8/10 ~ 10 hours
6/17/2024
My Norman Osbourn ass caved to the voices…I came back to Destiny 2 after 4 years…
And it feels good to be back.
Intro – The Destiny franchise is one of the most divisive series of games to fall into our grubby gamer hands. A franchise with an amazing foundation of fascinating lore and fantastic gunplay bogged down by abysmal handling by Bungie and formerly Activision. Regardless, I loved these games and played them on and off ever since year 2 of Destiny 1, where I enjoyed grinding for powerful guns. After a while, however, it just became too tiring. On top of the grind getting stale, I had little interest in sitting down for hours chipping away at large-scale cooperative content like raids, especially since I didn’t have many people to play with. I stepped away after Destiny 2’s fourth year.
4 years later, after accepting the game has fallen off with the endless complaints from the community, I caught wind that the newest expansion, The Final Shape, finally provided a consistently good experience. With it being the culmination of the Light vs Darkness storyline from the very beginning of the franchise, and the fact it was apparently good for once, I decided to cave and take the plunge. And it was actually good! Wow!
Plot and Gameplay – story follows the player and the staple characters of the Vanguard plunging into the now exposed heart of the Traveler, the celestial being that granted us our powers. In it, lies the Witness, the leader of the Darkness who seeks to reduce the universe to stone. He has encroached on our home again and this time we’re kicking his ass back out. We find our long lost friend Cayde-6, revived by the Traveller’s light, and with him brings some of the better story moments as he reunites with Zavala, Ikora, and Crow; formerly Uldren Sov; his killer. Overall, the story was much more refined and had meaningful and powerful moments that finally didn’t have me blankly staring or rolling my eyes. Dialogue is well written, character interactions are amazing, cutscene direction is interesting. Can you believe it?
The final fight is pretty cool too, and is matchmade with up to 12 other players (for better or for worse).
The Pale Heart of the Traveler itself is absolutely stunning and shows the brilliance of Destiny’s innate creativity and art direction. It’s the absolute pinnacle of Bungie level design. I quite enjoy the Overthrow planetary activity and its secrets that allow you to progress various Exotic quests. These quests are all fun as well, though the Khvostov’s was more of an easter egg hunt and was bugged for quite some time.
The new weapons are pretty fun to use, namely Still Hunt, Microcosm, exotic Khvostov, The Call, Pro Memoria, and No Hesitation to name a few.
I’ve yet to try the raid nor the Dual Destinies mission
We finally have a thoroughly solid expansion with lots to do and activities to enjoy throughout. It’s about damn time, and it’s good to be back playing Destiny. I admittedly missed the game a little while I was away. However, I still don’t plan to turbo tryhard it; I’ll check in every now and again as seasonal content is released.
Leave a Reply