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Destiny 2 review
Meh
by Pr0x

God Damn piece of disappointment. Bungie plez, do it better next time!!!
«Disappointment of the year»
«Waste of time»
«Reviewers bribed»

Other reviews20

Got addicted to it then hit a pay wall 
«Waste of time»
Let me set this straight: This game is fantastic - don't let this review take anything away from that. The set design is jaw-dropping, the gunplay is satisfying and clean, the music is fantastic, and I can keep playing this for eternity. However, with all that said. I still cannot recommend this game. Whilst it is incredible, the new player experience NEEDS to be revised, as it will be with Lightfall. When Lightfall arrives, I will come back and revise my review and maybe change it if the new player experience is properly fixed.
BRO seriously why are you playing shooters? And more importantly why are you mindlessly grinding a shooter, go play skylanders. 3/10
Games as Service games generally suck, but at least destiny has cool combat
This isn't a game.

This is a Skinner box. It's designed by sociopaths who don't even like playing games, specifically to play with how much they can manipulate people into playing this shit endlessly.

If you've ever played any other MMO, it will become immediately obvious that your ability to ever get any kind of loot worth having is going to be gated first by RNG, and then by other players. This may sound familiar, but the degree to which it's taken in this game is absurd, and the community, as a whole, couldn't be more toxic and n00b-hostile if it were required by law.

PVP, in particular, is absolutely not even worth considering at this point unless you've been playing since launch. The way Bungo makes droprates suck complete shit paired with how they've removed the ability to even get a ton of old weapons means that no matter what you do, if you start playing right now, you'll never catch up with people who have been playing since launch.

And that's to say nothing about how before you can even think about going into PVP, you're likely as not to discover if you do some research that you're going to want to go in there as Stasis, which means both that you have to pay for Beyond Light AND that you better get comfy, because in order to get the Stasis subclasses, you have to play through the whole campaign ON EACH CHARACTER, and then spend weeks grinding out bounties with Elsie before they're actually worth using.

And even once you do all that? If you don't instantly prove that you're the best to ever play this game, you'll be relegated to shit-tier ELO, where you'll exclusively be used as easy pickings for players you're never going to be able to beat. Sweat all you want. Tell yourself you just need to "git gud." Believe that you'll get better.

None of that will make a difference.

Particularly in Trials of Osiris, don't get suckered in by the fact that you can solo queue; that shit is only there to bait you in to get slaughtered by the players Bungo actually cares about.
If you don't show up to this game with at least 5 other people and an insatiable hunger to exchange money for cosmetic shit, Bungo doesn't give a flying fuck about you.

I would sooner recommend staring at a wall than starting to play this game in 2021.
It would be less of a waste of your time, and significantly less likely to spike your blood pressure.

It simply isn't worth the chance that you'll actually fall for their purpose-built addiction machine and find yourself feeling compelled to fall for the neverending FOMO cycle of them introducing shit for a limited time, then deleting access to <whatever>, then being continuously shit on by other players who got <whatever>.

To put the finest point on this I possibly can: If you want a game you can ever, for an instant, stop playing 24/7, you have no business whatsoever even considering this nuclear grease fire.
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«Waste of time»
«Reviewers bribed»
I've decided to quit this game.

(A d33p reflection on this game and how video games pair with real life as a whole.)

writing this review real quick and procrastinating schoolwork in the process....

Part 1: Destiny 2 review

I started back playing in February after stopping in early D2, and I enjoyed catching up with everything, raiding regularly with the boys etc. However, since I've started back at school I've finally accepted that this game just isn't compatible with my life. And I just don't think it's compatible with real life in general.

Definitely some people might be able to come and go freely from this game and don't care that much about keeping up with it, but I have always been hooked by Destiny. Hell, this game has been a part of my life for almost a third of my existence (although i did quit it like this on 2 occasions). 

This realization was brought on by farming strikes for the current season's ritual weapon. Since the start of the new season (and school for me), I've played maybe an hour a week, only doing the "new" content. But yesterday I went down a youtube rabbithole and got the idea to grind out the ritual weapon and try some new builds along the way.

Let me just say that any game that incentivizes you to play the same exact levels OVER AND OVER AGAIN is not worth your time (I was speedrunning Lake of Shadows, which is probably as repetitive as content can possibly get. I could've been doing nightfalls but i didn't feel like it and, despite the extra rewards, playing content like That repetitively is Also not worth your time.)

I realized that I'm not playing this game because I actually enjoy playing it aka the act of gameplay and playing through missions. I'm only playing it because of the carrot on the stick at the end of it. I mean, I've known this game was pointless forever now, but I'm having a particularly strong reaction to it now. 

The design and environments are pretty damn nice. The universe is pretty large scale and decently interesting even if the plots of the game have been extremely mediocre. These are two big appeals of a game to me. But I realized I'm only thinking about that pretty much 0.01% of the time I'm playing the game. 

