Ubisoft’s taken the feedback they received over The Division‘s closed beta on board and made various tweaks and changes as a result, but what’s been changed?
Well, as usual, a good portion of the changes come in the form of bug fixes and patches to exploits and cheats discovered (and abused) by players in the closed beta held earlier in the year, but there’s some been some large changes made to how the game’s Dark Zone functions, too.
First though, here are the quality of life improvements:
- New Ubisoft Club Action available for participating in the Open Beta unlocking an exclusive reward in-game
- New and improved Tutorial Video
- Tutorial video is now available to view from the Character Select Screen
- Fixed two bugs that allowed players to become invisible to other players
- Fixed an exploit with Ballistic Shield Skill that allowed players to become invincible
- Cheat Detection and Prevention additions and updates
- Fixed mismatch of stats that occurred occasionally between Vendor Inventory and Player Inventory when item purchased
- Adjusted player movement speed while running with a grenade in hand
- Fixed a bug that sometimes caused other player’s name and health bar to not be visible in the Dark Zone
- Fixed some Weapon Mods that resulted in incorrect stat values when equipped
- Fixed some weapons that didn’t appear as Contaminated when obtained in the Dark Zone
- Fixed a bug with the Reward Claims Vendor that caused stacks of consumables to be decreased under specific circumstances
- Fixed a bug with stats display not updating when browsing Vendor Inventories
- Fixed a bug that caused continuous vibration under very specific conditions
- Fixed a very rare bug that prevented players from being able to fire or switch their weapons
- Added mission Dialogue lines in Missing Persons: Heather Lau Side Mission
- Several environment fixes to prevent falling through world issues in specific places
- Multiple stability fixes (23 unique crashes fixed)
- Server optimizations and improvements (players will receive less connection errors now)
- Multiple localization fixes and improvements
- Additional polish & bug fixes too numerous to mention!
That’s the technical (but still very much welcome) stuff out of the way, but here’s the stuff you’re going to want to scrutinize if you’re a fan of The Division‘s competitive multiplayer mode: Dark Zone.
- New High End weapons available in the Dark Zone
- Refresh rate on Dark Zone chests has been greatly reduced
- Non-player enemies in the Dark Zone have been significantly increased in number
- Non-player enemies in the Dark Zone have been buffed slightly
- The Manhunt Timer now pauses instead of refreshing while in combat as a level 5 Rogue
- The Reward for surviving as a Rogue Agent has been increased to 1.5x the kill bounty
- The Health Bar for Agents in the Dark Zone now only turns red when they actually become Rogue
- A new warning icon has been added to indicate an Agent who has shot another player but has not done enough damage to go Rogue
- Dark Zone experience leveling curve has been adjusted slightly
- Disabled the option to transfer Dark Zone brackets as a Rogue (This prevents players using Bracket Transfer as a means to escape after becoming Rogue)
- Removed some ropes that allowed players to reach areas that gave them an unfair advantage
Breathe a sigh of relief guys, it seems that Ubisoft have taken note of almost every complaint players had concerning the imbalance of the Dark Zones mechanics, including how easy it was to accidentally become a Rogue Agent despite having no intention of doing so. It’s equally nice to see that Ubi have made venturing inside the dangerous area more rewarding by upping experience and loot rewards. The inclusion of more NPC enemies should help to liven up the place, too.
The Division‘s open beta begins February 18 for Xbox One, and a day later for PlayStation 4 and PC. Also, note that new content not available in the previous beta will be included to give returning players the chance to try it out.