Ubisoft, wake up! Hide the scars to fade away the shake-up!

Ubisoft Entertainment SA (NASDAQ: UBSFY) has a strong history when it comes to mangling the PC versions of its games. Even if the company has some vendetta against the Windows-based community, The Division – a potential gold mine for Ubisoft – is not going to survive on the platform if it continues to see a lack of developer support.

During its open beta, The Division on PC saw a large number of players take advantage of a blunder on Ubisoft’s part that allowed them to override a number of settings. Usually, such actions are either restricted on the client’s end or sees to the master server restoring all changes before letting the player connect. However, players faced no obstacles in tweaking their client-side files to increase the Critical Chance for their weapons, maximum health for their characters and much more.

At the time, Ubisoft promised that it was “on it,” as in working on a fix to correct the mess. However, the beta period soon expired and we all went our separate ways. It was a testing ground for the game after all and it was evidently clear that Ubisoft had to have a good anti-cheat system in place with the official launch.

The studio apparently forgot all about it. We’re currently into the second week of the Division’s release and the PC version is already plagued with numerous players packing aimbots, wall hacks, infinite ammunition and invincibility. In accordance with a new report, it clearly didn’t take them long to crack open whatever security measures Ubisoft had in place.

Here’s a video to show you all of that in action. Showcasing players right through obstruction, unlimited ammo, apparently no reloading, zero recoil, auto-aiming; you simply have to click once to kill.

You can expect Ubisoft to acknowledge the issue and once again state that it has a team working on a fix. The fact remains that the beta taught the studio nothing; the PC version has always been an open playing field for hackers, as developers in the past had to take extraordinary measures to secure their player-base. It’s saddening to see that for an online MMO, The Division’s anti-cheat on PC – if it even exists – was broken within one week of launch.

That doesn’t bode well for the game. A game cannot survive without constant support from its developer. Ubisoft needs to wake up and formulate a plan this instant to keep its game and servers safe from rodents. Otherwise, players are simply going to walk away, making post-apocalyptic New York City even more barren. No one is interested in wasting time in a game where the developers are least bothered about cheating players.