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We sat down with Ubisoft to learn more about the new The Division experience, which is bringing the signature gameplay to Android and iOS devices.
"Hello everyone and welcome back to Gamereactor.
Today we have another really exciting one for you because I'm here with Fabrice from Ubisoft to talk a little bit about The Division Resurgence again.
This is our second actual interview dedicated to The Division Resurgence and I figured, you know, it deserves that attention because this is quite a big project that Ubisoft is bringing to mobile platforms."
"So to begin with Fabrice, I just wanted to touch on that a little bit, talking about this move to bring mobile or existing console and PC games to the mobile platform.
How have you found that the mobile audience is adapting to that? Is there that desire to see these existing PC and mobile games making the leap to mobile? Is it something they're excited to experience for themselves?
I guess as a big player myself, the fact that I have, let's say, more options to play my favorite games everywhere is what I'm looking for."
"So more from a strategy standpoint, we believe at Ubisoft we have some very powerful universe like The Division, for instance, and the challenge was how can we bring that to more people in more countries and can be, let's say, played anywhere.
So that's really the basis of what we are doing. And coming back to The Division Resurgence, here it was really how we keep the essence of what makes The Division on mobile devices and that's really what we have been crafting lately.
And actually touching a little bit on that, how does your development philosophy change when you're approaching creating a game for the mobile platform instead of creating a game for PC and console?
As leading the project, I'm a big believer of how constraints can shape your experience and especially in video games. So it was a lot about, okay, if we think about the different constraints of being on a mobile, what does it mean on the gameplay experience?
And basically, how do we adapt to that? And if we take mobile, it's a very complex environment from a technical standpoint because you have a lot of different devices. So the question was, how can we make sure the game is running on as many devices as possible without compromising on quality?
A second aspect would be the connection as well. If you're playing on a phone, you're on Wi-Fi and sometimes you're on data roaming and so how you handle that as well. So it was, once again, something we really take into account. And the game is very strong at being pretty flexible depending on the connectivity."
"And last but not least, it's also adapting to the size of the screen, the fact that it's touch devices. And here it's a lot of back-and-forth. Mostly it's still technical, but a lot of game design, user experience, a lot of back-and-forth, playtesting the game to make sure that the controls are very good and very smooth.
And all in all, I believe, to come back to the sense of your question, it's really, and I believe it's the best way to work in video games, it's really to think about where the player will be when he's going to play the game and to adapt to that, basically."
"Now, The Division Resurgence is also a really special game, you could say, because it's the latest Division game in quite some time, really, actually. That distance that we've gone from The Division 2 to The Division 3 is in the pipeline, but this game is coming and it's the latest Division game in, I think, seven or so years.
So with that in mind, did you feel any pressure knowing that people are going to look at this as the next step of the Division franchise, even though it's maybe not a numbered mainline next installment in the series?
The way I see it is more like how you expand The Division itself. So The Division is 10 years old now. The Division 2 is still doing strong, bringing a lot of content."
"And so for us, it's really to be in that line and to bring a new way of playing The Division, but still being very true to what The Division is about. So in that sense, for me, I see it more like an expansion and making sure that people that are familiar with The Division, used to play or still playing, can play it basically anywhere.
But also, I believe, especially with a mobile game, it's a new way to reach new players that either never heard of it or did not have the chance to play with it because they don't have a console, for instance. So it's more an extension."
"Do you have any plans in place to connect The Division Resurgence to The Division 2 or, in the future, The Division 3? Will there be any sort of collaborative efforts that you have in store?
Well, I think first, there is already a connection in the sense that The Division Resurgence is canon. So it's fully consistent with The Division universe. The storyline is, the prologue is basically just before The Division 1, you're a first wave agent and you're trying to save the day in New York City where everything is collapsing.
And the main part of the game is between The Division 1 and The Division 2. So there is a strong link there. The game will be updated very often. We have a very ambitious plan for the players to make sure that they keep being entertained by what we're doing."
"And definitely, there will be options to find synergies or common ground with what's going on in The Division experience.
One of the things I noticed when I was going hands-on with the game again to experience it is that the open world is quite a complex affair that you've offered. That can't have been easy bringing a full open world to the mobile platform. So tell me a little bit about what that was like.
A nice challenge! The Division is really famous for very complex open world, realistic as well. So actually, we did a lot of research and development to make sure that we can bring that on the mobile."
"All in all, if you take The Division 1, you have almost 60-70% of the open world of The Division 1 on your mobile. A lot of stuff is behind the scenes to make sure that the game is still relatively small, around 10GB.
