I decided to install this game this free play weekend and get back into it. I was one of the people that purchased the gold edition of The original Division and had several well established characters. I did play the demo and enjoyed it quite a bit. I was very hopeful for where they would take this game but I did not preorder it based on my previous experiences.

I just installed this game yesterday at and at level 4, I uninstalled it. Here is some feedback I can provide:

As a "New" player, this game is trying to hard to present a challenge. I was playing a mission at level 3 and my friend witnessed how it was just too much. For a level 3 mission you are throwing too much at solo players Although I overcame the challenge, the challenge could never be rewarding enough. I think the the one thing that was lost on this generation is that some people just want to enjoy a good story. Yeah, sure, challenge me but don't get out of control and this is exactly what this game does.

Every map, every encounter is full of bad cover where you can easily get flanked and the AI knows how and when to exploit these to their advantage. I continuously called out these flankers and their obvious paths to the amusement of my audience and even could position myself to counter this.

One of the biggest gripes of this game was the bullet sponginess of the enemy. This still exists and it seems like they have dialed it up. I put a whole clip of chest and head shots into an enemy and they are still (barely) alive. Then I have to reload while 1 or 2 people charge me for the purpose of melee. Every encounter included grenadiers who could land grenades from all angles and distances. I overcame all of these cheap tactics and cared so much less about this game for it's effort. It was just too much try and not enough enjoy.

If you are really serious about bringing in new players and getting back returning players, at least let them (us) enjoy the game until the endgame without the cheap boring tactics. This should just be a welcoming fun experience and what I experienced is everything but.

If you are reading this and thinking get good then you are probably a part of why this game is so bad.