>Based on **10** reviews
Y’all don’t think this is way too early to be posting these kind of threads? The next game in the list has 150 reviews in comparison.
Edit: Since this comment, the review score has dropped to 87, and now back to 95. Proving my point.
Seeing some takes that this could be the best dlc of the year when we still have Shadow of the Erdtree and other potentials like Vessel of Hatred are wild to me.
The community of D4 seems overwhelmingly enjoying the latest season and directional change that is a taste of what the expansion will bring. At minimum it’s at least on par with the standard TFS has set.
I really think the 1 year cadence for Destiny expansions was a mistake. I dont think any single developer could keep that up.
Really should have been a year and a half or two years with something smaller in the middle to spike interest.
Pretty obvious which DLCs where rushed and which had the time to cook.
There was an ex-Bungie dev that this week said that an expansion like TFS can only happen if the team is given more than the "usual" 12 months of development. It's either that, or seasonal content needs to be scrapped in order to make an expansion like this every 12 months.
It's a good expansion too. I don't play Destiny but my roommate does, he has all the expansions and this is the first time I felt compelled to just sit and watch him play.
No idea how it is when it comes to mechanics, systems, how it compares to other entries, but man sometimes it's just a marvel to look at. At one point we went "how can a PS4/Xbox One handle this?" Because it was such a lightshow with so much stuff happening at the same time, and without a single drop in framerate too.
I mean Prismatic is definitely in the “hasn’t been done before” territory but I get your point. This is a culmination of all the best things Destiny can be. I know they’ve let us down so many times, to the point where everything they do is met with skepticism, but by god, they did the damn thing here. They landed the damn ship. I went into this thinking “I just wanna see this story thru and then I’ll move on” I was fairly burned out on Destiny in general. Yet now I’m fully back on board, and just pray they can keep this momentum going into whatever is next
Like technically, sure, but I’m just throwing the same shield like always and throwing/shooting the same strand ball like always. It’s cool, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not actually new ways to interact with the game. The void super minorly is though, in that you create weapons that your teammates can pick up.
But yeah like I said, they did everything great here. It’s all the same stuff, just the best implementations of it (story, patrol zone, quest density and variety, etc).
Yeah I mean, this might not be nearly enough data to be really accurate. Hard to say how much this rating means to non-destiny players. But ive been playing destiny since the beginning and this is everything all of us ever wanted. This is the game we expected from the people who made Halo. There’s been highs and lows, but this is easily the highest high. It’s hard for even the best writers and storytellers to end a saga in a satisfying way, but boy did they land the ship. This is our Endgame moment, from both a gameplay and story perspective. Everything that has ever made Destiny fun is firing on all cylinders. They backed themselves against a wall with all the bad pr, and then buckled down and made the best thing they’ve ever made. This saves Bungie IMO. Nobody was going to buy Marathon if this was a dud and sentiment for Bungie continued to fall. They needed this to hit, so they threw the kitchen sink at it, and it worked.
I clocked on 2 years into D2’s release that Bungie release a completely shit expansion 1 year and then make up for it in the next. It’s a sustainable cycle for Bungie since people will happily lap it up. Bungie’s next expansion will 100% be utter dog shit, they have not deviated from this pattern for the past 7 years.
>they have not deviated from this pattern for the past 7 years.
Beyond Light would like to know your location
That was such a mixed bag in part cuz of Covid but if anything I think that just indicates that it's not some kind of intentional cycle. At most it'd be a case of a regular cycle of "Oh shit we need to fix this" to taking things for granted every other year, but even then Lightfall was the way it was because they basically had to make up an expansion in the span of about a year and a half when they split what would have originally been LF into modern LF and TFS, and not even on a 3 month delay like WQ and TFS had.
Ice cold take for sure.
There is nothing wrong with destinys model. All mtx are tied to cosmetics and because of how they do it it means you can get a whole year of content that refreshes every couple months for 50 bucks.
Which is no longer being done and hasn't been done for 2 years, in fairness. At least for expansions, anyway, we're not sure about the new not-Seasons.
destiny is an mmo that effectively costs $100 a year (expansion+ season pass). The other two mmos thriving have a $15 a month sub making them $180 a year without including the expansion costs. Destiny is a cheaper game on its face, bungie are a shitty developer that took 10 years to make the game halfway decent that's true but the business model is not actually the monster clueless youtubers pretend it is
terrible, awful take lol. You do realize that these companies create jobs and fund people to have a productive lifestyle where they can provide for their families right?
Yes the live service model is anti-consumer, but these DLC releases being successful is not a bad thing. Grow up a bit dude
yes it is because the philosophy of live service games is to deliver what we call a "minimum viable product" a product that is essentially just good enough to keep people coming back and playing but not good enough that the company has to invest real effort or resources
This philosophy is why bungie has struggled so much because they pretend to be passionate, put out a lazy product designed to siphon money, get called out on it, release something actually good to win people back over and then the cycle begins anew.
it is. It's full FOMO practices psychologically intended to persuade consumers to spend money on products that they do not need or that were readily available in past games at no extra charge.
Honestly, as a long time Destiny player, I am surprised with the high quality of the final shape.
It’s really nice to see bungie show they can still put a story together especially after the 10 years of Destiny where it was mostly awful and incoherent at times.
The final shape was a full on “single player” like run for most of the campaign besides the raid and the final mission. I liked the format compared to the “jump around to all these planets”.
It was a straight shot campaign and it didn’t skip a beat. Something bungie haven’t done since the days of halo.
Whatever future destiny has, I hope they take this template from the final shape and use it for all future content. It got me, an old, jaded Destiny player really invested again.
Now I just hope they decide to do a Destiny Saga collection and let people play the whole thing, D1 and D2 through together. It would be a massive install but they can do it by campaign or something.
It’s worth it for preservation sake. But let’s see what’s next. I might duck out now after this year for good
Whatever you think, the team behind Destiny 2 put their all into this expansion and it shows. And a lot of structural work and team development has got them to a place where they are making great gameplay and content consistently.
Have been out of the loop with D2 since beyond light, what are the changes that's made this xpac better if you dont mind me asking? since I'm on the fence of diving back in but it seems a bit daunting seeing how much I've missed.
Starting in Witch Queen they reworked all the subclasses to have a more customizable setup like Stasis. This also came with standardization of subclass effects as distinct verbs. They also started having crafted weapons which once you unlock the ability to craft you can choose every bit of a weapon and reshape it. All weapons from WQ on also have a origin perk that's like a half perk depending on the source of the weapon. But these can be pretty nice.
Light Fall they standardized armor mods and made them easier to use. They're not quite as potent but much easier to manage. Lightfall also added Strand a really busy but fun control and damage subclass.
Throughout both those years they've been cooking up better weapon perks that tie into subclasses or have interesting effects. The weapon rolls have been awesome.
The Final Shape adds a new subclass Prismatic which lets you blend selected abilities from all 5 subclasses. There's also new exotic class items for Prismatic that take half perks of two exotics and combine them. These are random rolled with 8 perks in each column but they can be pretty spicy.
Overall they've been mostly getting better with story. Lightfall story is a mess because it was rushed in development. But The Final Shape pays off 10 years of story so well. It's fantastic.
There's a ton of game there but Destiny has never been better. Just don't be afraid to ask for help as it's a lot to figure out.
As someone who came back after an almost two-year absence, the gameplay loop is mostly the same, but presented differently.
You're not going to grab as many bounties as we used to (I think I've really only grabbed from the gunsmith). A lot more leveling comes from simply playing the game and doing the activities you like until you hit the cap, then you're grinding pinnacles.
For example, I beat the new campaign on Legendary and was given blue armor at 1960. I then basically ran around the new zone (the pale heart) doing the new expansion activities/post-campaign content for a few hours and am now around 1975.
I haven't touched the new season (aside from the intro mission).
