DESTINY 2: FORSAKEN (Bungie – X1, PS4, PC – September 4) – “Forsaken” is the Year 2 expansion for Destiny 2. It is in the vein of Destiny 1’s “The Taken King“, but with one caveat; Destiny 2 is in a huge, bad place. Destiny 1 was on the comeback at this time with an April update and such. Destiny 2, on the other hand, sucks. Streamers and hardcore players left for greener pastures, and game reporters continue to laud Destiny in general. So the question arises again — will this expansion bring anyone back? Will this “fix” the game? Bungie held a Twitch stream to reveal the next expansion and the stream began with a ViDoc…
So much went on visually, but the developers explained a lot about the changes. They broke the game; in tech terms, they made our characters too powerful. They brought back the Reef, made a RAID, and made a PvP/PvE mode called Gambit. Oh and made power levels matter again in Trials and Iron Banner. Thank Jebus.
GAMBIT – CHARGING CARDS
This all new game mode is 4v4, with two teams separated by a wall. Gambit’s objective is to kill enemies and collect motes (aka orbs), and bank them into pillar, thus increasing your teams score. The opposing team can block the pillar by collecting a set amount of motes before the other team. The blocker is an enemy and the pillar drops below the floor not allowing anyone to deposit anymore motes. The opposing team can not advance until they kill the blocker(s). So basically, this sounds like PvE; but, here’s where Gambit gets it’s name: One person from a team can go over to the other side and attack
the team! This will be fun.
OUR ARROWS WILL BLOT OUT THE SUN…
…then we will fight in the shade. Weapon slots have changed.. big time. Back in Destiny 1, we had primaries (scout rifles, autos, hand guns, and pulse rifles), secondaries (fusion rifles, shotguns, sniper rifles, and sidearms), and heavies (rocket launchers, swords, and heavy machine guns). In Destiny 2, Bungie went full-on stupid — and not in a Rage-y, good way — and made Kinetic (scouts, pulse, autos, handguns, sidearms, and submachine guns), energy (scouts, autos, handguns, sidearms, submachine guns, and pulse), and power weapons (rocket launchers, grenade launchers, snipers, shotguns, fusion rifles, and swords). The game became nothing but Shooterman’s TeamKill USA. PvP is not fun; would have you ever have expected me to give something from Destiny, such as the “Warmind” DLC, this low of a score?
But in the Forsaken, weapon slots are now interchangeable. If you want classic D1 weapon slots? Go for it. If you liked D2’s? …HAVE AT IT. But, want to try Forsaken and have a shotty in every slot?? You can be that guy. Yes. Weapons can now be placed in whatever slot you want. This may also break the game. They also brought back weapon randomization, by increasing the amount of perks in a gun. Of course, Bungie didn’t go into any freaking detail, but hey–it’s back. They also have introduced bows and arrows, with short range, mid range, and long range bows. Bung showed them off and the short range is like a simple bow. Long range is a compound bow. It looks insane. No, really.
TORNADO OF FIRE, KAME HAME HA
Destiny 2‘s expansion will also change the subclasses, and now: Titans with the fist of havoc can swan dive; Sunbreakers can have a huge hammer like in the old Rise of Iron and smash the ground, causing a flame to travel the ground (which, ultimately, causes a tornado of fire upon enemy impact); Voidwalkers can blink attack like Vegeta; Arcstriders can deflect projectiles with their bow by twirling; and Stormcallers can do an electrical beam like a Kame Hame Ha. All classes now have 3 supers (9 total) and, apparently, a fourth subclass. Bungie even claimed that they may have made the characters too powerful (a.k.a broke the game), but they went “oh well, let’s keep going.” Noice.
HOARDERS SEASON 12
If you like collecting things such as yours truly, well, you’re in luck. Now the game will have a collections tab within your character screen. It will keep track of what you have, and if you accidentally delete it you can retrieve it. That includes ships, sparrows, ghosts, legendary/exotic weapons, and legendary/exotic armor. My Vault is packed full of shaders and legendary guns… Now I can free it up with this. In game lore is now a thing ala Grimoire. This was a big deal for a lot of players. And I really like the lore of Destiny. So, Bungie finally putting all the lore in the game and not just on their website is a freaking Godsend! The lore will be next to your Triumph tab, which will keep track of what you do — something that was done in Age of Triumph. Oh, and mass shader deletion is a thing.
RAID? KILLS BUGS DEAD
There is a Raid, and it looks like there will be a Raid area like a Raid
hub (ala World of Warcraft). The raid itself looks gorgeous and there are more bosses in this Raid than any Raid created before it. Kings Fall was 4 (WarPriest, Golgoroth, The Sisters, and Oryx). That is cool, considering Leviathan had really one boss fight, the Eater of Worlds, and Spire of
the Stars had one boss fight. Also, speculation is that since it is a Raid hub, you may not unlock all the paths right away, only adding far more length to the event. Raids will also never look the same twice.
HOW MUCH DOE
So, Bungie has introduced what they call Annual Pass. At $70, it covers all the items introduced (weapons, armor, exotics, triumphs, ornaments, and other things added during the course of the game). If you choose not to get the Annual Pass, the game itself will cost $40, just like The Taken King. The only advantage The Annual Pass does is that it eliminates the Eververse store, which in my opinion is a good thing. I have already read on Reddit how it’s too much and some bullcrap. You can JUST buy the game. The need for the Annual Pass is unnecessary, unless you are a Whore-dur.
To sum up today’s Year 2 reveal, with all of the changes, all of the new additions, and all of the returning features that the community wanted and Bungie will improve upon — not to mention the story and the addition of a new enemy type — can only equate to these three words: OH. MY. GODHatesGeeks.
-Adam Bowers