Ubisoft’s plague-ridden-New-York simulator The Division released last night at 9 p.m. Pacific and I went hands-on with the game for the third time in as many months, thanks to two earlier beta periods. The problem is, as expected, The Division’s online component. Despite two beta periods to (presumably) stress test servers, the clock hit 9 p.m. and The Division hit itself in the face with a tire fire. Things looked like this off-and-on all night: I’ve no idea how the servers will hold up over the next few days, but like any online-centric game it’s worth keeping in mind the game may be unstable for a bit. The Division is basically an MMO, and if there’s anything we’ve learned from MMOs it’s that launch days are uniformly abysmal. Steam reviews have reacted accordingly, dropping all the way to 45 percent positive as of 1 a.m. Pacific (when I’m writing this). The game looks decently pretty when I get it to load, though. Here are some screens. (Click on any image to enlarge it.)

As for the game itself, I’m slowly working my way through missions. So far I’ve done quite a few hours of “Clearing floors in generic office buildings” and “Shooting people wearing bulletproof hoodies” and “Watching dogs poop on the street.” The guns feel as spongy as ever, with headshot after headshot barely making a dent in enemies a few levels higher than you—a choice I still think clashes with the ultra-real aesthetic Ubisoft’s touted since the first E3 reveal. I wasted 400-plus rounds of assault rifle ammo on one sniper boss. It’s a weird game at first blush. We’ll have more for you once I feel I’ve covered enough ground for a proper review. My first impressions aren’t super positive, but maybe it’ll turn around on me later. The important part is: It’s not a technical disaster, aside from the requisite server hiccups. To comment on this article and other PCWorld content, visit our Facebook page or our Twitter feed.In the beginning there was God, then the Queen, then New Order.

New Order, for anyone unfamiliar with goths, Danny Brown, or the medium known as tumblr, is the band formed from the ashes of Joy Division. If you’re young enough to not be terribly familiar with either band, Joy Division, while running parallel to punk, was arguably one of the first “post-punk” bands; New Order was one of the first post-punk bands to acknowledge a black music besides dub. dohc hoodieA lot of iffy stuff that came afterward can be directly traced back to both bands, but the musicians themselves, like Sid and Jesus, were innocent.nhra hoodieLike Joy Division, New Order’s visual identity was formed by designer and co-founder of Factory Records, Peter Saville. ruff ryders hoodiesFrom the wave pattern as Dante-esque mountain range of Joy Division’s 1979 debut, Unknown Pleasures, to the haunted floppy disk of New Order’s "Blue Monday," Saville took a futurism and matched it to the new bass-heavy, disaffected sound of youth too emotionally and financially exhausted to revolt. faithless hoodie

The frantic smashed bottle aesthetic of punk was giving way to a colder and, at least visually, conservative look that both matched and slyly undercut the times. Or at least the latter was the hope and intention. Historical revisionism of “great time for punk music and maybe they weren’t so bad compared to now…” aside, it’s hard to push one’s art up against the combined cultural forces of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. ucsb hoodie saleThe ‘80s were decidedly mean times run by decidedly mean people.milwaukee heated hoodie ladiesWhich brings us to these decidedly mean times. First Raf Simons (2003), then Supreme and Vans (2013), and now the retailer Sandro have all used New Order’s Saville-designed Power, Corruption & Lies LP cover design from 1983 (which used art from the Henri Fantin-Latour 19th century painting “A Basket of Roses”) on various clothing they designed.

It famously appeared on the back of a (now very pricey) Raf parka, and was blown up and repeated all over Supreme x Vans sneakers. Sandro included it on a range of tees and hoodies released this week.Whether you’re a studious Anglophile, a Brit Pop audiophile, or just someone who wants to look like someone the Oasis brothers would pick on, it seems you can’t go wrong by throwing a Peter Saville design on your shit. Peter Saville, with his Joy Division and New Order designs, forever ensured theater kids would know who to sit with in the cafeteria and fashion designers could periodically take a break from coming up with anything new.The artwork of New Order, especially that of Power, Corruption, & Lies—classical imagery starkly laid across a background best described as “absent”—will always have appeal because it could mean anything, to anyone. Rebellion or fascism or austerity, or all three, packed neatly, never outside the lines. It’s ostensibly counter-culture, but even Saville’s story of getting permission to use the Fantin-Latour painting has a whiff of God Save The Queen patriotism.

(Saville told the Guardian in 2011, “Tony Wilson had to phone the gallery director for permission to use the image. In the course of the conversation, he said, ‘Sir, whose painting is it?’ To which the answer was, ‘It belongs to the people of Britain.’ Tony’s response was, ‘I believe the people want it.’it’s work that gestures towards meaning, but that asks nothing of either viewer or wearer, but to admire its coolness. This is not an insult. Post-punk fashion was only briefly following punk fashion, which was in direct response to fifteen odd years of shrill vomitus earth tone and rainbow decadence. A little restraint spoke volumes. And, as we’re once again in the midst of a hysteria that threatens to deafen, it still does.If Sandro, through its press release and creative director, Ilan Chetrite, wants to pretend the New Order iconography “transcribes” youthful rebellion or “’80s energy” (presumably not the “80s energy” of fired coal miners or AIDS), then they can and should.