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Destiny - Review Thread
- Thread starter opticalmace
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T
thepotatoman
Unconfirmed Member
The marathon series was pretty great and was very highly regarded, in both story and (for the time) gameplay. It just wasn't popular thanks to the platform they were released for.
As for what went wrong here, they swung and missed wildly on their trying to marriage a MMO structure to a not MMO game. That's really it. All problems Destiny has seems to come back to that one problem of MMO but not MMO design.
It shouldn't have that much of an effect if they find the game to be fun to play.
I've got 40 hours in it now and I find the co-op and gameplay to be incredibly enjoyable but I have no clue whats going on in the story. That wouldn't stop me from giving the game at least an 8 / 10.
Ingueferroque
Banned
So, he doesn't understand the game?
Disclosure: I'm only lvl11, don't have much time to play.
Yesterday I had some time at 1AM to play a few missions on the Moon, so I started the mission, looked in my friends list, and invited someone I didnt really know who was similarly levelled.
He arrived in my game world as I spawned, and started voice chatting, and we set upon our mission. Everything was perfectly smooth.
We saw another player in the distance as we were near a cave, I went up to him, and invited him to our fireteam. He joined us and we continued to finish the mission.
The shooting feels incredibly fun, co-op feels smooth (though there is that awful delay when the PS4 UI comes up to send someone an invite) and dynamic. The graphics (to me, subjective, sure) are through the roof. RIght now, with limited time to play it and having not finished the campaign, it seems packed with content. I can do roaming missions, take on strikes, or do regular missions. I can also PVP..
I actually like the 'limited' storytelling. I like the little bits that play as I'm flying to a planet with Dinklage talking to me, or playing back audio clips relating to the mission I'm about to do.
The actual mission variety is lame, but since everything looks incredible and plays really well that doesn't really bother me.
I saw the Vex for the first time on Venus, and they are really fun to fight. I don't get the generic comments.. they look awesome!
Now here's the thing, after (I think) the first mission on Venus there was a short cutscene, and despite not caring about what is happening, I thought it was perfect for this type of game. Short, interestingly written, and charming. My character's voice sounds really interesting, and I liked his quick interaction with dinklebot. (No idea why he/she doesn't talk during the gameplay).
I understand the complaints, but to give this game a 4.6/10 should be grounds for a The Hague trial.
Sodding_Gamer
Member
I'm definitely feeling this too. There has been games that were way more ambitious than Destiny that were made in a smaller timeframe, and with less people. I'm willing to put money on (even though we will probably never get the full story anyway) that something happened around a year ago that changed the game completely and stuck it safe with those story missions. Considering the cutscenes are so bare, the random Reef area which consists of one out of the what 4 cutscenes in the game, and the repeated mission design which can easily be implemented quickly from a gameplay development perspective. Hell I could create those missions in a bog standard mission editor in weeks.
Never just read one review. You may agree with that single review, but somebody else might not.
Oh I wasn't saying it should have a big effect on everyone's opinion of the game. Some people love story. Others skip cutscenes no matter how good a story is. How important a good story is differs for each person.
I was just noting it anticipation of the review because the tweets seem like a preemptive defense. I don't care about the score is. I just want to read their opinion on it regardless of whether it's positive, neutral, or negative.
Ingueferroque
Banned
Those flying drone enemies really remind me of Marathon 2 every time I see it. I think I'm pretending that this is secretly a new Marathon game.
Have any direct references been found relating to Marathon? Or does 343i own that license now?
^^
This. Exactly. Even the maps are not really open that world, cause you get railroaded a lot, and the game gives you TURN BACK NOW whenever you explore. And if you don't, it kills you.
FunkyPajamas
Member
Yup. Middle ground between "worst game ever" (6) and "greatest game of the millenium, even better that Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball" (10).
Also makes sure they get invited to upcoming Activision/Bungie events.
I kind of agree. Like, I don't see how the hell they spent 4+ years and this is what they came up with. This game is 2 years of development time max.
4.5/10? Absolutely ridiculous. Reading that review all I can do is shake my head.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-09-18-destinys-story-for-people-who-dozed-off
"A Destiny story summary for people who dozed off
In case you lost (or couldn't be bothered to keep) track of what was going on."