Even if those two elements of the game are nice, they are inseparable from the core gameplay loop of this game. There may not be a game that scratches the same itch as this universe (in reality there are multiple), but it just simply isn't worth playing this to experience it because of the package it's wrapped in. It's an amazing business model for Bungie, but it comes at the (non-financial) expense of the player in my opinion. 



Part 2: Games and the real world

As with many things in human civilization, we don't know what we're doing when it comes to video games. We're still in an early stage with video games I think and we don't have a good enough understanding as a society on how they interact with our lives. The prevalence of games like this and mobile games that are meant to get you addicted and suck away your time is really not good. To me, these sorts of games, like social media, are just predatory in how they take advantage of the mechanics of our brains.

Honestly, China might be justified in limiting gameplay time to 3 hours a week and docking your social credit score for excessive gaming. The more time you spend playing a video game (or watching reality tv or whatever), the less time you're spending on improving your real life. In a pErfEct worLd, we'd be able to do whatever we wanted if it made us happy. BUT THIS IS NOT A PERFECT WORLD*. If we're spending our time living in fantasies, then our lives and the rest of the world goes to shit. Now this might not happen as immediately as that sounds, but I do think this is something as a society that we're going to have to grapple with. Do we want to focus on real life and improving this shitshow of a world? Or do we want to sedate ourselves with media or whatever and neglect that? so basically just the message of Serial Experiments Lain.

Obviously it's not THAT binary and you can play video games/watch shit and still have a decent life. But it is honestly a verrry slippery slope imo. I don't have the data on-hand to reference for this, but we are seeing problems with these latest generations who've grown up on the internet and their competency as adults. (i'm very much in this category....). So i think this is something we're going to have to think about going forward (as if we aren't already doing enough wrong....)

How should video games be? How should they/entertainment as a whole interact with our lives?

In my opinion, stuff like battle royales that don't require you to grind for shit, that you play solely because it's fun, is much better than stuff like D2. Games with immersive stories and worlds, that might actually have some substance to them, are far better as well. Even with these though, I feel like you can very easily have too much of a good thing and neglect your real life as a result. I guess with forms of recreation prior to movies, tv shows, video games etc, we were probably doing things that were either A) beneficial to our physical health or B) more than likely had some kind of real world benefit to them (becoming a chess chad and meeting people through playing them, winning MONEY. playing instruments and getting clouted up thru it, etc). Basically parents were right when they said stop watching so much tv/playing so much vidja. Idk, i'm just letting this shit fly. Time for me to actually do this frickin scoowork

*the video i'm referencing in case you ain' know: https://youtu.be/Kl3H4vMqYNo 
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«Waste of time»
I played Destiny 2 for around one year, from the middle of Shadowkeep to the middle of Beyond Light. It was fun at first. Played solo for a while, then joined a clan to be able to do more end-game activities. Still fun, learning dungeons and raids. The release of Beyond Light was fun, as was attempting a day one raid. Shortly after that it started loosing the appeal.

The game world is not that big, you'll be running a lot around in the same environments. There's just too much of repeating the same activities every week and completing bounties within those activities that force you to use something other than your favorite gear or play style. Everything seems to be about completing bounties and it's boring. On top of it, they started adding gear that was only possible to get if you solo kinda difficult content, while the game is much more fun with others.

I don't know... the game was fun, while the mechanics felt new and fresh. The gun play and movement is good. It's just that all the new content is doing more bounties for a different reason.
«Boooring»
Chores the game. 

If only this game had deeper and more interesting characters and narrative threads.

It's so addicting because it has some of the best gunplay of any game. It feels so good to get new weapons and get those sweet kills, while the progression loop is always rewarding the player. 

But it is an empty shell that never leads anywhere. The PVP is very unfun, and it can be hard to find the right crew to play with. 

The music and art-direction of this game are top notch.
«Sit back and relax»
«Better with friends»
8/10
«Can’t stop playing»
«Beaten more than once»
I swear to god, Bungie butchers this game more and more with each and every update. The removal of SBMM seals the deal; this is quite possibly one of the worst balanced games ever.
«Buggy as hell»
«Waste of time»
Initial Review:
Destiny 2 had a strong opening. I thought it looked very good and I enjoyed the actual campaign portion. I only ever played solo and once I beat the main campaign I stopped playing very quickly. The end game stuff didn’t interest me and I though the sense of progression died out too quick. This game was almost an A-.

Initial Score: B+

Journal Style Review:
Okay this is the first time I’ve cared about cross play. I played destiny 2 on PlayStation and now I’m wanting to play the expansions on gamepass and I was not looking forward to having to start from scratch. The cross play was really easy to set up.

Not a great first session just because it was so confusing. I want to remember how the game works and how to pick up quests. And even how to find waypoints and things. It’s not the type of game you can just wander around aimlessly. There needs to be reasons to do things.

