Bungie Pulls the Curtain Off ‘Destiny 2’
Neal Sweeney ’19 / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer
The first gameplay and details for the numeric sequel to 2014’s Destiny have finally been shared, and the hour-long event leaves a lot to be discussed and analyzed. The game aims to build and improve upon the foundations of the original, and to help soothe the wounds that some players felt after the original launch. While we still don’t know the nitty gritty about how much content the game will offer and how progression will work, there were still a lot of notable improvements.
To start, Destiny 2 will feature a cinematic campaign where players will witness the fall of the first game’s base of operations and work to defeat the menace that destroyed it. That menace would be the Cabal, the heavily armored enemies who had laid their claim to Mars. Sections of the first mission were shown and it looks to offer the high production values that you might want for a shooter with the scale of Destiny.
The combat looks largely unchanged; however, players will have some new tools at their disposal. Weapon classes have been changed, and some new types of have been added. Players will now carry a kinetic, energy, and power weapon, instead of the primary, secondary, and heavy as seen in the first Destiny. Kinetic and energy weapons both look to be what would be considered “primary”, though it seems that only weapons slotted in the energy position will be able to utilize any elemental effects. Power weapons will include things like fusion and sniper rifles, as well as grenade launchers and chain guns, which were seen in the demo. Guardians will now also have three available skills at their disposal at any time, and all three classes appear to have new sub-classes.
We also heard about exploration and the worlds in Destiny 2, which will feature three brand new and beautiful planets. Players will now spend much less time in orbit and instead will be able to engage in activities in a much more fluid manner by navigating through the spaces and using a map to get from place to place. These spaces will also offer new types of side quests and content to enjoy on top of standard patrol missions.
A lot of the talk also centered on social features in the game, as clans will now be accessible within the game itself. Formerly relegated to Bungie.net, clans will allow players to group together and engage in activities, and be customized with banners. Clans will also be making way for a new feature called “guided games” which is Bungie’s solution to criticisms surrounding Destiny’s intentional lack of matchmaking for endgame activities such as raids. Guided games will allow solo players to be matched up with clans that are shy of one or two players, ideally allowing for players to find new groups that they can consistently play with.
Destiny’s PvP crucible will also be seeing a lot of significant changes, as all game modes will now be four players per team, as opposed to three and six from Destiny. Additionally, one brand new game mode called Countdown was unveiled, a round-based mode in which one team will attempt to plant a bomb in a base, and the other team will defend it.
Finally, Destiny 2 will also be available on PC for the first time through Blizzard’s proprietary launcher, and will be launching at some point after the console versions release. This version of the game will support 4K resolutions and 21:9 monitors, have an uncapped framerate, adjustable field of view, text chat, and mouse and keyboard customization. The PS4 Pro version at the event was running at 30 FPS.
Destiny 2 hopes to be the thing everyone wanted Destiny to be, and is working to build on the existing framework by making the experience more approachable as a whole. It looks promising, but we won’t know if the game lives up to expectation until it launches on September 8th.