I kind of find this headline offensive. Like its really the player's fault if they say the story is poorly delivered or nonsensical? I paid attention, read every codex card I've acquired, beaten the game and played several parts multiple times and I can say this story really does not add up in multiple areas. A lot of context or exposition feels purposefully withheld, like they were trying to make another Halo happen, which had this grandiose mysterious universe in the beginning. Thing is, that game actually had enemies with apparent goals. There was enough meat there to give Halo CE some legs.
With Destiny so much is left unsaid or wrapped up in so much vague convoluted pseudo-scientology babble that its either hard to discern what they are really saying, or it comes off as politician speech- big flowery words that mean nothing. I actually get a lot of ME3 ending vibes with this, where the plot is so bad people here actually cannot believe it; they think that there is an underlying master plan from the devs and that all will be revealed in time. Granted I am one of those people myself, and I really hope there is some kind of sinister reveal where humanity or the traveler in particular is actually a force for evil in the universe.
I suppose all we can do is wait.
"A Destiny story summary for people who dozed off
In case you lost (or couldn't be bothered to keep) track of what was going on."
I kind of find this headline offensive. Like its really the player's fault if they say the story is poorly delivered or nonsensical? I paid attention, read every codex card I've acquired, beaten the game and played several parts multiple times and I can say this story really does not add up in multiple areas. A lot of context or exposition feels purposefully withheld, like they were trying to make another Halo happen, which had this grandiose mysterious universe in the beginning. Thing is, that game actually had enemies with apparent goals. There was enough meat there to give Halo CE some legs.
With Destiny so much is left unsaid or wrapped up in so much vague convoluted pseudo-scientology babble that its either hard to discern what they are really saying, or it comes off as politician speech- big flowery words that mean nothing. I actually get a lot of ME3 ending vibes with this, where the plot is so bad people here actually cannot believe it; they think that there is an underlying master plan from the devs and that all will be revealed in time. Granted I am one of those people myself, and I really hope there is some kind of sinister reveal where humanity or the traveler in particular is actually a force for evil in the universe.
I suppose all we can do is wait.
Those flying drone enemies really remind me of Marathon 2 every time I see it. I think I'm pretending that this is secretly a new Marathon game.
Have any direct references been found relating to Marathon? Or does 343i own that license now?
Agghhh... All this talk about Marathon is reminding me of the wild speculation that Halo 3's Legendary ending was hinting at a Halo-Marathon universe crossover.
Halo 4 was good, no doubt, but the idea of that grand crossover still resounds in my head.
Ingueferroque
Banned
You guys are just being ridiculous. Wow. Did you expect this to be a Bioshock title?
bananafactory
Banned
The best part was my first time running Patrol on the Moon. I landed and my ghost said "Now, we can go anywhere we want!" I took about 5 steps to my left because I saw this gorgeous crater and open terrain I wanted to explore and it immediately said TURN BACK. That's when it really sunk in for me. I haven't got to see as much of Venus or Mars so I don't know if they're more expansive, but the Moon felt really confined.
...What? I haven't played 2 and haven't played much of Infinite, but I have no idea what you're getting at.
tokyobanana
Banned
Have there been any responses from Bungie on the post launch comments and criticisms?
Ingueferroque
Banned
It's a online shooting game. I understand the criticisms on the lack of mission variety (and maaaybe content, not sure yet myself), but what on earth makes you think that this should have taken only 2 years to make? The production values are very impressive to me.
I have a feeling a lot of people expected a cinematic campaign similar to the Bioshock Infinite/Call of Duty games, and that this is why they are so disappointed with the 'story' aspect.
Because there's just not a lot to it. Seriously, the map sizes aren't that big, there's not a ton of loot, not much variety in enemies, etc. Bungie (AFAIK) isn't a small studio, so it's not like they were lacking manpower (and obviously they had dat Activision $$$).
I always went into this assuming it'd be 80% Borderlands, 10% WoW, and 10% Halo, and that's pretty much what we got. So no, I wasn't really expecting some grand, cinematic campaign. But I expected something else, whether that's bigger maps, more guns, whatever. And they didn't deliver it.
So I think it's far to ask: What the hell happened during the development of this game? Did they reboot it halfway through? Did they spend all their time polishing the UI (which is awesome)?
Exploratory
Banned
Everyone defending this game is so goddamn insulting. "In case you couldn't be bothered to follow the story"... yeah fuck that guy.
The time went to DLC and multiplatform support. But there does seem to be drama at Bungie with Staten leaving and O'Donnel getting fired, suing, and still being on the board despite Bungie wanting him gone. Which leads me to believe the game was tracking poorly internally.