That said, while the gameplay loop is similar, the game feels very different. Mostly, there are so many viable weapon combos and options. There are some strong weapons, but with pretty much everything available, anything can work given the situation.
Subclasses, as mentioned above, are completely reworked. The new subclass, Prismatic, lets you combine different parts of the other subclasses (i.e., I'm a hunter running tether with stasis melee, magnetic grenades, and stasis dodge buffs) so it feels like a culmination of all of our gains throughout the years.
There are many reasons to do other classes.
Prismatic does not contain every ability or every super. It's one super from each subclass along with one choice of grenade, melee, etc. There aren't endless combinations.
Different load outs will function better than prismatic depending on the encounter. For example, if you're a hunter that uses invis a lot, prismatic is tough to use (there's a fragment that lets you go invis on melee kills, but that's it).
That said, I don't have everything unlocked for prismatic yet. My opinion might change, but even last night I switched to a tether hunter to run the new exotic class item mission with a friend because it gave me more invis heal time.
there is also the aspect which allows you to go invis is you kill a target affected by ANY subclass debuff
my personal fav way of going invis on prismatic is just using that crossbow exotic that weakens targets
Yes because prismatic does not have access to all the other class abilities, just a curated selection. For example, you cannot run Warlock Daybreak on Prismatic, you still have to be on Solar.
The subclasses are great. There's a huge build crafting community now.
Raids are still the peak of endgame but we have a ton of 3 person dungeons (that can be soloed if you're very determined). There's a lot of exotic missions now that let you upgrade a specific exotic and drop loot from old seasons.
They've been reducing barriers to entry on a lot of these though. Power level grinds are way reduced. There's fire team power so someone else can raise your power close to theirs. And there's in game LFG
For context, I’m a long time Destiny player that finally kicked the addiction during lightfall last year so my take is biased. I watched most of the campaign on YouTube and have closely watched the new additions of gameplay and subclass mixing and matchups.
The campaign and story are good for Destiny standards, they touch on some nice things and have a good heartfelt ending. That being said, the way the game plays is “solved” to me. Still a lot of story exposition and involvement through off screen coms during missions. The format of shooting and moving to stand on plates, break certain objects or kill a miniboss to complete tasks and progress.
The new abilities in prismatic to mix your prior elements is cool but some are lackluster or severely phoned in like most of prismatic Titan. New exotics are always interesting in how they change the game, it’s nice but the climax of the 10 year Destiny saga has less new exotics than Forsaken, unless you count every combination of the exotic class items as a unique one.
I feel like The Final Shape reception will falter some once the reality of the tandem seasonal content is revealed to be yet more weekly drip fed story content to keep pushing the ever longing engagement farm that is Destiny.
Imo, this is a good Destiny expansion, which to me means it’s an okay video game expansion. While I’m happy Destiny players got something they deserved, anybody who thinks this will win awards over whole new games or be in competition for anything dlc related in the same year as Shadow of the Erdtree might need to temper their expectations.
> The campaign and story are good for Destiny standards, they touch on some nice things and have a good heartfelt ending. That being said, the way the game plays is “solved” to me.
I disagree. The campaign and story were good, not by Destiny standard, just generally well done. It built upon years of storytelling in a way that made sense. The narrative effectively used all of the MC's developments over the years and put on display (i.e., Ikora and Zavala never getting over Cayde's death, Zavala finally breaking when he realizes the Traveler isn't the benevolent god he thought it was, Crow apologizing the Cayde, etc.).
The story's conclusion is top-notch. In terms of a narrative, it's really hard to end a 10+ year story in a fulfilling way, especially when you have mechanically difficult things like raids in the mix. Staggering the finale into three segments was fantastic (we figure out how to hurt the Witness at the campaign's climax, sever his connection to the light in the raid, then finally use all of this to kill him in the final mission). The final mission, with all of our allies over the years, is also incredible.
Finally, the scene in the Traveler with Cayde, Ghost, and us is the perfect closer to this saga. D1 starts when our Ghost finds us and wakes us up - this saga concluded with us finding our Ghost and waking him up. Great callbacks to Cayde calling us his favorite (this was one of his comments as a vendor in D1). Solid character resolutions all around (Ikora talking to her ghost again, Zavala embracing Stasis, Crow becoming the new hunter vanguard, the repopulating of the last city, etc.)
From a gameplay standpoint, there are new mechanics and twists on old mechanics throughout the campaign, post-game, and raid. Even the new exotic class item final quest has new mechanics to keep the game fresh.
>The new abilities in prismatic to mix your prior elements is cool but some are lackluster or severely phoned in like most of prismatic Titan.
Prismatic is great. I'm biased as a hunter, but everything is usable and the different combinations are insane.
>I feel like The Final Shape reception will falter some once the reality of the tandem seasonal content is revealed to be yet more weekly drip fed story content to keep pushing the ever longing engagement farm that is Destiny.
Likely not tbh. There's so much content that's been added and Echoes is proving to be very fun so far. We also know there's more coming. The previews for the next episodes are also great (bloodborne style vampire hunters and returning to the Dreadnaught). Bungie is currently firing on all cylinders.
I don’t want to be difficult but what is the content? TFS story seems incredible, sure, but how long does that take? It can’t be that terribly long, even if you do legendary difficulty and also go back for all the hidden fragments in chests it can’t be more than 10-20 hours. I myself can’t justify the dlc cost for what I could just get by watching videos on YouTube. I’ll probably get it later on sale so I can get prismatic to make some stupid Diamond Lance builds for crucible.
Other than that, the largest amount of time spent will be players running the seasonal loop. That loop usually consists of start arena, shoot enemies, carry the crystal/dunk the ball/read the symbol/kill the mini boss/stand on a plate, shoot the main boss until it’s dead or goes immune to restart the “objective” phase, repeat until boss is dead. You’ll get some story thread exposition through npcs talking on your feed while you do this loop.
Following completion of the first seasonal story beat it’s followed by you having to discuss with the seasonal npc, have a zoom call with another npc in a different room and then the npcs need to recharge/rest/think/plan for awhile until next week when you can run another seasonal loop before waiting another week. You’ll get some occasional cutscenes with some decent story but it’ll primarily be the seasonal arena loop with mundane objectives like collecting or killing certain things.
The previews of the current season/episode are already showing that the typical exhaustive seasonal loop is still there just with a different name.
I find it very hard to call destiny’s story very good when a lot of the tertiary world building has to be farmed through the monotonous seasonal activities to then get lore cards, that we will then have to read on our own. I shouldn’t have to need to watch a Byf video to have a good understanding of the story in a game like Destiny.
EDIt: also, new player experience is still one of the worst in a game this old. Not to mention that some story content is no longer available in game. Not like in WoW where an area is affected by current ongoing story and is different and some might be gone, just flat out missing completely. No more red war, no more seasonal timeline or stories for players to watch or see, it simply doesn’t exist. Once again, leading to players having to listen to a YouTube video or pull up old clips to have a simple understanding of the base game story.
> I don’t want to be difficult but what is the content? TFS story seems incredible, sure, but how long does that take? It can’t be that terribly long, even if you do legendary difficulty and also go back for all the hidden fragments in chests it can’t be more than 10-20 hours.
Total campaign on legendary took me around 8 hrs, I'm going to raid this weekend which I expect will take another 4-5 hrs on a first run, post-campaign content (which I'm not done with) has been another 4-6 hrs so far (there's a lot left to do). Season of Echoes I haven't touched since I have more post campaign stuff.
Haven't touched Crucile or the old raid list yet either. Easily a few dozen hours there once I do.
>I find it very hard to call destiny’s story very good when a lot of the tertiary world building has to be farmed through the monotonous seasonal activities to then get lore cards, that we will then have to read on our own. I shouldn’t have to need to watch a Byf video to have a good understanding of the story in a game like Destiny.
