Over the last few months though, Ubisoft has been conducting extensive QA on The Division Heartland, leading some sources to believe that a release could be imminent. We can exclusively reveal that the game will feature two modes, ‘Storm’ which is a PvPvE mode and ‘Excursion’ (previously named Expedition), which is a PvE mode aimed at preparing you for Storm. Several sources compared Excursion to the tutorial mode of Storm, where players can play with two other friends and learn the map by scavenging, looting, exploring, and fighting against enemy AI on the game’s massive map named ‘Silver Creek’. The current description for the Excursion mode reads “Explore alongside other friendly agents to prepare the world for the coming storm”. However, Heartland’s bread and butter is Storm, a PvEvP mode with a similar formula to the likes of Escape From Tarkov. The aim of this mode is to survive, loot, and extract from Silver Creek to your Base of Operations (BOO).
Silver Creek
Silver Creek is a large open world with plenty of opportunities to find rare loot, but the game’s virus-contaminated gas can spread from random locations, instead of just moving in from the maps edges like we have seen with many Battle Royales to date. Players survive the gas by finding and crafting gas mask filters, which will prevent you from falling into a ‘DBNO state’, which is simply a more complicated name for being downed. The game will feature tiered loot like we have seen in previous The Division games, with grey, green, blue, purple, and gold. Strategic Homeland Division Beacons (SHD’s) litter the map, enabling players to spend resources on various upgrades, in addition to virus detection, virus clearance, calling in supply drops, and more.
Base of Operations (BOO)
Your BOO is your central hub located in an abandoned ice rink. Here you can customise your loadout, matchmake for lobbies, sell your scavenged items, and buy upgrades, mods, and other weapons. Here you will also be able to enable “projects” which is Heartland’s take on daily and weekly missions. Completing these projects will grant you extra resources and XP points. One especially interesting feature of your BOO is the small arcade that it contains. This arcade includes previous Ubisoft games like For Honor, Just Dance, and Driver. It’s not clear whether these will be playable as minigames once the game releases though. At the BOO, you can craft upgrades to your weapons and “Prep Items”. Prep Items are self-explanatory, but they are items you can take with you into a match in order to get an advantage. There is currently four Prep Items in the game.
Insertion Point – Allows you to choose a specific insertion point when joining a match. Stash Box – Used for storing consumables and crafting materials in game. Buff Tower – Currently unknown description. Extractor Pod – Currently unknown description.
Characters and Classes
There is currently six individual characters to choose from in The Division Heartland, three male and three female. Apart from their appearance though, nothing else distinguishes them. Instead, you will pick one of three different classes after selecting your character: Weapon Expert
Talents: “tracking shot” - Enemies are marked after damaging them with a firearm, lasts 5 seconds. “shared armor kit” - Armor kits repair your armor as well as nearby teammates/friendlies. Perk: Covert Armor
Medic
Talents: “Health Recovery” - Restore Health after being in cover for a short time. “shared health kit” same as above but for health. Perk: covert Melee.
Survivalist
Talents: “Loot detection” - Crouching highlights nearby unopened loot crates. " shared filter" as above but for filters. Perk: Covert cover.
As you would expect with any The Division game, Heartland features AI enemies called “Vultures”. There’s currently six different types of vultures in the game, each with different attributes. These six types of Vultures are named Flanker, Grunt, Heavy, Sharps, Hooter, and Technician. Although the game has yet to be given an official release date, my sources reveal that The Division Heartland is progressing well and is in a better state than the recently leaked Tom Clancy’s Frontline. Ubisoft could reveal the game soon, with its quarterly earnings call for Q3 22 taking place on February 17th.