I really only want to do the campaigns, which I’ve googled how to do, but I’m concerned they won’t be fun because I will be so over leveled? There won’t be any sense of progression which is the whole point... I’ll give it a shot but I’m not so sure I’m going to actually play these.

Starting curse of Osiris...it’s too easy. Biggest complaint so far is that it isn’t balanced for power level 750, which is what it starts you at. So like what the fuck. And it’s a bummer too because the gunplay is really good. The gun variety is nice at the beginning at least. Lots of guns feel good so far. The enemies are fun to shoot at because they do a lot of interesting weak spots and immune spots, so from a gameplay perspective it’s entertaining. The actual art designs are kind of boring in a generic kind of way but not too bad. The environment is fun in a cheesy light hearted way as well.

Finished Osiris. It was fine. A bit generic. I only died once so there was no challenge which hurt it. This did not increased my score.

Start of Warmind. More of the same so far. Some firefights are getting a bit tougher...but I’m still not dying and I’m not getting a lot of loot so I’m getting bored of using the same guns.

I googled and realized I need to pick up guns from this robot mailman and need to do this quest so I can use these Engram things. It’s been more fun now that I’m getting new guns again. It took a lot of googling to figure out how to do everything though. Too much googling.

Uhh I beat Warmind. I didn’t realize the worm fight was the final fight. Pretty short and lame expansion actually. Well on to the forsaken.

Opening prison break mission of forsaken is better than any mission from the previous two expansions. The cutscenes were actually good. The action was pretty cool. The new enemy design looked cooler than most. There was some comedy in there also, I chuckled at least once. Strong start. I hope it keeps it up. This feels more like a real campaign.

I loved the second mission as well. The style of this game is way better. The enemies and environment is more to my taste. And the gameplay and guns I currently have are both very fun. Plus it’s harder. It’s not stupidly easy anymore.

The game forces you to do some bounties next which was actually an appropriate time for me to learn about bounties and to complete some of the public events. I won’t do a lot of these though. I still prefer traditional missions and think these events get repetitive fast. 

I’m a big fan of the bow you get in this expansion. It’s sweet. Going around hunting these bosses is very fun. It’s great gameplay too. This forsaken dlc is about the same quality as my first impression of the base game. It’s a very high B+. Like just barely below an A-.

I’ve said it before but I need to say it again. The gameplay is really good. It’s the games biggest strength. It’s a fast paced and feels so smooth. The repetitive structure of the game is not as big an issue because the guns are so fun to use and the combat feels so precise.

Finished forsaken. Thoroughly enjoyed it. Partly because the environment, story and enemies were better, but also because I just had a better understanding on how things work. I was getting better gear and actually making progress. 

Start of shadowkeep. First impression is I don’t hate the aesthetic of moon. Opening mission was not bad.

After playing for maybe 4 hours in this dlc It’s getting a bit repetitive again for me. Forsaken was the peak. 

These “campaign” missions are getting cheap. Kill 100 enemies is not a mission this deep in a game. I’ve already free roamed your moon map. It’s overkill.

Finished the campaign. I was pretty bored by the end. It gets too repetitive and there aren’t enough missions that are actually designed so the enjoyment is very heavily reliant on how much I like the guns I have. The original base game score was a very high B+. If I reviewed these 4 expansions as a complete independent product, it would have only been a mid level B+. 

Beyond Light Coop Review:
Completing the last DLC, and whatever other side content, with 2 friends. I’m finally playing this game the way it’s supposed to be played.

The game is definitely better with others. I’ve been enjoying gambit as well as messing around with the story missions but the latest DLC is again lazy and feels cheap and repetitive again. They aren’t campaigns. They just set up new locations and missions for prolonged grinding for those that enjoy it. Destiny 2 doesn’t pull me in enough for me to want to grind away. I do want to complete a raid that these guys keep talking about.

I’m quadrupling down on my opinion that destiny is super confusing. All the different places you have to go to get bounties and the upgrade systems and all that I just don’t find intuitive or well explained.

If you are partied up but you don’t stay close enough during certain parts of the campaign you don’t get the progress. It happened a couple times. Just another quality of life thing.

The dungeon was a highlight though. The long commitment is daunting and the mystery of what to do was confusing at first but I really enjoyed it overall. That was a unique experience I had not done before.

Played all the dungeons and they were fun. Played a bunch of gambit. Played some strikes. Played some pvp. The game is fine and it’s fun playing with friends but I don’t feel any desire to grind out higher levels and gear. I feel like I have experienced all destiny 2 has to offer at this point.

Final Score: B+
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I see the addicting qualities, but over all the game suffers from many flaws. Combat, enemies and level design are all extremely repetitive and lackluster. Skins and weapons are in variety, but this does not make up for the terribly basic combat. the story is also extremely bad and full of exposition. This game is appealing to some, but to those who want quality games.. well then you will be sorely disappointed.
«Boooring»