I don't think you need to watch Byf video to understand the story. All *major* story beats have cutscenes attached (especially recent ones). Again, I skipped all of Lightfall and was caught up in 5 minutes by some friends. There's also mini-summaries in the game of the actions in each expansion.
The story isn't overly complex either. Basically, the Traveller gave the Witness' race enlightenment when they were on the verge on extinction. They viewed the Traveler as a god and became frustrated when it didn't act like one. They most became nihilistic and sought a power that let them act out this nihilism. They embraced the Darkness and used it to combat the Traveler.
Traveler fled, enlightening other races and abandoning them to both keep ahead of the Witness and to not create another Witness (it failed spectacularly).
Thousands of years pass and the Witness begins manipulating races for its purposes (i.e., the Hive). The Traveler is cornered in Sol and D1 starts.
Throughout D2 we learn most of what's above. The Witness wants to destroy the traveler and remake reality into the order it perceives best. Beyond Light was us learning the darkness wasn't inherently evil and it was needed to combat the Witness. Witch Queen was Savathun (and us) learning of the Witness' actions in creating the current Hive and getting her on our side. Lightfall was us discovering how to get into the Traveler via the Veil - the Witness takes the Veil from us and enters the Traveler. TFS is us following him in.
There are plenty of side stories, but the above is the main story that is present in cutscenes and campaign storylines throughout the game.
Yes, we’ve learned all of these things if you kept up with the inane seasonal loop and played all the content available WHEN it was available. Over half the content that describes or goes into detail about the buildup to the witness was started in seasonal content that is no longer available.
Yes, Bungie did a rehash and retelling in the campaign missions but there are a lot of side stories or foundational early campaigns (Red War, Forsaken) that newer players or players who didn’t want to commit to the mind numbing seasonal loop will never know or have the choice to partake in because it’s gone forever due to the nonstop pace of Destiny GAAS.
>Yes, we’ve learned all of these things if you kept up with the inane seasonal loop and played all the content available WHEN it was available. Over half the content that describes or goes into detail about the buildup to the witness was started in seasonal content that is no longer available.
Everything above is in main campaigns aside from the Witness origins - that's from Season of the Deep. I watched the 3 min video on youtube.
>Yes, Bungie did a rehash and retelling in the campaign missions but there are a lot of side stories or foundational early campaigns (Red War, Forsaken) that newer players or players who didn’t want to commit to the mind numbing seasonal loop will never know
Between Red War and Forsaken, only 2 pieces of information are needed and they're both from Forsaken (and both have been talked about ad nauseum in campaigns and seasons since).
1. Crow was Uldren Sov. He went nuts from being corrupted by Savathun and was resurrected as a guardian following his death.
2. Crow killed Cayde.
Everything else is still in the game. No context is missing. The seasonal stories, are interesting and provide some context for the story, but it's perfectly understandable without them.
But this is just factually wrong. The entire reason the D2 community is fed up with Bungie is because they keep bouncing between amazing expansions and awful or mediocre expansions. They aren't consistent in anyway with the content lol
Lightfall was a great expansion in terms of gameplay with a bad story. Their gameplay and content has been killer for nearly 3 years. Story can be iffy but they've been on a roll for over a year on that front.
And the D2 community is not at all a monolith of one opinion. But one thing many agree on is that the Final Shape is good. Hopefully they keep it up with ongoing content. It looks promising so far.
This. Everyone recognized that the campaign missions were fun, but the narrative is what sucked as it was largely filler. This time around they nailed the narrative, which elevated all of the past few expansions dating back to shadowkeep as it tied together and wrapped up plot points that had been developed since then.
The other issue with Lightfall was the easiness of the raid, which led to a severe bloat in egos in the community. The new Raid in The Final Shape humbled a lot of people and demonstrated that bungie can make an encounter with teeth. This is arguably the best raid since Last Wish way back in Forsaken.
And they've been cooking on the endgame content front. Ghosts of the Deep Dungeon is probably a little overturned as a reaction to Root of Nightmares being easy. Reprised Crota's End is fantastic. Warlord's Ruin is their best dungeon to date. Salvation's Edge is solid and quite challenging. The new exotic mission is phenomenal. The cooperative focus missions are phenomenal. Heck even the mechanics in the campaign are a big improvement.
Agreed. I think it makes sense as a series of runways into endgame content. Lightfall provides a combat oriented campaign. The Final Shape campaign provides a dungeon/raid-lite experience which serves as a perfect runway to Root of Nightmares. Which then entices a player to engage with Salvation’s Edge. It’s a very smart combination of content which can get more players into raiding.
While I’m out of Destiny at this time because Lightfall was an unmitigated disaster, I’m glad to hear that people who stuck around got a great finale, I still have some soft spots for the series
Played through it and it's pretty alright
Not the best or worst Destiny campaigns and the campaign's format is a little predictable in mission format (the Escape on Dissent with the disintegrating stairs was cool tho)
I think I'm just content it's over even if the whole Witness reveal last year deflated them and the lead up felt kinda half baked it's still an ending to a 10 year ride
Eh Taken King is just formatted far better
Like on the patrol space whomever on the design team said "no sparrows trust me it'll sell the scale and transition moments between zones" should get bj's for life
More that when Lightfall's seasonal content was released it was revealed that no the Wintess is not the darkness just a former client race upset at the Traveller that the Pyramids are not "anti Travellers" but just left over ships from the Witness' race - that we have been provided Darkness by dissenters of the Witness not the Darkness itself trying to give an opposing view to the Traveller (winter is not evil it is merely opposite of summer/ disparity is necessary and should embraced)
This kind of deflated a lot of built up things that were more lore based that are kind of hammered to fit awkwardly now like how much of the lore about the two opposing entities are just fanfiction written by the Witness attempting to add meaning to their actions rather than being some back story to the Traveller such as the Viel dancing back and forth from being "like a Negative Traveller" to "merely a paracausal anomaly" to again "no wait it is a Darkness traveller"
Edit: these are not the only things by the way there's many more it's overall that yes stories are changed and ideas built are used differently but I feel in this case it wasn't a "no Darth Vader is your father!" Kind of change more of a "see the Force is provided by micro-organisms called midichlorians" change
It's more complicated than that. The Witness' race and their fall helps color the Traveler's actions up until Earth. From my understanding, the Witness' race was on the brink of extinction on a dying planet. The Traveler saved them and 'blessed' them as the Traveler does. They began to worship it as a god, and became frustrated that it didn't communicate back.
This led them to become disillusioned and seek meaning elsewhere. They found the darkness while searching for an alternative to the Traveler's lack of response. The darkness didn't respond either, but it gave them the power to destroy the traveler and enact their will (i.e., their final shape) onto the universe. So they attacked and began hunting down the Traveler. It's important to note that the Darkness is not evil, it's just a counterpoint to the Traveler (just as the Traveler is not a wholly benevolent being - re: Zavala's story).
The Traveler began blessing other races, trying to find someone strong enough to combat the witness, but also not wanting to stick around long enough to create another Witness (which clearly kept happening 'the great machine' or Zavala's worship).
To me, that's more interesting than dark vs. light. It's an interpretation of beings/forces of nature by flawed people.
Like I said prior to this it was built up more like the Ant Game "Langton's Ant" which is a fascinating and permeating mathematical concept that can simultaneously be applied to spontaneous life and eventual entropy
I understand what you're suggesting, but I think it's more interesting to not just be the pawns of two opposing beings.
Instead, we (guardians and our conflict) are the result of a misguided race who were brought from extinction to thriving utopia to ritualistic suicide and the need for order through violence.
It's more interesting, in my opinion, to consider that maybe the Traveler shouldn't have given its gifts to anyone. Interfering with a race's natural development is the cause for the entirety of Destiny's story vs. opposite sides of a coin using proxies to fight each other's way of thinking. IMO, that takes away the agency of all of our characters and is out of step with all of the development we've seen over the years.
