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Destiny

5.0
Release Date: Sep 9th, 2014
Genre: FPS
Developer: Bungie Software
Review by: killerworld

When Halo meets basic RPG.

Centered around a Post-apocalyptic universe, mankind and other things on Earth survived “The Collapse” thanks to an entity known as “The Traveller.” A ghost – a construct of The Traveller searches for lost 'Guardians' to revive them from the grasping claws of Death and protect the rest of creation from impending destruction.

That's the jest of the story unfortunately, that is pretty much what sums up Destiny's story. There is no long story like most RPGs' have and Destiny does have a Codex system similar to what Mass Effect or Xenosaga has but relies the Codex to be accessed online only.

destiny01
Traveling in space as a loading screen

GAME BASICS:

The game offers four different enemy factions to face against in your campaign story, The Vex – a robotic race which look like bronzed Geth where they apparently have control over 'time' and some can teleport and roams on two planets and you won't forget them because they will hurt you like hell compared to most. Another, called the Fallen have very strong ties to The Covenant on Halo roams three planets and a moon, lower grunts do hit tactics while the larger foes tries to tank the damage or head-on assault to melee you relentlessly. Next is the Hive, basically the flood of Halo, zombie styled forces which you will forget existed since they only roam on one planet and on a moon. The final faction is called the Cabal, a larger variant of the Volus from Mass Effect that have strong Military values but their gameplay tactics are horrendous for a faction that should be feared only roams one planet.

GAMEPLAY:

The game embarks in mission format, where one must select a mission, complete it and then select another mission to progress the story. The “sandbox” shines during Patrol missions where you are given infinite number of missions per section of the sandbox level, however the sandbox equivalent to most games is very small. Imagine if GTA 3 only had one island and it was the size of a medium island, you can quickly go from one territory to another in an instance and you will quickly know where to go and what places are what within 10 – 20 minutes, while in other games it takes you longer to fully memorize the territory you're in. The game offers 25 story missions which can be completed in 5 to 10 minutes (if you rush them) and 20 minutes (slow progression).


MULTIPLAYER:

PVE COOP

Some downsides that you will expect are 3 player co-op story missions and 6 player Raid missions. Having an odd number for regular patrol or story mission co-op leaves question to damage and probability of loot values. The loot is terrible on this game, focused around those who are playing above level 20 (30 is max for now) but when approaching level 20 you must acquire more of a certain stat only found in level 20 armor and must be high tiered (blue – purple – yellow), this certain stat is called Light, the game heavily enforces the prospect of light and darkness like how people view Heaven and Hell in certain aspects. When you obtain Light you gain more levels, Raid offers the most Light stat gear but can only be acquired Weekly and worst of all you might not get the Armor pieces due to its random loot function, it could be Materials needed for High Tier armors or weapons or it could be just a simple miscellaneous item. Exotics (yellow) offer high Light as well but you can only equip one armor and one weapon of exotic tier, unlike Borderlands where you can equip any exotic weaponry and whatever else but this makes it much more harder to obtain Level 30.

destiny02
The loot system, shaped as a pentagon ball, you will never know what you'll get

The game tries to offer a friendly message to gamers, but eventually when you get to level 25+ you begin to see that PvE is just something kept in the corner to play with when bored or have enough friends to handle the harder regions to obtain loot that will eventually be nothing good because either the randomization will offer you something you have or don't want and dismantling weaponry offers little materials needed to upgrade other high end weapons making you unable to upgrade it to max without waiting for a day to pass and hope you get more materials from Daily story challenges to only obtain 2 Materials while weapons wants 6 per damage upgrade (about 3 upgrades that demand the materials – total 18 materials needed). You can also get materials from Public events and the Raid but the are capped to be Weekly limitation.


PVP

PvP is very strong on this game, making the PvE feel very non-existent, you can obtain good gear within 5 – 10 sessions and you obtain these coins called marks which are needed to obtain purple tiered weaponry if you can't find any, also there are Factions at the main hub level where they offer purple tier weaponry but you must gain reputation by beating PvP mode or do Bounties that have PvE or PvP challenges.

PVP has four different modes but three of them are very comparable:

  • Control – capture territory and defend it from enemy players
  • Clash – Team based PvP, Kill enemy players on sight but don't die or you let the enemy gain points as well
  • Rumble – Free for all, Kill all who are in your way
  • Skirmish – 3vs3 where you can revive your allies

At certain times of the month you may encounter

  • Iron Banner – Level advantages are on, meaning if your a level 30 surrounded by level 20's you're gonna survive a lot longer against them. Follows the control setting (or at least every moment I tried it, control mode was always there)
  • Vehicle mode – plays only maps where it has vehicles in it
  • Salvage – a random item drops that needs to be analyzed but you must defend it from enemies otherwise you won't get bonus points for acquiring the item.
destiny03
The bounty tracker to offer exp and reputation


MY OPINION:

At the end, the game feels like a job. You get on one day, do bounties to gain reputation for the faction you are working in hope that when you get to rank 15 they give you something epic or do really hard missions that requires great team effort and skill to only gain a reward that you're later saying “why did my friend get that exotic hand-cannon and I get a purple sniper rifle which I don't need because I maxed out my sniper rifle I am using now.” The game wants you to earn things the hard way and I am cool with that but there is a moment where you can't even solo it or at times the enemies are given extra damage (which also affects you if you have the right elemental weapon) but they still can kill you in a shot or two.

