Community Discussions

Div 2 Team: This is not how to run a live service game.

Main Post:

With what seems to be less than a day's notice, you unceremoniously pulled the plug on season 4 despite the fact that its in-game timer had showed 12+ weeks remaining. Players were still in the midst of progressing their manhunts and season passes, thinking they had plenty of time left because that's what your game told them.

What good is an in-game countdown if you're going to arbitrarily end it and eject players? You couldn't provide a grace period after announcing the re-runs to make sure that people had a chance to even find out that this was happening and scramble to complete their goals? And what could possibly have prevented you from letting us know when these season re-runs were going to begin in your big "The Road Ahead" post?

By the way, I responded to your tweet about that post asking:

If you will be re-running seasons throughout the year, where does that now put season 4's end date? It currently shows as having more than 12 weeks left; is that still correct? (I want to make sure it doesn't unexpectedly end before I finish my manhunts.)

16 people liked my reply, indicating that they had the same concern. No one on your team responded to me. Where was your community manager? The next day, I logged into the game just to check the timer, and it still showed 12+ weeks remaining in the season. Today, I found out that the season ended early this morning. How do you think I feel?

Some people want a refund for the money that they recently spent on the season pass, and they are absolutely right. I'm not in that sunken boat, but, while you're at it, how about I also get back the wasted hours I had put into my incomplete manhunts that I'll now have to repeat?

Rule #1 for a live service game with events and objectives running on a schedule is that you do not ever pull the rug out from under your players. You broke that rule severely.

Assuming that what's done is inexorably done, I think what people want from you now is: 1) An acknowledgment that you handled this transition inconsiderately; 2) to know, what, if anything, you intend to do to rectify it (referring primarily to those who just recently bought their season passes); and 3) assurances that something like this will never happen again.

Edit: It's amazing to me to see how many fans are willing to defend this. Take a look around this subreddit and see how many people are trying to refund their season passes right now (which Ubisoft is reportedly not making easy for them). How can you say that it's fine for the in-game season timer to just be false? For Ubisoft to fail to use their own announcement post or Twitter communication to let players know that the timer's display was not to be trusted? For advance notice and a grace period to not be provided?

So this didn't affect you; I'm glad. But look beyond yourself and consider how many others might feel anything from inconvenienced to cheated right now. It's not good enough that "the community suspected" this might happen or whatever. Do you realize what a small portion of the player base frequents a niche place like this sub? It is not players' responsibility to guess the hidden intentions of the developer but their responsibility to communicate with us. Heck, there are news and update sections on the game's title screen that could have been used to let people know that the timer was false and the season could suddenly evaporate at any moment, but Ubisoft didn't use any of these tools—their own tools! They just didn't try.

Top Comment: They extended the date until they figured out what to do. It actually ran a week past its original end date.

Forum: r/thedivision

The Truth About The Division 2

Main Post:

I have played The Division 2 on and off since launch. I’m only Shd level 915. But every time I come back. It hits me.

Ubisoft dropped the ball on The Division 2 so hard. Ubisoft and Massive had the Destiny 2 killer the whole time. If they would have to continue to push out study content. Maybe season’s and two small dlcs a year and then an expansion every 2 years with seasons. Continued to promote the game. They could have pushed the game as The Destiny 2 killer slash alternative

I believe in the future we will look back at how bad The Division 2 was handled and fumbled. And how in the long term it hurt Ubisoft. How it was one of the biggest mistakes and fumbles in gaming.

I would like to have your opinions and feed back Agents! Now I’m off to find Kelso so I can be marked safe from Manny and his debriefings!

Top Comment: I first picked up this game during the pandemic to play with some co-workers that I stopped seeing during the lockdowns. We played the campaign and then we were done. 2 months ago, we saw it for sale on Steam (I previously played it on PS4) so bought it again for PC and introduced it to a few other friends and we're back in it. I can't figure out why I stopped before, there was still so much left to do and it's such a blast playing this game. I absolutely love it!

Forum: r/the_division_2