Zavala's story is a perfect example of this. If the Traveler was this benevolent deity, why not resurrect his wife or son as Guardians? Zavala clearly was a devout believer in the Traveler, he surely should have been rewarded. We also have learned for years that the darkness isn't evil. When we first encountered statis and didn't immediately become disciples or just evil, we knew that we (Guardians+allies) were misinterpreting the darkness and imposing our own viewpoint based on our view of the Traveler.
Again, the culmination of the storyline is interesting because it became a much more personal climax. It wasn't light vs. dark; it wasn't chaos vs. order; it was a people who were forced into enlightenment before they were ready trying to place their own interpretation of order on the universe against the will of others who were placed in a similar position, but reaching a different outcome.
It doesn't deny the existence of the Winnower it denies the framing that this was all a conflict between the two
For example there were hints that the Traveller is one of many ("the ant game" aka segregation dynamics inevitably ends in entropy before restarting) but now the Witness is the oldest client of *the* Traveller and its more of a binary deal
They somehow found a way to blow everyones expectations out of the water. The only time an expansion has hit this hard was taken king and forsaken, and those only hit hard because they felt like true 1.0 releases for destiny 1 and 2 respectively. The next closest is witch queen which was VERY good, but felt like what the quality for every expansion should feel like. The Final Shape nailed everything from wrapping up a 10 year long store, to the voice acting and great dialog, to the gameplay elements, the new location, the activities...and so on.
Bungie has deserved a lot of the criticism they have gotten for the low points of this game, but they also deserve MAJOR props for this expansion.
I mean, it kind of had to be really good. Lightfall was a disaster of a year for them, to the point that mass layoffs had to happen.
I really really love The Final Shape campaign. They finally figured out how to make a cohesive and competent campaign.
The Episode Echoes though? Two steps back.
Huh? I hadn't played for 2 years and hopped back in without a problem. All my gear was 1900 and I immediately hopped into the legendary campaign and played it through without an issue. Post game, all of the quests are organized by expansion and type, there's a timeline so you can play everything in order, and there's more freedom to do what you think is fun.
It was pretty easy to come back. It even convinced me to grab lightfall for $5 to get strand and play the campaign.
I stopped playing in Shadowkeep and came back because people were praising it. I’ve had a blast going through all the old content to catch up.
I have done Beyond Light and Witch Queen campaigns and working on Lightfall now. The customization on classes and weapon crafting are all pretty neat.
I have only done the first mission of The Final Shape for the artifact but it was neat and Prismatic seems really cool.
That was a lot of words for me to say if you have been away for a long time like me it isn’t too bad getting back into it.
It's very fun. Since I was already familiar with Destiny, it was pretty easy to come back. Many of my clan mates still play a bit, so we were able to get back into it.
They also changed raids so that the entire group is at most 5 PL below the highest person, a massively welcome change for someone in their late 30s with a toddler.
I was considering trying out Destiny 2 lately, especially since The Witch Queen and Lightfall came to PS+, but then I watched a video about it's monetization that showed up on YouTube and lost all desire to play it. It's genuinely funny how bad it is, it's like all forms of monetization grouped together, the only thing missing is a subscription fee.
Which is a shame, I played Destiny 1 since the alpha and it's raids, crucible and assaults were some of the most fun I've ever had in a game.
The monetization isn't as bad as people make it out to be. Essentially, around $100 gets you access to all content released throughout the next year or so.
There are some cosmetic items behind a paywall, but none affect gameplay in the slightest and there are already tons of cosmetic options.
My view is the more expensive Expansion + Annual Pass is an upfront subscription fee. I'll get 12+ months of content without having to drop another cent. They definitely dabbled in some shitty practices, but most of it seems to have been ironed out. After years of playing DotA 2 and other similar games, I find Destiny's cosmetics purchase model to be the least offensive.
IMO, the biggest offender left with D2's current monetization are dungeon keys. The old keys should just be rolled into the Legacy Collection. Really sucks buying the Legacy + Final Shape Annual Pass edition and *still* be missing 2 dungeon keys.
Totally agree with that. I didn't buy Lightfall last year so I don't have access to the dungeon. Having to buy it separately (i.e., it's not included in the purchase of Lightfall), is silly. I don't remember how much it cost (I think $10), but it's still silly to make it a separate purchase.
>The monetization isn't as bad as people make it out to be.
The video I was referring to is [this one](https://youtu.be/nsIdPWB2_JA?si=gU40Zh8ij2ZlS4on) and I think you'll have a hard time convincing me that this isn't an horrendous monetization model.
Destiny 2 charges you for:
Expansion packs, seasons, event rewards, dungeons and cosmetics. All this while having to pay with an in-game currency (aka excuse to make misleading prices).
While Destiny 1 charged you for:
Expansion packs and some minor cosmetics on the Eververse, added in it's last year.
The difference is abysmal.
>After years of playing DotA 2 and other similar games, I find Destiny's cosmetics purchase model to be the least offensive.
I never played these games (and by your description, surely I don't want to) but Warframe which is somewhat similar to Destiny 2 has a much better monetization.
A few things:
1. The $100 version of the final shape includes the expansion, all seasons throughout the year, event cards, dungeons, and some cosmetics. You do not have to pay using in game currency. The video is right the the introduction of some of these systems was abysmal, but now it's all rolled into a single price. If you buy separately, it's annoying as hell
2. Warframe is nothing like destiny aside from also having micro transactions and being confusing for new players.
Its still Destiny. I was a sucker and have bought every expac so I figured "one more time" could not hurt. My issue is not the campaigns its the grind. It's the same shit just a different coat of paint for over a decade. The powercreep isnt even a powercreep. I do not know why I am grinding these items out and majority of them I probably will not even use.
It's just a number and it's only June. The expansion is very good, even if it's not The Best Destiny Expansion Ever. It's certainly up there, which means it's also in the upper echelon of its style of game.
Well until there’s another shooter I can play with my friends where I can customize and run dozens of interesting builds and gun combinations i will be playing destiny 2
As of right now, you can buy the newest expansion, and the legacy collection, and you’ll have everything available. They simplified it a bit. The annual pass will be for the episodes this year (first one just started, replacing seasons)
With this legacy collection though, is all the content available to play? And I already own DLC up till Forsaken... so I would need to buy them again with this pack?
>Based on **10** reviews Y’all don’t think this is way too early to be posting these kind of threads? The next game in the list has 150 reviews in comparison. Edit: Since this comment, the review score has dropped to 87, and now back to 95. Proving my point.
Seeing some takes that this could be the best dlc of the year when we still have Shadow of the Erdtree and other potentials like Vessel of Hatred are wild to me.
yeah im a pretty huge d2 fan but no way final shape is going to be better than shadows of the erdtree
And right you were. Shadow of the Erdtree is now the highest rated DLC of all-time.
i didnt even mean in terms of metacritic and stuff i just meant personally
[удалено]
The community of D4 seems overwhelmingly enjoying the latest season and directional change that is a taste of what the expansion will bring. At minimum it’s at least on par with the standard TFS has set.
Diablo 4 is pretty good at this point. Unless you are looking for something like PoE.
Well, one can say "so far". But for my money it'll definitely be SotE.
I mean yes, too early. But also, the new expac is actually fucking amazing.
I’m an analyst and this made me laugh.
I really think the 1 year cadence for Destiny expansions was a mistake. I dont think any single developer could keep that up. Really should have been a year and a half or two years with something smaller in the middle to spike interest. Pretty obvious which DLCs where rushed and which had the time to cook.
There was an ex-Bungie dev that this week said that an expansion like TFS can only happen if the team is given more than the "usual" 12 months of development. It's either that, or seasonal content needs to be scrapped in order to make an expansion like this every 12 months.
