Divide is an isometric sci-fi adventure game with action elements that, while rough out of the gates, has righted its course significantly in a short time thanks to several patches.
When I first got a glimpse of Divide in December, it reminded me of one of my old favorite games that I was actually re-playing at the time — Crusader: No Remorse. Taking an isometric perspective for game design has always struck a chord with me, and Divide’s cool, yet familiar, futuristic sci-fi atmosphere made me yet more intrigued. I was pleased to receive a review code just after launch, but due to personal scheduling bumps, was not able to play more than about two hours right away, and then it was several days later that I was able to sink back into it. By that time, at least three patches were released, and I noticed that some of my initial pressing concerns were essentially fixed, making the experience much more enjoyable. Very early players and reviewers may have missed out on these significant changes that make the load times shorter and more importantly the combat sequences much better than at launch. While I don’t have an official changelog, it was clear to me from playing between the launch version and the latest, v1.07, how much had changed.
But let’s take a step back and take a look at what Divide offers at face value. Players take the role of David, a widowed husband and father of a young daughter, Arly. One day a former co-worker of his wife’s, Alton, asks him to meet at a subway station. David’s wife, an advanced scientist and engineer at Vestige which is a large and shady organization, recently died on the job, apparently by accident. Alton has information that may second guess the official findings though, and he gives David a suitcase that he is to open back at his home. Upon doing so, David discovers some very strange technology in the form of augmented reality contact lenses. Suddenly, a mysterious orb-shaped object seemingly teleports him and Arly to another place, and time. With Arly missing and David struggling to figure out where and when he is, the adventure is on to survive, find Arly, and figure out Alton’s role in this whole mess.
With the Solus contact lenses, David can see and access terminals and doors and other things that the naked eye cannot see. He soon encounters Eris, a woman with a quick trigger and who also has something to take up with Alton whenever they can find him. She agrees to help David out, and together, the duo navigate the large, futuristic Vestige campus, decrypting locks and fighting security bots and forces along the way.
Divide has a super simply control scheme that is essentially twin-stick in nature. Left stick moves you, right stick looks, or aims. Most of the time, David is in a relatively safe environment and you’re “aiming” just to be looking for interactables that the Solus lenses pick up. These include Vestige storage containers, terminals, doors, or even security bots to disable them if their shield is down. Of course, sometimes you have to wield a ranged weapon, requiring that you hold L2, aim with right stick, and fire with R2. It may sound complicated, and certainly some other articles I have read online suggest that it is, but it’s really not at all. The aiming can be touchy, but a bluish laser helps you keep track of what you’re shooting at. The first pistol you get has a long delay in between shots, but, David can run with R1 (no cooldown), there are plenty of objects to hide behind (plus you can run past enemies sometimes), and, after the patches, both the aiming and the amount of hits David can take have been much improved. The first time I played the game, David would die very quickly and the aiming was worse, making it a real pain, but post patches, David’s health regenerates rapidly, and the action sequences are no longer a dreadful event. Side note — the face buttons are not used, R2 is like your ‘X’ button for navigating and interacting, and you cannot look with Solus while running, which, is a kind of neat way to slow the player down and encourage exploration.
That said, Eris of course will help you in these action sequences when she is present, but at times she’s working on a terminal while it’s up to David to seek out other terminals and interfaces to steal hashes from. These hashes are like currency used to unlock other items to gain you more security clearance. Exploration in Divide is neat, but, a more detailed map could have been a plus. As is, you have to keep an extra eye out for stairs or other paths that go up or down, or ‘false walls,’ especially if you’re not particular familiar playing the genre. So, you can get a little bit lost or turned around from time to time. Fortunately, this hasn’t happened to me much and never for long, but I can see this being a potential sticking point for some players not used to the isometric perspective. It also doesn’t help much from an esthetic standpoint, that the art direction (specifically the design of the hallways and rooms) has a lot of similarities, making environments look and feel similar. The design is a pretty typical sterile, sci-fi look, which can get a little monotonous, but in between Vestige buildings you often get a short reprieve outside.
On the other hand, the music in Divide is quite good, and the only thing I can really say against it is that it’s not playing all the time. It fits the atmosphere wonderfully and it was one of the first components to the game I noticed and immediately liked upon first play, and that has stayed true several hours later. The voice-acting and the artwork used during the in-game dialog is a weakpoint, but not at all experience-breaking.
Overall, thanks to some quick release patches that really made playing Divide more enjoyable, it’s a game I would recommend. It’s not without a few sticking points, but none of them are bad enough to wreck the experience, resulting instead in a cool experience, even if it’s one that’s best played one or two hours at a time.
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