Developer Massive Entertainment has cited DayZ as one of the major influences for The Division.
With the beta just finished and the March 8 release date now a tangible thing, many will be excited that The Division is nearly here. At long, long last.
Many gamers though, despite their enthusiasm for this Tom Clancy title, won’t have been able to sample its New York mid-crisis scenario, instead having to make do with the multitude of trailers and screengrabs.
Well, if you’re looking for a game to compare The Division to, Creative Director at Mass Entertainment, Julian Gerighty, states that DayZ was a “big influence” on the Ubisoft game.
“I know that Day Z was a big influence because there are certain emotional things that happen in Day Z that really are very unusual in other games,” explained Gerighty speaking to TrustedReviews. “We wanted to see how we could have a very seamless experience within our game that could simulate this a-typical multiplayer experience where it’s very ambiguous when you see people in the Dark Zone.”
Related: 5 things you need to know about The Division
The Dark Zone is The Division’s PVP element. While all the campaign is available to play co-operatively – and positively encouraged both by Massive and us here at TrustedReviews – the actual PVP happens within a cordened off area in the centre of the Manhattan map known as The Dark Zone.
Within this you work with your team mates to recover loot and extract the contaminated swag. If you engage with a rival team, you’ll turn rogue and become a target for any players in the Dark Zone.
“There’s always this mental calculation of whether this is a friend or this is a foe. Do they have anything that I could want? Am I playing with any other people, could we take them down? Do they have other players hiding and waiting for us to come out into the open? All of these things are super intense emotional feelings, and it’s not a classic PVP area. I don’t think it’ll ever be a classic PVP area. That’s its richness.”
The Division release date is set for March 8 on Xbox One, PS4 and PC.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.