It really bothers me that some of these reviews I feel are coming from a place of resentment for the game not being what everyone dreamed it would be. Review it for what it is and not what you want it to be. Telling me the consumer it is a 4.5-6 / 10 I am going to assume the game is bad because over the last 10 years those scores have been reserved for below average games. I have been trained to believe a 7/10 is good / average. It makes no sense but that is how I have been conditioned since I was 9 years old. I don't feel this game is below average at all. Even if I hated the game I wouldn't objectively call it bad or below average.
Ingueferroque
Banned
I guess that because I haven't seen everything yet, my views on the quantity of content are skewed. Because to me it feels like there is quite a lot to do, see, and play.
I also love timed content/events in games, gives me the impression that Destiny will continually be updated and added to with extra content.
Exactly, my feeling as well. And which is why I'm really happy with Destiny so far.. I take it for what it is.
TheCanisDirus
Member
Not even on Bungie's own forums! And there is a huge feedback sub-forum with tons of threads... one even asking if/when Bungie would comment.
They've only seemed to comment on actual glitches actual broken elements of their game like Hunter FWC upgrading via Ascendant Motes.... that done even exist, lol.
In terms of story and game design, the game is actually sub par.
Another one :
http://www.honestgamers.com/12363/playstation-4/destiny/review.html
5/10
"Before the game was even released, Bungie made the bold claim that Destiny doesn't hit its potential until players reach the soft level cap and engage in postgame activities, a good 20 hours in, basically.
I completed the campaign in a few days, spent the remainder of the weekend senselessly grinding with no direction and no reward, and as soon as I'm done writing this, I'm going to play something that has a point. Bungie asks us to invest dozens of hours in exploring a flat world steeped in clichés, interacting with a community that barely exists and toying with RPG elements that seem to have phoned in sick. I like Destiny's gunplay, but that doesn't mean that I want to spend this much time with it for no real payoff."
http://www.honestgamers.com/12363/playstation-4/destiny/review.html
5/10
"Before the game was even released, Bungie made the bold claim that Destiny doesn't hit its potential until players reach the soft level cap and engage in postgame activities, a good 20 hours in, basically.
I completed the campaign in a few days, spent the remainder of the weekend senselessly grinding with no direction and no reward, and as soon as I'm done writing this, I'm going to play something that has a point. Bungie asks us to invest dozens of hours in exploring a flat world steeped in clichés, interacting with a community that barely exists and toying with RPG elements that seem to have phoned in sick. I like Destiny's gunplay, but that doesn't mean that I want to spend this much time with it for no real payoff."
Air Zombie Meat
Member
Perhaps not as much but I think people would care because it was coming from Bungie.
bananafactory
Banned
NullPointer
Member
While people did craft magnificent visions of what the game might've been in their minds, lets not let the marketing and pre-release build-up off the hook. The marketing set the expectations, and I think its fair for reviews to contrast marketing expectations against the released product.
That's what the extra low spin on scores are representing imho.
They just posted a mail bag on their forum.
"@Bungie: This Mail Sack will not be open for long! bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/69703199/0/0 pic.twitter.com/4zpPBj4oGr"
Mission Design and Story I totally agree. Overall game design though I think there are some great things at work with the leveling, guns, events, level designs etc.
Whoever designed the main story missions though, talk about a lack of creativity.
Wind's Howling
Member
Sssh. You will get a tag next to your name for disagreeing with reviews. Trust me. I am part of the evidence, lol.
Muffdraul
Member
I pretty much agree with you, and I know Jason Jones has always had an aversion to long expositional cut scenes in video games in general. I suspect he thought they compromised too much on that aspect in Halo and he wanted to walk it back. Not a smart move, IMO. Robust story telling in video games is not a genie to be put back into its bottle. I also suspect how Destiny's story was handled had everything to do with Joe Staten leaving Bungie.
But I object to you referring to Marathon's terminals as "additional world building and story". Marathon had no cut scenes or spoken dialogue or anything. The terminals provided ALL of Marathon's world building and story, they had no other choice back in ye olden tymes.
Don't forget all the people not "getting" Destiny, or not "understanding" what it is.
Fuck outta here with that. Half of the people throwing this accusation seem to understand the game less than most of those being critical (such as all that "play on hard, the AI is much smarter" nonsense we had earlier).