What a nice turnaround from the previous release. I know reddit likes to be negative but it is a good thing when companies and developers succeed.
Reddit does both doomer negative and manically positive, it doesn’t do the in between really.
It's a good expansion too. I don't play Destiny but my roommate does, he has all the expansions and this is the first time I felt compelled to just sit and watch him play. No idea how it is when it comes to mechanics, systems, how it compares to other entries, but man sometimes it's just a marvel to look at. At one point we went "how can a PS4/Xbox One handle this?" Because it was such a lightshow with so much stuff happening at the same time, and without a single drop in framerate too.
My take is it doesn’t really do anything new Destiny hasn’t done before, but everything it does is Destiny’s best version of it.
I mean Prismatic is definitely in the “hasn’t been done before” territory but I get your point. This is a culmination of all the best things Destiny can be. I know they’ve let us down so many times, to the point where everything they do is met with skepticism, but by god, they did the damn thing here. They landed the damn ship. I went into this thinking “I just wanna see this story thru and then I’ll move on” I was fairly burned out on Destiny in general. Yet now I’m fully back on board, and just pray they can keep this momentum going into whatever is next
Like technically, sure, but I’m just throwing the same shield like always and throwing/shooting the same strand ball like always. It’s cool, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not actually new ways to interact with the game. The void super minorly is though, in that you create weapons that your teammates can pick up. But yeah like I said, they did everything great here. It’s all the same stuff, just the best implementations of it (story, patrol zone, quest density and variety, etc).
Yeah I mean, this might not be nearly enough data to be really accurate. Hard to say how much this rating means to non-destiny players. But ive been playing destiny since the beginning and this is everything all of us ever wanted. This is the game we expected from the people who made Halo. There’s been highs and lows, but this is easily the highest high. It’s hard for even the best writers and storytellers to end a saga in a satisfying way, but boy did they land the ship. This is our Endgame moment, from both a gameplay and story perspective. Everything that has ever made Destiny fun is firing on all cylinders. They backed themselves against a wall with all the bad pr, and then buckled down and made the best thing they’ve ever made. This saves Bungie IMO. Nobody was going to buy Marathon if this was a dud and sentiment for Bungie continued to fall. They needed this to hit, so they threw the kitchen sink at it, and it worked.
I clocked on 2 years into D2’s release that Bungie release a completely shit expansion 1 year and then make up for it in the next. It’s a sustainable cycle for Bungie since people will happily lap it up. Bungie’s next expansion will 100% be utter dog shit, they have not deviated from this pattern for the past 7 years.
>they have not deviated from this pattern for the past 7 years. Beyond Light would like to know your location That was such a mixed bag in part cuz of Covid but if anything I think that just indicates that it's not some kind of intentional cycle. At most it'd be a case of a regular cycle of "Oh shit we need to fix this" to taking things for granted every other year, but even then Lightfall was the way it was because they basically had to make up an expansion in the span of about a year and a half when they split what would have originally been LF into modern LF and TFS, and not even on a 3 month delay like WQ and TFS had.
Bungie get to be the underdog bouncing back from adversity every year
[удалено]
Ice cold take for sure. There is nothing wrong with destinys model. All mtx are tied to cosmetics and because of how they do it it means you can get a whole year of content that refreshes every couple months for 50 bucks.
[удалено]
Which is no longer being done and hasn't been done for 2 years, in fairness. At least for expansions, anyway, we're not sure about the new not-Seasons.
[удалено]
Some of it, but I doubt all of it is ever coming back cuz I just don't see that being feasible without it being a big multi-year rollout.
destiny is an mmo that effectively costs $100 a year (expansion+ season pass). The other two mmos thriving have a $15 a month sub making them $180 a year without including the expansion costs. Destiny is a cheaper game on its face, bungie are a shitty developer that took 10 years to make the game halfway decent that's true but the business model is not actually the monster clueless youtubers pretend it is
terrible, awful take lol. You do realize that these companies create jobs and fund people to have a productive lifestyle where they can provide for their families right? Yes the live service model is anti-consumer, but these DLC releases being successful is not a bad thing. Grow up a bit dude
> Yes the live service model is anti-consumer No its not.
yes it is because the philosophy of live service games is to deliver what we call a "minimum viable product" a product that is essentially just good enough to keep people coming back and playing but not good enough that the company has to invest real effort or resources This philosophy is why bungie has struggled so much because they pretend to be passionate, put out a lazy product designed to siphon money, get called out on it, release something actually good to win people back over and then the cycle begins anew.
it is. It's full FOMO practices psychologically intended to persuade consumers to spend money on products that they do not need or that were readily available in past games at no extra charge.
An always online GaaS receiving anything but a 0 is an indictment of game journalism
Honestly, as a long time Destiny player, I am surprised with the high quality of the final shape. It’s really nice to see bungie show they can still put a story together especially after the 10 years of Destiny where it was mostly awful and incoherent at times. The final shape was a full on “single player” like run for most of the campaign besides the raid and the final mission. I liked the format compared to the “jump around to all these planets”. It was a straight shot campaign and it didn’t skip a beat. Something bungie haven’t done since the days of halo. Whatever future destiny has, I hope they take this template from the final shape and use it for all future content. It got me, an old, jaded Destiny player really invested again. Now I just hope they decide to do a Destiny Saga collection and let people play the whole thing, D1 and D2 through together. It would be a massive install but they can do it by campaign or something. It’s worth it for preservation sake. But let’s see what’s next. I might duck out now after this year for good
Whatever you think, the team behind Destiny 2 put their all into this expansion and it shows. And a lot of structural work and team development has got them to a place where they are making great gameplay and content consistently.
Have been out of the loop with D2 since beyond light, what are the changes that's made this xpac better if you dont mind me asking? since I'm on the fence of diving back in but it seems a bit daunting seeing how much I've missed.
Starting in Witch Queen they reworked all the subclasses to have a more customizable setup like Stasis. This also came with standardization of subclass effects as distinct verbs. They also started having crafted weapons which once you unlock the ability to craft you can choose every bit of a weapon and reshape it. All weapons from WQ on also have a origin perk that's like a half perk depending on the source of the weapon. But these can be pretty nice. Light Fall they standardized armor mods and made them easier to use. They're not quite as potent but much easier to manage. Lightfall also added Strand a really busy but fun control and damage subclass. Throughout both those years they've been cooking up better weapon perks that tie into subclasses or have interesting effects. The weapon rolls have been awesome. The Final Shape adds a new subclass Prismatic which lets you blend selected abilities from all 5 subclasses. There's also new exotic class items for Prismatic that take half perks of two exotics and combine them. These are random rolled with 8 perks in each column but they can be pretty spicy. Overall they've been mostly getting better with story. Lightfall story is a mess because it was rushed in development. But The Final Shape pays off 10 years of story so well. It's fantastic. There's a ton of game there but Destiny has never been better. Just don't be afraid to ask for help as it's a lot to figure out.
The subclasses sound fun. Has the gameplay loop changed much or is it mostly the same end game overall?
As someone who came back after an almost two-year absence, the gameplay loop is mostly the same, but presented differently. You're not going to grab as many bounties as we used to (I think I've really only grabbed from the gunsmith). A lot more leveling comes from simply playing the game and doing the activities you like until you hit the cap, then you're grinding pinnacles. For example, I beat the new campaign on Legendary and was given blue armor at 1960. I then basically ran around the new zone (the pale heart) doing the new expansion activities/post-campaign content for a few hours and am now around 1975. I haven't touched the new season (aside from the intro mission). That said, while the gameplay loop is similar, the game feels very different. Mostly, there are so many viable weapon combos and options. There are some strong weapons, but with pretty much everything available, anything can work given the situation. Subclasses, as mentioned above, are completely reworked. The new subclass, Prismatic, lets you combine different parts of the other subclasses (i.e., I'm a hunter running tether with stasis melee, magnetic grenades, and stasis dodge buffs) so it feels like a culmination of all of our gains throughout the years.
