Ubisoft has no idea what they are doing when it comes to things like this.

I would approach this one really cautiously. It MIGHT be worthwhile on consoles, but I would lean towards waiting until after the first content patch/release/expansion hits.

[Evildrider]

There is going to be a HILARIOUS amount of cheating in this game. Ubisoft has no idea what they are doing when it comes to things like this.

I would approach this one really cautiously. It MIGHT be worthwhile on consoles, but I would lean towards waiting until after the first content patch/release/expansion hits.

There is no difference than any other pvp game out there though.. People still constantly cheat on CS and how old is that game.  I'm not being defensive, but I'd be more worried about the lack of stuff that beta testers had access too then if they were running anti cheat on a beta weekend. 

[Nija]

I don't know if you are serious or not. This is going to be like Diablo 1 cheating.

[Evildrider]

Basically if it isn't a complete game cheating doesn't even matter.  I can do the pve stuff while waiting for them to patch pvp. 

[Kageru]

PvE depth is the other concern though, unless they take the game in some weird direction I don't see how encounter and loot diversity plus a probably small and static over-world map are going to keep game-play engaging.

[Evildrider]

PvE depth is the other concern though, unless they take the game in some weird direction I don't see how encounter and loot diversity plus a probably small and static over-world map are going to keep game-play engaging.

After seeing some stuff about the map it's not as small as it seems though.  There's only one fast travel spot and there are no vehicles so it's going to feel big enough. 

[01101010]

http://tomclancy-thedivision.ubi.com/game/en-GB/news/detail.aspx?c=tcm:154-237962-16&ct=tcm:148-76770-32

Demo weekend coming... Feb 18.

[NiX]

For anyone getting this that lives in North America, you can unlock 4 skins for free by going here and entering the code AGENTORIGINS.

This is what you get:

[01101010]

Cool. Thanks.

[Falconeer]

Works in Europe too!

[kaid]

No, Destiny was shit at launch because people had built it up to be Robot Jesus and it was merely a solid shooter with a lot of MMO elements thrown in.

That had its entire story thrown out shortly before release and came out as the most disjointed WTF random missions strung together for reasons it was no longer possible to grasp game.

[NiX]

Works in Europe too!

Must depend on where you are in Europe. GAME has one of the skins as a pre-order bonus, so some Europeans get rejected for the code that gets all 4.

[Falconeer]

Apparently, I was able to get it but my friends in my same country or even city weren't. I don't know what to think, at this point I wonder if it had anything to do with what language were your cookies set on on the UBI page, or the language of your browser. So, huh.

[01101010]

http://tomclancy-thedivision.ubi.com/game/en-GB/beta/index.aspx?ncid=1628-3502-5748--2-odsocmed-17-23-TCTD_RCH_--1-4-11-0216

Demo client is up for downloading on all platforms. No clue about Europe, sorry...

[Mac]

Demo client is up for downloading on all platforms. No clue about Europe, sorry...

I was able to join the open beta from Europe through U-Play.

Just log into U-Play and then it's kind of hard to miss.

[Falconeer]

Oh I preordered through Steam and today it let me download the open beta client no problem, so looks like it's gonna be alright.

[NiX]

Apparently, I was able to get it but my friends in my same country or even city weren't. I don't know what to think, at this point I wonder if it had anything to do with what language were your cookies set on on the UBI page, or the language of your browser. So, huh.

Just an FYI that if your friends are getting the season pass they get those skins plus a few more. Here's what comes with it currently:

-Survivor increased carrying capacity

-NY EMT bonus to healing

-NYPD increased ammo capacity

-NYFD bonus to fire resistance

-Hunter bonus to shotgun damage

-National Guard increase to armor

-Hazmat Suit increase to exotic damage resistance

I'll see if I can find good images of the additional ones.