The loot table is very small, you will most likely see someone with that epic weapon that you hold in your hands with the same features and the same design structure, unlike Borderlands where even though you have the same epic weapon both guns won't have the same look or small features. Although, the programming on the gameplay is unique and fun no small flickering of enemies or player everything runs smooth and pristine, it might even get you hooked on how great the game feels when you are shooting an enemy or how everything plays out which some games have had issues with like Warframe or Rage.

Destiny offers an semi-MMO experience when you are exploring the various sections of the worlds you will come across random players but if you are playing a mission and you are heading towards the objective in a different area you will be alone or with your fireteam(co-op friends) while other MMO's allow players to roam in your mission sessions.

destiny04
Peter Dinklage voices this ghost and it's not his fault that his voice acting on this game sucks, its because of what the developers wanted. Peter Dinklage has done phenomenal voice acting he has voice acted as Captain Gutt from Ice age 4

The game's motto is to be Legend, I guess they meant the other Legend.. where you fade away in time from boredom of doing the same rotation of doing bounties, doing PvP, short PvE story challenges, Some patrolling missions that offer little reputation unless you find assassination ones and have the nightfall award bonus but after all that it's not the same as playing a game where you can find loot easily in a chest or a game where beating a certain boss might have that epic weapon or a random enemy might drop stuff that will help in the long run. The game just wants you to play the hardest PvE and hope that you have friends or communication skills and luck to gain that weapon or item you are hoping to get but only get 2nd hand items.

With three planets and one moon, the sandbox is very small compared to most games of this nature and the level system will remind you of Call of Duty. It all comes down to if you are looking for a game that will eat your time like a job would and have the friends to be co-workers or are you a lone wolf that will not make it far because the game is heavily reliant on co-op (even the raid is designed to have people with you otherwise you fail to open the front door or beat the boss)

In my honest opinion, this game should have been priced at 20 bucks or free like Warframe considering the small story I went through and all this heavy grinding that I would've done in a full old-school JRPG.


TROPHY:

Most trophies are grind trophies of kills or getting Codex points from killing with specific weapons or class, collecting stuff and winning. The hardest trophy is getting the Raid trophy with Clan mates, you need 6 people and they can't die during the raid. The vault of glass raid has a moment where everyone can die during the gorgon maze, so practice can make perfection if everyone on the team is willing.


PROS AND CONS:

The Pros

  • Great gameplay functionality and fluctuation.
  • Neat special skills that separate the three classes.
  • Neat landscapes and details on clothing.
  • If you are tired of Grim Stories or relationship drama
  • No random player interference in mission buildings unless playing a Strike mission
  • What loot you see is for you to grab, the only thing shared in game is chest locations and material pick ups which disappear after 20 seconds if not picked up by players if it has been accessed.

Neutral

  • No Gore
  • No blood
  • No gibbing(body blown to pieces)
  • No malice (when exploring enemy areas it doesn't feel like they killed people)
  • No cussing
  • 'Soccer mom' approved

The Bad

  • Loot table is small – getting good stuff is harder and not much uniqueness among the playing field
  • Only offer three classes.Not much customization options
  • Raid primary weapons have elemental damage but every other gun including exotics have no elemental based damage.
  • The whole aspect of acquiring Light Gear just to level up is very annoying.
  • Just because you owned everyone on PVP mode or killed more than your friends on PVE mode doesn't mean you will get the shiny prize.
  • 10 years in making, the game feels like the 10 years was spent on the engine design and only a year on the actual game.
  • Chests hardly offer any weaponry and if it does its either a blue or green tier weaponry/armor, chests only good to obtain materials.

The Ugly

  • This game runs on servers of Bungie's, your character is saved and can only be accessed on their end, just like Warframe so if they have to do maintenance you cannot access the game, if they go out of business guess what happened to all your progress.. the only upside is that if you formatted or have a non-functional PS4/PS3/Xbox/360 your character will always be there waiting for you on your PSN account.
  • PS Plus required on some levels and PVP.
  • The hunter's Bladedancer special if the right skills are selected, the player is almost invincible on PVP unless hit by another person's special.
  • Titan and Warlock's Specials are one shot while Hunter can shoot three times and four if Hunter has a certain exotic helmet.
  • No non-mic social communication, must rely on message system of console.
  • The Reef area is just there, nothing to access after story completion.
  • Plot dies out after Earth.
  • If you've played the Beta, you've played the 'whole game' just minus two playable areas and certain skills.
  • Loading times are semi-long.
  • No spaceship traveling, no spaceship battles, no space pirating fallen getting in your way. Spaceships are just there to show off and to see during loading screens.
  • NO REAL SUPPORT SECTION must rely on forums to get help with technical difficulties of Destiny
  • Point and shoot - hardly any puzzles, raid offers a puzzle but its something that really requires communication and causes frustration only to open a gate and get teleported again by the boss

SUMMARY:

  • Graphics: 9/10 PS4, 4/10 on PS3
  • Sounds 6/10 (exotics guns have better noises but ambient noises get over shadowed by music)
  • Music 9/10 (the theme song is really nice)
  • Trophy difficulty 6/10

without the gameplays smoothness and the nice music and some good landscape design the game is just another shooter

Overall Score: 5.0 /10

By

Killerworld


Nov 3rd 2014

Killerworld




Movies similar:

  • Marvel movies (Destiny shares Marvel's non-grimness in stories unlike DC comics where they have grim stories)

Games similar:

  • Mass Effect
  • Warframe
  • World of Warcraft
  • More recent Final Fantasy games




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