It’s time for another Retro Ad Replay article! This is the series where we take a trip back in time to reminisce and celebrate the anniversary of some of the most significant moments in gaming. If you find yourself hungry for more content like this, be sure to visit Mandatory.com.
In this March 8 edition of Retro Ad Replay, we’re heading back four years to when Tom Clancy’s The Division first launched on PC, PS4, and Xbox One. After a huge amount of hype caused by an impressive E3 reveal trailer, gamers were ready to explore the post-apocalyptic world of the Massive Entertainment-developed, and Ubisoft published, The Division.
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The GameRevolution The Division review awarded the game a 3.5/5, celebrating the “beautifully realized ‘after the fall of civilization’ version of Midtown Manhattan” and how, “for an online game, [it] works extremely well for solo players.” However, the reviewer criticized the RPG elements for being “too simple” and “too generic,” in addition to how the game “somehow makes shooting boring.”
Here’s a snippet from the GR review:
They say to avoid the pitfalls of the future, we must look to the past. At the very least for Ubisoft, this mantra could have been thought of a lot more in creating The Division. Like BioWare and Rockstar Games, the French-Canadian publisher has proved time and time again that they are near unbeatable when it comes to hatching up brilliant new IPs. Sadly, they are just as frustrating in what exactly these grand idea games add up to. Watch Dogs, Assassin’s Creed, and now The Division are all the kinds of worlds I love to lose myself in. But I think we’re at impasse. Entertainment is ever evolving, and that goes double for videogames. It’s just not enough to make a game that is big and richly-detailed, only to then tie down players by saying “look at all this, but seriously just do this… pew pew pew!”
Check out The Division launch trailer embedded below:
