Destiny 2
September 24, 2022 8:49 AM - Subscribe

Destiny 2 is a game about future space wizards with lots of guns trying to survive in a hostile solar system and its adjacent planes of existence.
posted by curious nu to A Videogame Club (8 comments total)
 
I finally tried this out and have fallen into it pretty hard. Lots of the gamedev folks I follow on Twitter have been singing its narrative praises for awhile, and I figured I'd dip into the F2P part. Picked up Witch Queen deluxe about a week after that. Still haven't done any raids or dungeons, unfortunately, been trying to find folks to team up with!
posted by curious nu at 8:51 AM on September 24, 2022 [1 favorite]


Destiny2 occupies this weird space in my brain where I don't fully understand the iterations that the game has gone through and how easy it would be for a new player who is completely unfamiliar with the franchise to start the game.

What was your experience like?
posted by lazaruslong at 5:37 AM on September 30, 2022


Pretty challenging. There's, y'know, stuff to do as a F2P account but it's all locked down in terms of campaign/storyline so you need to be okay with just doing pretty random stuff. Having Stasis locked in a campaign also means that meeting some challenges is more-or-less impossible (there's something in the current season about doing shatter damage, which is apparently separate from normal stasis-element weapon damage). And also some of the past storylines are completely locked now ("vaulted") so.. I'll never see those.

There is also basically NO tutorial about how gameplay mechanics work and I can't find a good wiki or other resource like I'd expect.

I tried to do a raid and gave up because there was a jumping puzzle sequence and the deep and abiding shame I felt at continually fucking it up when everyone else had made it was one of the most stupid intense emotions I have felt in a long time. Like.. just really bad. There's cool gear locked in those, and I'm interested to join in the gameplay (not just watch it), but I need a very forgiving group of people to play those with, I think.

BUT oh my gosh the game just feels good. It's so fast, moment to moment (it is EXTREMELY difficult to shift between this and DRG). I thought I'd get bored doing the same encounters over and over, but I think playing a lot of DRG has made that easier for me. The world is weird and wonderful. I still don't love how much of it is about guns, I'm working through some feelings there. Also I think I've been playing too much; there are so many little achievements/challenges to go after, so clearly that is meeting some need in my life I'm not getting otherwise, which is probably something I should look into.

I don't know if I'll pick up Lightfall next year. I have access to this year's seasons, and I've started to go back and do those when I wait for this season's stuff to tick over.

I get to be a robot fighter wizard in science fantasy space who gets to wear actual armor regardless of which gender my character has (looking at you, FFXIV) and I've been fighting a lot of space pirates so, y'know. Good times.
posted by curious nu at 12:09 PM on September 30, 2022 [2 favorites]


Thank you so much for writing that out -- really validates the friction I was kind of fearing. Don't think it's the game I'm looking for right now, but for some reason I do like reading about Destiny and watching clips that go viral and stuff.
posted by lazaruslong at 2:34 AM on October 1, 2022


Yeah, I feel like with a regular playgroup it'd be great, but as-is it can be tough. I'm reconciling that there's just a lot of the game I'm probably never going to see.
posted by curious nu at 5:02 PM on October 1, 2022 [1 favorite]


So I 100% don't know what to think about this game, which I am continuing to play too much.

1) It's really just about collecting and shooting guns, and that's.. problematic.

2) It's ALSO about navigating grief and regret and toxic masculinity, and generational trauma, and standing up for your beliefs (and taking the consequences that go with that).

3) There's a whole-ass expansion based on Moon's Haunted and that's absolutely beautiful.

4) The loop of "here's a thing I can accomplish today.. hey, gunpoints! I'll get a new thing and accomplish another snack," is fucking insidious.

5) Jetting around the solar system fighting bad space wizards and robots is pretty good.
posted by curious nu at 4:15 PM on October 23, 2022 [2 favorites]


There was a point in time where I really missed Phantasy Star Online, which was pretty unique at the time for being kind of a MMORPG but with arcade play base. At the time I was like, "Where are more multiplayer co-op action games like PSO!?!?!?!"

And it feels like F2P games are the monkey paw granting of that wish. Like Sea of Thieves or the GTAO or RDO or Warframe or MonHunWorld or Anthem or... Destiny 2? From the outside Destiny 2 looks like the one of them that might last the longest, but it's sad that I'm just not interested in its gameplay at all. Even its aesthetics; while I have seen some beautiful things (I just watched a video with the Saturn "dusk cathedral" and it fucking HURT how beautiful it was... then the FPS pew pew starts and :-/). It and Warframe both have a idk too gothic, too ornate thing going on where I look at the character models and go, "eh".. Also of course D2 is first-person anyway, and I think I just really need to be able to see and dress up my character that's a critical thing for me, combined with how first-person often makes me motion sick.

Also back in my PSO bereavement days I imagined my ideal co-op MMO-action-RPG as a fantasy game, but somehow it skews scifi.

I feel like there's some other version of me out there who is playing and loving Destiny 2 tho.
posted by fleacircus at 3:49 PM on October 26, 2022 [2 favorites]


That's a great observation about PSO as an early version of these and.. promise deferred, maybe? I'm a huge PS setting fan (and was sad to learn just yesterday that Rieko Kodama died earlier this year). I didn't have a Dreamcast so I only got to try out PSO once pirate PC servers were up and running years later, and still had a blast. Looking at the current PSO2 offering and it just doesn't have the same feeling.

Even its aesthetics; while I have seen some beautiful things (I just watched a video with the Saturn "dusk cathedral" and it fucking HURT how beautiful it was... then the FPS pew pew starts and :-/).

Actual criminal crime: there's no screenshot mode in Destiny 2. The work the environmental designers have done is AMAZING and I'm so, so bummed that I can't just take a few minutes out, put the stupid gun and HUD away, and look out at a nightmarish pyramid lurking above a haunted moon, or a windswept lake on Europa, or clamber about the wreck of a ship without dodging invulnerable puzzle-bosses. This is legit one of my biggest complaints about the game.

It and Warframe both have a idk too gothic, too ornate thing going on

A weird selling point for me right now, actually! I was looking for something Locked Tomb-adjacent and this is as close as I've found. (I know WH40K is out there but the vibe just doesn't match up for me). Sad dearth of skeleton monsters for me to summon and/or battle, unfortunately.
posted by curious nu at 8:30 AM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]


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