Anton Sugar
Member
I completely agree that the game doesn't deserve 5/10 but Bungie touted the social aspects of the game and they underdelivered, IMO.
Exactly. And if all that time went into DLC that is done already and they're staggering out--well, that's just shitty.
Aside from the art direction and design, I can't think of a single aspect of Destiny that has enough "depth" to warrant a 5 year development cycle.The worlds to explore aren't huge, each planet has 5-7 stages only, and there are only four planets.
Honestly, if I didn't have my friends to play with, I would probably have a miserable time while playing it.
Despite its shortcomings, I keep coming back to it, though.
Vincogneato's Twitter :
"What's the story of Metroid? What's the "reason" it gives you to push forward? There isn't one. It doesn't NEED one. Few good games do."
He's wrong. Super Metroid has an enticing story. Your mission is to get back the last Metroid and you have to investigate this entire planet in order to do so.
What's Destiny's goal? To fight back The Darkness. Except the game "ends" before you actually can.
"What's the story of Metroid? What's the "reason" it gives you to push forward? There isn't one. It doesn't NEED one. Few good games do."
He's wrong. Super Metroid has an enticing story. Your mission is to get back the last Metroid and you have to investigate this entire planet in order to do so.
What's Destiny's goal? To fight back The Darkness. Except the game "ends" before you actually can.
HiredN00bs
Member
Considering they're the only major review body actually playing a good amount of the game, it's probably one of the few you should.
bananafactory
Banned
Pretty sure everyone's already made up their mind - the IGN review will only server to further stoke the fires of debate. I'm just curious to read their opinion on it, is all. Don't really care what score they give it.
I have a love / hate feeling about it. Much of the game is great, but some decisions drag down the overall package.
TemplaerDude
Member
And I'm sure every other outlet just put an hour or two in.
bananafactory
Banned
Pretty much how I feel about it. The core gameplay like shooting and abilities are pretty fun, but as I'm going through the game further I keep feeling an emptiness that isn't being filled.
Same. And to me that's the biggest tragedy. The core, underlying gameplay is so good that it hurts me that much of the rest of the game is so unfulfilling.
rogue_nine82
Member
Its a crying shame that it has taken IGN so long to review this game. I mean sheeesh......
I know we'll very likely never know exactly what happened, but GOD I'd love to know what went down.
Based on the fact that initially Bungie announced in a seemingly heartfelt farewell letter that Marty O'Donnell was leaving the company and that less than a day later Marty went to Twitter to announce that "Hey guys, Bungie just terminated my contract without cause." That really raised my eyebrows. It made it seem like Bungie quietly wanted Marty to leave and wanted him to "civil" about doing so. Marty, being the fairly headstrong emotional type didn't want to hear it, so instead Bungie's Board of Directors decided to have him formally fired. The withholding of upaid vacation/sabbatical time and stock shares were just the kick in the pants as he was shown the door.
Rewind back to September 2013 when Joe Staten left. Specifically, his Bungie.net post states that he left the company to "pursue new creative challenges". It is my belief that Staten had this grand idea for the story/cinematics a'la Halo, but over time this was whittled away to the very basic form it is currently. Whether this was creative differences with others on the team or the fact that Joe might just simply be better at home making good story/cinematics for immersive single-player experiences (as opposed to generic mass-market appeal) is up for debate. I find it hard to imagine that Destiny's story faults lie at Joe's feet. If you listen to his Halo-era ViDoc's it's evident that he has a passion for lore and storytelling.
I think Joe found that the project in general was getting far too muddled and generic for his tastes, so he basically said, "I'm out." The departure of Joe could easily explain Destiny's lack of coherent story, at least from the perspective of how it's presented. The general story in the Halo games were always a bit derivative to be sure, but Joe's storytelling cinematics coupled with well-timed in-game dialogue always gave you that very visceral, basic drive as to "this is why I (as the player) am here and this is what I have to do." This is what Destiny seems to sorely lack.
That's my little theory anyway...
EDIT:
Yep, goes pretty much hand-in-hand with my post here. I could totally see a roughly Harold Ryan/Jason Jones/Luke Smith vs. Joe Staten/Mary O'Donnell type rift that might have formed in the company of the course of the project. Different ideals resulting in a dragged down development cycle.
Activision's "IGN FIRST" deal with IGN and Destiny was the first sign that you shouldn't.
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