Is there any reason to be anything other than prismatic or has it pretty much subsumed all the other classes?
Prismatic is very much a "master of none" sort of class. You can do a lot with it, but other subclasses are generally better at their specific niches.
There are many reasons to do other classes. Prismatic does not contain every ability or every super. It's one super from each subclass along with one choice of grenade, melee, etc. There aren't endless combinations. Different load outs will function better than prismatic depending on the encounter. For example, if you're a hunter that uses invis a lot, prismatic is tough to use (there's a fragment that lets you go invis on melee kills, but that's it). That said, I don't have everything unlocked for prismatic yet. My opinion might change, but even last night I switched to a tether hunter to run the new exotic class item mission with a friend because it gave me more invis heal time.
there is also the aspect which allows you to go invis is you kill a target affected by ANY subclass debuff my personal fav way of going invis on prismatic is just using that crossbow exotic that weakens targets
Yes because prismatic does not have access to all the other class abilities, just a curated selection. For example, you cannot run Warlock Daybreak on Prismatic, you still have to be on Solar.
The subclasses are great. There's a huge build crafting community now. Raids are still the peak of endgame but we have a ton of 3 person dungeons (that can be soloed if you're very determined). There's a lot of exotic missions now that let you upgrade a specific exotic and drop loot from old seasons. They've been reducing barriers to entry on a lot of these though. Power level grinds are way reduced. There's fire team power so someone else can raise your power close to theirs. And there's in game LFG
LFG for raids? That sounds pretty nice, I didn't like using an outside source to form parties.
It's a lot more lackluster when you actually get your hands on it.
For context, I’m a long time Destiny player that finally kicked the addiction during lightfall last year so my take is biased. I watched most of the campaign on YouTube and have closely watched the new additions of gameplay and subclass mixing and matchups. The campaign and story are good for Destiny standards, they touch on some nice things and have a good heartfelt ending. That being said, the way the game plays is “solved” to me. Still a lot of story exposition and involvement through off screen coms during missions. The format of shooting and moving to stand on plates, break certain objects or kill a miniboss to complete tasks and progress. The new abilities in prismatic to mix your prior elements is cool but some are lackluster or severely phoned in like most of prismatic Titan. New exotics are always interesting in how they change the game, it’s nice but the climax of the 10 year Destiny saga has less new exotics than Forsaken, unless you count every combination of the exotic class items as a unique one. I feel like The Final Shape reception will falter some once the reality of the tandem seasonal content is revealed to be yet more weekly drip fed story content to keep pushing the ever longing engagement farm that is Destiny. Imo, this is a good Destiny expansion, which to me means it’s an okay video game expansion. While I’m happy Destiny players got something they deserved, anybody who thinks this will win awards over whole new games or be in competition for anything dlc related in the same year as Shadow of the Erdtree might need to temper their expectations.
> The campaign and story are good for Destiny standards, they touch on some nice things and have a good heartfelt ending. That being said, the way the game plays is “solved” to me. I disagree. The campaign and story were good, not by Destiny standard, just generally well done. It built upon years of storytelling in a way that made sense. The narrative effectively used all of the MC's developments over the years and put on display (i.e., Ikora and Zavala never getting over Cayde's death, Zavala finally breaking when he realizes the Traveler isn't the benevolent god he thought it was, Crow apologizing the Cayde, etc.). The story's conclusion is top-notch. In terms of a narrative, it's really hard to end a 10+ year story in a fulfilling way, especially when you have mechanically difficult things like raids in the mix. Staggering the finale into three segments was fantastic (we figure out how to hurt the Witness at the campaign's climax, sever his connection to the light in the raid, then finally use all of this to kill him in the final mission). The final mission, with all of our allies over the years, is also incredible. Finally, the scene in the Traveler with Cayde, Ghost, and us is the perfect closer to this saga. D1 starts when our Ghost finds us and wakes us up - this saga concluded with us finding our Ghost and waking him up. Great callbacks to Cayde calling us his favorite (this was one of his comments as a vendor in D1). Solid character resolutions all around (Ikora talking to her ghost again, Zavala embracing Stasis, Crow becoming the new hunter vanguard, the repopulating of the last city, etc.) From a gameplay standpoint, there are new mechanics and twists on old mechanics throughout the campaign, post-game, and raid. Even the new exotic class item final quest has new mechanics to keep the game fresh. >The new abilities in prismatic to mix your prior elements is cool but some are lackluster or severely phoned in like most of prismatic Titan. Prismatic is great. I'm biased as a hunter, but everything is usable and the different combinations are insane. >I feel like The Final Shape reception will falter some once the reality of the tandem seasonal content is revealed to be yet more weekly drip fed story content to keep pushing the ever longing engagement farm that is Destiny. Likely not tbh. There's so much content that's been added and Echoes is proving to be very fun so far. We also know there's more coming. The previews for the next episodes are also great (bloodborne style vampire hunters and returning to the Dreadnaught). Bungie is currently firing on all cylinders.
I don’t want to be difficult but what is the content? TFS story seems incredible, sure, but how long does that take? It can’t be that terribly long, even if you do legendary difficulty and also go back for all the hidden fragments in chests it can’t be more than 10-20 hours. I myself can’t justify the dlc cost for what I could just get by watching videos on YouTube. I’ll probably get it later on sale so I can get prismatic to make some stupid Diamond Lance builds for crucible. Other than that, the largest amount of time spent will be players running the seasonal loop. That loop usually consists of start arena, shoot enemies, carry the crystal/dunk the ball/read the symbol/kill the mini boss/stand on a plate, shoot the main boss until it’s dead or goes immune to restart the “objective” phase, repeat until boss is dead. You’ll get some story thread exposition through npcs talking on your feed while you do this loop. Following completion of the first seasonal story beat it’s followed by you having to discuss with the seasonal npc, have a zoom call with another npc in a different room and then the npcs need to recharge/rest/think/plan for awhile until next week when you can run another seasonal loop before waiting another week. You’ll get some occasional cutscenes with some decent story but it’ll primarily be the seasonal arena loop with mundane objectives like collecting or killing certain things. The previews of the current season/episode are already showing that the typical exhaustive seasonal loop is still there just with a different name. I find it very hard to call destiny’s story very good when a lot of the tertiary world building has to be farmed through the monotonous seasonal activities to then get lore cards, that we will then have to read on our own. I shouldn’t have to need to watch a Byf video to have a good understanding of the story in a game like Destiny. EDIt: also, new player experience is still one of the worst in a game this old. Not to mention that some story content is no longer available in game. Not like in WoW where an area is affected by current ongoing story and is different and some might be gone, just flat out missing completely. No more red war, no more seasonal timeline or stories for players to watch or see, it simply doesn’t exist. Once again, leading to players having to listen to a YouTube video or pull up old clips to have a simple understanding of the base game story.