The fact that we keep a realistic look. One of the challenges, for example, if you take a mobile device, as the screen is small, it is very detailed. It can be very noisy, very quick.
So we did a lot of adjustment on the art direction to make sure it looks realistic and very qualitative, but still very legible and you can still follow the action, understand where you should go, what type of threat you should shoot at."
"So that's all those little stuff, adjustments to bring the experience on mobile that we have made. And I have to say we are very proud of the result because I think the game is really shining on the market right now.
One of the other key parts of The Division is always the social element, being able to team up with players and friends and work together and conquer all the different activities. With it being the mobile platform, how did you navigate the social element to make sure that The Division Resurgence felt like an authentic The Division experience?
On the social aspect, indeed The Division is a very social experience, so we kept that foundation and we even pushed it even further with the fact that the open world itself, you can meet with real players that are not necessarily in your team, which is a first in The Division universe."
"The whole idea was, okay, what's going to happen if you meet strangers in the open world, try to tackle the same objective, the same targets in the world, and perhaps you can friend with them and ultimately join in the main mission, for example.
And so we did a lot of development there to make sure that you have that very vivid feeling when playing. I can't wait to see when we're going to release on the 31st because with the mass of players, I think New York will be very busy.
I'm pretty sure we will see stuff that we didn't necessarily anticipate. And I think at the end of the day, the goal was really to make it as quick as possible to meet and ally with strangers."
"And also there is a lot of small quality of life experience, like for example, you can post in the chat that you are about to join in a mission and people can jump in directly in the fight. They can also jump in in the middle of the completion of the mission.
So it's really to smooth that thing. And at the end of the day, and especially mobile gaming, I think is really strong at giving options to the player to play with others. And so we fully embrace that philosophy.
And then talk to me then a little bit about the process that you went through with balancing the game, because obviously the Division has a very broad looting and progression element in that regard. But then you also have to add to that the mobile sort of centric task structure and daily login encouragement. How did you bring that all together into one cohesive whole?
First thing is, once again, being very authentic, we keep one of the foundations of the Division. So it's an RPG at heart. And that's my favorite part personally as a player, to get that loot that gives me the perfect build for a specific situation. So we really kept that."
"It was very important also to kind of simplify a bit the equation, knowing that it can be a complex very fast. So that's why we developed something that is specific to Resurgence, which are the specializations that are kind of, it's like classes, if you want, that give proper gameplay elements, gameplay style, I mean, to your character.
So you can be a tank, a DPS, a support. And from there to give that routine to get stronger and stronger. As we're on mobile, so that means you play while moving around, when going to your job or playing in your coach, for example."
"And so that's where we also designed a shorter game session. And ultimately, the goal is really to make sure that if you play a bit every day, you're still progressing to get a stronger character and at some point to tackle the most challenging part of the game.
So that is the legendary mission. So it's like the highest level of difficulty of the game right now. And it's very challenging. And of course, the infamous Dark Zone.
Regarding balancing, that's why we did sort of test the game with real players looking at the behavior, how people were progressing, where we felt the difficulty was kind of off. And for the launch, I'm very happy with the current state of the game."
"I think we have something very progressive, a good pace towards, I guess, very powerful builds at some points.
And talk to me then as well a little bit about the monetization, because obviously, being a mobile game, you're offering it as a free to play experience. So how does that change the sort of dynamic of the way that you monetize the division?
The first principle for us is that if we come back to the core loop of the game, which is to get the best gear and the best weapon. So for us, it was very important to keep that."
"And so what it means is that everything in the game can be lootable, can be dropped by enemies. And so the goal for us is really to keep that loop.
In terms of monetization, we have basically two main axis. One, as it's a very social game, is how can you brag yourself. So it's like what we can see in a lot of game titles, cosmetics to express yourself and show your special, let's say.
And also, the other axis is more like if you pay, you're basically progressing a bit faster and have a bit more options to get more powerful. But at the end of the day, and that was very important, is to keep that fairness, whatever you're not paying or you're paying in the game."
"And as a final question, then, Fabrice, what's your long term vision for the Division Resurgence? And is there a world that potentially this game, bringing the division to mobile through Resurgence, is maybe a stepping stone to bringing the division to Nintendo Switch platforms?
I think the most important for us is a bit to follow the path of our big brother, with the Division 2 especially. They've been live for seven years, a lot of developments, improving the game, adding new stuff. And so that's really that path we want to follow.
In terms of platform, we're still looking at our options. But for me, what is very important now is to do a great launch on mobile on the 31st of March."
