I haven’t really been following The Division: Resurgence, the mobile-first entry into Ubisoft‘s cover shooter franchise. I didn’t even realize it had launched until I heard the news it was being ported to PC, but now that it is on my preferred platform, I thought it might be worth checking out. I do have mildly to moderately fond memories of the original The Division, even if the sequel didn’t quite do it for me.
I was pleasantly surprised by what I found. Resurgence isn’t doing anything innovative, but it’s a smooth port and a generally enjoyable shooter experience, which I think is about the best you can expect from a game like this.
Resurgence takes us back to the beginning, New York in the aftermath of the Dollar Flu outbreak. The story starts slightly before the events of the first game before time-jumping ahead to just after the original, allowing it to serve as a more direct sequel than The Division 2 did.
The game isn’t just inspired by the original’s. The map and environment assets appear to be a direct copy and paste from the original game, with only small modifications. That might rustle a few Jimmies, but I don’t mind. The original map was very well designed, and enough time has passed that revisiting it feels more pleasantly nostalgic than repetitive, at least for me. Plus, the missions, collectibles, and such are still all brand new.
Resurgence does include some of the more positive improvements from Division 2, namely deeper character customization. On the visual front, character creation is fairly limited, but still better than the original’s, and mechanically character builds are much deeper than the first Division.
You can choose from one of four classes (called “specializations” here). You aren’t locked into your original choice; you can eventually unlock the ability to swap to other specializations as you wish. Your specialization grants you three active abilities — two on short cooldowns and an ultimate with a longer recharge — plus a tree of passive talents. I appreciate that you get all your active abilities right away, no waiting to unlock the fun stuff.
Each specialization has two talent trees that alter its playstyle significantly. As a Combat Medic, I can choose between a healing build or a DPS subclass based on spreading DoTs. As a DoT enjoyer, I’ve had a lot of fun with the latter — definitely my favourite set-up in any Division game to date. My one complaint would be I wish I could combine elements of both talent trees. It would be nice to have some healing without needing to sacrifice all of my damage abilities.
There’s also approximately 42,069.67 (repeating, of course) different ways to upgrade, modify, and otherwise enhance your gear, abilities, and character. It’s a bit overwhelming, but at least you won’t want for goals to chase.
The story isn’t going to win any awards. The dialogue is often quite cringe, and like The Division 2, it abandons the relatively grounded feel of the original for more over the top post-apocalyptic tropes. Early on I fought a dude wearing medieval knight armour and wielding a massive automatic crossbow. Sure. Okay.
On the plus side, the player character is fully voiced, which I always appreciate. You even get dialogue choices occasionally, though it doesn’t seem to affect much. More importantly, I don’t think the main story was ever a major draw for these games. For me, the appeal of the first was the immaculate vibes of wandering a mostly depopulated New York.
I won’t say Resurgence has fully captured the haunting loneliness that made the original game special, but it does get a lot closer than The Division 2 did. I think the winter setting does a lot to add to the mood, and the open world doesn’t feel as overstuffed as Division 2‘s did, while still offering plenty to do.
I did have one issue where I wasn’t able to log in for a while. I tried many fixes without apparent success, but then it just started working again. It might have just been launch day jitters, but it did put a bit of a black mark on an otherwise very positive first impression. I’ve also encountered minor issues with dialogue; the subtitles rarely match what’s being spoken, and I did have one moment where the audio kind of skipped forward and chopped out a chunk of dialogue.
In terms of being a mobile port, I would say The Division: Resurgence is a nearly perfect adaptation for PC. The graphics look a little dated by PC standards, but the controls, UI, and gameplay all feel made for PC. The gunplay feels great, and frankly it just doesn’t feel like playing a mobile game at all.
It’s got all the features you’d expect from a Division game, too. Open world (multiplayer in the MMO style rather than solo as in previous games), instanced story missions you can take on solo or co-op, PvP, the iconic Dark Zone. It doesn’t feel like any important features were cut to accommodate mobile.
Where it does show its mobile roots a bit more is in its endless upgrade and progression systems and its overwhelming plethora of events and rewards. It’s funny to me that mobile games have a reputation of being so miserly, because whenever I play them my complaint ends up being that I spend so much time claiming free items I barely have time left to actually play the game.
The cash shop is also as expansive as you’d expect. Guns, gear, cosmetics, battle passes, gachas, it’s got everything. You can earn free pulls for the gachas in-game, but of course you can always buy more for cash. For what it’s worth, the prices did seem to be on the lower side, relatively speaking. Certainly more reasonable than the eye-watering prices of Diablo: Immortal.
I think you have to go into The Division: Resurgence with the right expectations. I believe it’s best viewed as a large standalone expansion for the original game than something totally new. But if you’re not expecting a game that’s going to change your life and just want a solid free to play looter shooter to blow off steam, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the quality on offer here, as I was.
