It’s surprising to think about, but The Division 2 is well over a year old now. It’ll be celebrating its second anniversary in February 2021, and yet, as a live service game, The Division 2 is still firing on all cylinders. Substantial communities across PC, PlayStation, and Xbox continue to be supported by Massive Entertainment. In fact, support is strong enough that Massive feels so confident in continued support for The Division 2 that it’s willing to commit to upgrades on both PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.
During its most recent State of Play presentation, Massive revealed its plans for The Division 2’s upcoming Title Update 12.1. During the presentation, Massive confirmed that it was working on an update for The Division 2 specifically for the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S console. With update 12.1, The Division 2 will be available in 4K resolution with 60 FPS on next-generation consoles. While Massive doesn’t clarify, the Xbox Series S is likely to be a lesser resolution.
Massive does clarify, however, that while it is working on an update for The Division 2 on next-gen consoles, it isn’t an “optimization pass.” The update will likely just unlock the resolution and frame rate for the game so as to allow the next-gen consoles’ improve hardware performance to do the work, and The Division 2 will not otherwise feature any improvements. Massive isn’t making any other meaningful changes on its own.
While it would be great for Massive to give The Division 2 a full range of improvements for next-gen consoles, just the improved resolution and framerate will be a huge improvement. The Division 2 features just 30 FPS on both PS4 and Xbox One, as well as PS4 Pro and Xbox One X. The Xbox One X did achieve 4K resolution, something the PS4 Pro struggled with, which is impressive on its own. The new next-gen patch should make the game perform much stronger, though.
During The Division 2’s Title Update 12.1 State of the Game, another reasonably big announcement was made. Massive had previously announced the release of Codename: Nightmare, a new gameplay experience set in Kenly College. Massive has now canceled this, unfortunately, citing “unforeseen circumstances in what has been a challenging year.” It’ll instead be made into an apparel event tied to the second half of Season 4.
Suffice to say, there are still some good things coming to The Division 2 players. Patch 12.1 will be especially nice for those who have acquired a next-gen console. However, it does seem like things could be winding down on The Division 2. That doesn’t mean players won’t be able to continue playing for a long while yet.
The Division 2 is available now on PC, PS4, PS4, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