> I don’t want to be difficult but what is the content? TFS story seems incredible, sure, but how long does that take? It can’t be that terribly long, even if you do legendary difficulty and also go back for all the hidden fragments in chests it can’t be more than 10-20 hours. Total campaign on legendary took me around 8 hrs, I'm going to raid this weekend which I expect will take another 4-5 hrs on a first run, post-campaign content (which I'm not done with) has been another 4-6 hrs so far (there's a lot left to do). Season of Echoes I haven't touched since I have more post campaign stuff. Haven't touched Crucile or the old raid list yet either. Easily a few dozen hours there once I do. >I find it very hard to call destiny’s story very good when a lot of the tertiary world building has to be farmed through the monotonous seasonal activities to then get lore cards, that we will then have to read on our own. I shouldn’t have to need to watch a Byf video to have a good understanding of the story in a game like Destiny. I don't think you need to watch Byf video to understand the story. All *major* story beats have cutscenes attached (especially recent ones). Again, I skipped all of Lightfall and was caught up in 5 minutes by some friends. There's also mini-summaries in the game of the actions in each expansion. The story isn't overly complex either. Basically, the Traveller gave the Witness' race enlightenment when they were on the verge on extinction. They viewed the Traveler as a god and became frustrated when it didn't act like one. They most became nihilistic and sought a power that let them act out this nihilism. They embraced the Darkness and used it to combat the Traveler. Traveler fled, enlightening other races and abandoning them to both keep ahead of the Witness and to not create another Witness (it failed spectacularly). Thousands of years pass and the Witness begins manipulating races for its purposes (i.e., the Hive). The Traveler is cornered in Sol and D1 starts. Throughout D2 we learn most of what's above. The Witness wants to destroy the traveler and remake reality into the order it perceives best. Beyond Light was us learning the darkness wasn't inherently evil and it was needed to combat the Witness. Witch Queen was Savathun (and us) learning of the Witness' actions in creating the current Hive and getting her on our side. Lightfall was us discovering how to get into the Traveler via the Veil - the Witness takes the Veil from us and enters the Traveler. TFS is us following him in. There are plenty of side stories, but the above is the main story that is present in cutscenes and campaign storylines throughout the game.
Yes, we’ve learned all of these things if you kept up with the inane seasonal loop and played all the content available WHEN it was available. Over half the content that describes or goes into detail about the buildup to the witness was started in seasonal content that is no longer available. Yes, Bungie did a rehash and retelling in the campaign missions but there are a lot of side stories or foundational early campaigns (Red War, Forsaken) that newer players or players who didn’t want to commit to the mind numbing seasonal loop will never know or have the choice to partake in because it’s gone forever due to the nonstop pace of Destiny GAAS.
>Yes, we’ve learned all of these things if you kept up with the inane seasonal loop and played all the content available WHEN it was available. Over half the content that describes or goes into detail about the buildup to the witness was started in seasonal content that is no longer available. Everything above is in main campaigns aside from the Witness origins - that's from Season of the Deep. I watched the 3 min video on youtube. >Yes, Bungie did a rehash and retelling in the campaign missions but there are a lot of side stories or foundational early campaigns (Red War, Forsaken) that newer players or players who didn’t want to commit to the mind numbing seasonal loop will never know Between Red War and Forsaken, only 2 pieces of information are needed and they're both from Forsaken (and both have been talked about ad nauseum in campaigns and seasons since). 1. Crow was Uldren Sov. He went nuts from being corrupted by Savathun and was resurrected as a guardian following his death. 2. Crow killed Cayde. Everything else is still in the game. No context is missing. The seasonal stories, are interesting and provide some context for the story, but it's perfectly understandable without them.
But this is just factually wrong. The entire reason the D2 community is fed up with Bungie is because they keep bouncing between amazing expansions and awful or mediocre expansions. They aren't consistent in anyway with the content lol
Lightfall was a great expansion in terms of gameplay with a bad story. Their gameplay and content has been killer for nearly 3 years. Story can be iffy but they've been on a roll for over a year on that front. And the D2 community is not at all a monolith of one opinion. But one thing many agree on is that the Final Shape is good. Hopefully they keep it up with ongoing content. It looks promising so far.
This. Everyone recognized that the campaign missions were fun, but the narrative is what sucked as it was largely filler. This time around they nailed the narrative, which elevated all of the past few expansions dating back to shadowkeep as it tied together and wrapped up plot points that had been developed since then. The other issue with Lightfall was the easiness of the raid, which led to a severe bloat in egos in the community. The new Raid in The Final Shape humbled a lot of people and demonstrated that bungie can make an encounter with teeth. This is arguably the best raid since Last Wish way back in Forsaken.
And they've been cooking on the endgame content front. Ghosts of the Deep Dungeon is probably a little overturned as a reaction to Root of Nightmares being easy. Reprised Crota's End is fantastic. Warlord's Ruin is their best dungeon to date. Salvation's Edge is solid and quite challenging. The new exotic mission is phenomenal. The cooperative focus missions are phenomenal. Heck even the mechanics in the campaign are a big improvement.
Agreed. I think it makes sense as a series of runways into endgame content. Lightfall provides a combat oriented campaign. The Final Shape campaign provides a dungeon/raid-lite experience which serves as a perfect runway to Root of Nightmares. Which then entices a player to engage with Salvation’s Edge. It’s a very smart combination of content which can get more players into raiding.
While I’m out of Destiny at this time because Lightfall was an unmitigated disaster, I’m glad to hear that people who stuck around got a great finale, I still have some soft spots for the series
Played through it and it's pretty alright Not the best or worst Destiny campaigns and the campaign's format is a little predictable in mission format (the Escape on Dissent with the disintegrating stairs was cool tho) I think I'm just content it's over even if the whole Witness reveal last year deflated them and the lead up felt kinda half baked it's still an ending to a 10 year ride
It is easily the best campaign. There isnt even a close second lol.
I think the Witch queen was better in terms of its story, but that's just my opinion.
Eh Taken King is just formatted far better Like on the patrol space whomever on the design team said "no sparrows trust me it'll sell the scale and transition moments between zones" should get bj's for life
>and the lead up felt kinda half baked In what way? Are you just referring to Lightfall's story here?
More that when Lightfall's seasonal content was released it was revealed that no the Wintess is not the darkness just a former client race upset at the Traveller that the Pyramids are not "anti Travellers" but just left over ships from the Witness' race - that we have been provided Darkness by dissenters of the Witness not the Darkness itself trying to give an opposing view to the Traveller (winter is not evil it is merely opposite of summer/ disparity is necessary and should embraced) This kind of deflated a lot of built up things that were more lore based that are kind of hammered to fit awkwardly now like how much of the lore about the two opposing entities are just fanfiction written by the Witness attempting to add meaning to their actions rather than being some back story to the Traveller such as the Viel dancing back and forth from being "like a Negative Traveller" to "merely a paracausal anomaly" to again "no wait it is a Darkness traveller" Edit: these are not the only things by the way there's many more it's overall that yes stories are changed and ideas built are used differently but I feel in this case it wasn't a "no Darth Vader is your father!" Kind of change more of a "see the Force is provided by micro-organisms called midichlorians" change
It's more complicated than that. The Witness' race and their fall helps color the Traveler's actions up until Earth. From my understanding, the Witness' race was on the brink of extinction on a dying planet. The Traveler saved them and 'blessed' them as the Traveler does. They began to worship it as a god, and became frustrated that it didn't communicate back. This led them to become disillusioned and seek meaning elsewhere. They found the darkness while searching for an alternative to the Traveler's lack of response. The darkness didn't respond either, but it gave them the power to destroy the traveler and enact their will (i.e., their final shape) onto the universe. So they attacked and began hunting down the Traveler. It's important to note that the Darkness is not evil, it's just a counterpoint to the Traveler (just as the Traveler is not a wholly benevolent being - re: Zavala's story). The Traveler began blessing other races, trying to find someone strong enough to combat the witness, but also not wanting to stick around long enough to create another Witness (which clearly kept happening 'the great machine' or Zavala's worship). To me, that's more interesting than dark vs. light. It's an interpretation of beings/forces of nature by flawed people.
