Destiny 2 Exotics 2 has even managed to mess up its core gameplay. While the developers’ hearts were surely in the right place when they chose to streamline the gameplay in the name of accessibility and PvP balance, in practice most of their changes have done more harm than good. One can tell that PvP was the major focus, because the changes work quite well for it. No longer do players have to endure the frustration of shotgun metas and constantly getting mapped by sniper rifles. Reduced access to abilities and power/special weapons allows for slower engagements. They’ve opened the door for an improved Crucible experience. The problem is that these changes are downright awful for the rest of the game. As it stands, Destiny 2’s gameplay mechanics encourage the hoarding of abilities and ammo rather than their enjoyment.
Following your defeat at the hand of Ghaul, it is your duty to rekindle the light, reform the Vanguard and take back what is yours. To do so, you’ll travel to new worlds, meet new allies and make some unexpected discoveries.
OK, yes, loot has not been talked about and isn’t that what Cayde-6 made a firm point of mentioning at the end of the trailer? Well, seeing as we already know the outcome of what happens to said “loot,” it might not seem to matter — wrong. Just like everything else, loot is in full-swing. It might as well be raining guns and armor from the skies because the loot is real and it’s good. Aside from the sweet Raid armor mentioned above, the drop rates on loot have all been set to maximum. I’m talking exotics, I’m talking legendries and everything in between. My guardian has never looked rawer. I’m a space wizard and I’m here to party. All this loot also means that catching up has never been easier for those who might have fallen behind coming back to Destiny. Getting to 400 light level should take no time at all and again, Destiny 2 isn’t out until September, so there is plenty to do until then.
Destiny 2 did manage to fix a couple of small issues from the first game, but it’s otherwise taken several steps back. Its consumable cosmetics and loot box-style method of awarding gear encourages hoarding and disengagement from the end-game grind. Its failure to offer at least as many features as the original Destiny has unsurprisingly led to rapid onset of player boredom. Worst of all, its neutering of the PvE’s moment-to-moment gameplay has resulted in a sequel that just isn’t as much fun to play. Destiny 2 may indeed have a loot problem as so many are loudly pointing out, but that’s small potatoes compared to these major fundamental flaws.
Not yet, but I promise that I will talk to you all about when it will happen as soon as we nail that down. It will happen this summer, obviously, and then on September 8 Destiny 2 will be available on PS4 and Xbox One. We’ll solidify and announce the PC ship date when we have it ready.
(Mild spoilers for the first mission of the game ahead) The Beta begins by throwing you into the first mission of the game, called Homecoming. A short cinematic shows your character and his or her ghost flying towards a massive cloud. They look at one another confused, mutually deciding to fly through the smoke to see what’s going on on the other side. When they emerge, the City is being bombarded by the Red Legion of the Cabal, led by Ghaul, the main baddie of Destiny 2’s campaign. When you drop into gameplay for the first time, it’s on the edge of the Tower and you fight your way to the top. You’re equipped with a good amount of weapons, including assault rifles, sub machine guns, hand cannons and a few Power weapons, as well as your new class abilities, which we’ll talk about later.
Destiny 2 is a full-fledged sequel to the original game and not an expansion. It contains all new locations, weapons, armor, characters, etc. You will not need to have played the original game and its expansions to hop into the sequel, but those that have can carry-over their character. Plus, there will be areas within the game that will acknowledge that you have played the previous content.
What we want to do is make every player in Destiny feel essential. We want every single player to feel like a superhero that gets to save the day at some point during the match. As a support player, I’m guilty on many occasions of hanging back and scoring assists. In Destiny 2, I’m going to be provoked into being a hero and helping my team of four in the competitive landscape.
Over the course of its lifespan, most players agreed that Destiny’s most persistent problem was a general lack of content. There just wasn’t enough to do between DLC expansions. The thing is, those expansions never actually helped all that much. It would only take a week or two for the hardcore crowd to start complaining about a lack of content again. Some would blame those players for spending too much time with the game and burning through that content too quickly, but it’s only natural that players would quickly burn through expansions when they often didn’t include many new features. I was cautiously optimistic that Destiny 2 would address the real issue at the heart of its forebear’s content woes, but this sadly hasn’t been the case. It’s added a few minor features in the form of the new director, a map, small activities in its explorable spaces, milestones and flashpoints, but that that’s it. Oh wait, scratch that. Milestones and flashpoints are just re-branded bounties, so they’re actually not new at all. So not only does it offer less content than Destiny’s final form, but it still hasn’t addressed the first game’s core problem.