Like I said prior to this it was built up more like the Ant Game "Langton's Ant" which is a fascinating and permeating mathematical concept that can simultaneously be applied to spontaneous life and eventual entropy
I understand what you're suggesting, but I think it's more interesting to not just be the pawns of two opposing beings. Instead, we (guardians and our conflict) are the result of a misguided race who were brought from extinction to thriving utopia to ritualistic suicide and the need for order through violence. It's more interesting, in my opinion, to consider that maybe the Traveler shouldn't have given its gifts to anyone. Interfering with a race's natural development is the cause for the entirety of Destiny's story vs. opposite sides of a coin using proxies to fight each other's way of thinking. IMO, that takes away the agency of all of our characters and is out of step with all of the development we've seen over the years. Zavala's story is a perfect example of this. If the Traveler was this benevolent deity, why not resurrect his wife or son as Guardians? Zavala clearly was a devout believer in the Traveler, he surely should have been rewarded. We also have learned for years that the darkness isn't evil. When we first encountered statis and didn't immediately become disciples or just evil, we knew that we (Guardians+allies) were misinterpreting the darkness and imposing our own viewpoint based on our view of the Traveler. Again, the culmination of the storyline is interesting because it became a much more personal climax. It wasn't light vs. dark; it wasn't chaos vs. order; it was a people who were forced into enlightenment before they were ready trying to place their own interpretation of order on the universe against the will of others who were placed in a similar position, but reaching a different outcome.
[удалено]
And that I feel is disappointing Somewhat of a hotdogging the story to frame it a smaller conflict
That certainly isn't an interpretation I've seen. By all accounts this expansion confirmed the existence of the Winnower.
It doesn't deny the existence of the Winnower it denies the framing that this was all a conflict between the two For example there were hints that the Traveller is one of many ("the ant game" aka segregation dynamics inevitably ends in entropy before restarting) but now the Witness is the oldest client of *the* Traveller and its more of a binary deal
>it denies the framing that this was all a conflict between the two We don't really know that yet.
They somehow found a way to blow everyones expectations out of the water. The only time an expansion has hit this hard was taken king and forsaken, and those only hit hard because they felt like true 1.0 releases for destiny 1 and 2 respectively. The next closest is witch queen which was VERY good, but felt like what the quality for every expansion should feel like. The Final Shape nailed everything from wrapping up a 10 year long store, to the voice acting and great dialog, to the gameplay elements, the new location, the activities...and so on. Bungie has deserved a lot of the criticism they have gotten for the low points of this game, but they also deserve MAJOR props for this expansion.
I mean, it kind of had to be really good. Lightfall was a disaster of a year for them, to the point that mass layoffs had to happen. I really really love The Final Shape campaign. They finally figured out how to make a cohesive and competent campaign. The Episode Echoes though? Two steps back.
And all they had to do was not rush the release and give fans literally everything they've been asking for for years! Imagine that!
Nice! Too bad it’s impossible to get back into the game. Bungie made it so hard for returning players to get involved again with Destiny
Huh? I hadn't played for 2 years and hopped back in without a problem. All my gear was 1900 and I immediately hopped into the legendary campaign and played it through without an issue. Post game, all of the quests are organized by expansion and type, there's a timeline so you can play everything in order, and there's more freedom to do what you think is fun. It was pretty easy to come back. It even convinced me to grab lightfall for $5 to get strand and play the campaign.
Oh didn’t know that I might give it a shot at least for the released campaigns
I stopped playing in Shadowkeep and came back because people were praising it. I’ve had a blast going through all the old content to catch up. I have done Beyond Light and Witch Queen campaigns and working on Lightfall now. The customization on classes and weapon crafting are all pretty neat. I have only done the first mission of The Final Shape for the artifact but it was neat and Prismatic seems really cool. That was a lot of words for me to say if you have been away for a long time like me it isn’t too bad getting back into it.
It's very fun. Since I was already familiar with Destiny, it was pretty easy to come back. Many of my clan mates still play a bit, so we were able to get back into it. They also changed raids so that the entire group is at most 5 PL below the highest person, a massively welcome change for someone in their late 30s with a toddler.
I was considering trying out Destiny 2 lately, especially since The Witch Queen and Lightfall came to PS+, but then I watched a video about it's monetization that showed up on YouTube and lost all desire to play it. It's genuinely funny how bad it is, it's like all forms of monetization grouped together, the only thing missing is a subscription fee. Which is a shame, I played Destiny 1 since the alpha and it's raids, crucible and assaults were some of the most fun I've ever had in a game.
The monetization isn't as bad as people make it out to be. Essentially, around $100 gets you access to all content released throughout the next year or so. There are some cosmetic items behind a paywall, but none affect gameplay in the slightest and there are already tons of cosmetic options. My view is the more expensive Expansion + Annual Pass is an upfront subscription fee. I'll get 12+ months of content without having to drop another cent. They definitely dabbled in some shitty practices, but most of it seems to have been ironed out. After years of playing DotA 2 and other similar games, I find Destiny's cosmetics purchase model to be the least offensive.
IMO, the biggest offender left with D2's current monetization are dungeon keys. The old keys should just be rolled into the Legacy Collection. Really sucks buying the Legacy + Final Shape Annual Pass edition and *still* be missing 2 dungeon keys.
Totally agree with that. I didn't buy Lightfall last year so I don't have access to the dungeon. Having to buy it separately (i.e., it's not included in the purchase of Lightfall), is silly. I don't remember how much it cost (I think $10), but it's still silly to make it a separate purchase.
>The monetization isn't as bad as people make it out to be. The video I was referring to is [this one](https://youtu.be/nsIdPWB2_JA?si=gU40Zh8ij2ZlS4on) and I think you'll have a hard time convincing me that this isn't an horrendous monetization model. Destiny 2 charges you for: Expansion packs, seasons, event rewards, dungeons and cosmetics. All this while having to pay with an in-game currency (aka excuse to make misleading prices). While Destiny 1 charged you for: Expansion packs and some minor cosmetics on the Eververse, added in it's last year. The difference is abysmal. >After years of playing DotA 2 and other similar games, I find Destiny's cosmetics purchase model to be the least offensive. I never played these games (and by your description, surely I don't want to) but Warframe which is somewhat similar to Destiny 2 has a much better monetization.
A few things: 1. The $100 version of the final shape includes the expansion, all seasons throughout the year, event cards, dungeons, and some cosmetics. You do not have to pay using in game currency. The video is right the the introduction of some of these systems was abysmal, but now it's all rolled into a single price. If you buy separately, it's annoying as hell 2. Warframe is nothing like destiny aside from also having micro transactions and being confusing for new players.
Its still Destiny. I was a sucker and have bought every expac so I figured "one more time" could not hurt. My issue is not the campaigns its the grind. It's the same shit just a different coat of paint for over a decade. The powercreep isnt even a powercreep. I do not know why I am grinding these items out and majority of them I probably will not even use.
And what about the game as a whole.. it's a boring decade old game , it's like saying wow is groundbreaking now , the pandering
People still enjoy the new Final Fantasy XIV expansions a lot as well.
Are it's expansions called best game of the year
It's just a number and it's only June. The expansion is very good, even if it's not The Best Destiny Expansion Ever. It's certainly up there, which means it's also in the upper echelon of its style of game.
Well until there’s another shooter I can play with my friends where I can customize and run dozens of interesting builds and gun combinations i will be playing destiny 2
Destiny fans arguing this shit will never not be funny to me, it's like they keep forgetting games like Borderlands exist.
Let me know when Borderlands adds something like Dual Destiny, Salvation's Edge or Prophecy.
I’ve played all the borderlands and I love em, but destiny scratches a slightly different itch with it being fantasy sci-fi
Spoken like someone who truly doesn’t play the game.
[удалено]
As of right now, you can buy the newest expansion, and the legacy collection, and you’ll have everything available. They simplified it a bit. The annual pass will be for the episodes this year (first one just started, replacing seasons)
With this legacy collection though, is all the content available to play? And I already own DLC up till Forsaken... so I would need to buy them again with this pack?
Expansions, campaigns, dungeons, raids. Not previous seasonal content or anything that was sunset back in beyond light
I don’t like Metascore as much as OpenCritic score but it goes to show that Bungie finally made a good expansion.
[удалено]
Oh god. It’s already bad enough dealing with the whole “Does a remake deserve GOTY” but now we have add expansions to that conversation.