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[Arkage]

If someone wants to create a better thread, go for it, but I gotta leave off some steam. I've been a pretty big Destiny fan since day 1. Even through all the horrible decision-good decision, one step forward two-step back bungie has put their fans through. But this new "expansion" or "update" or whatever the hell you want to call it has really pissed me off. Forsaken was a pretty good expansion and earned some good will. It gave you plenty of content to do, two new big zones, lots of stuff, etc. Keep in mind this is after Bungie's screw up with vanilla Destiny 2, in which they threw out all the cool stuff they built in Destiny 1 for no goddamn reason, and then added it back in with Forsaken.

But after a while I got bored with Forsaken. The game capped you at 600 Light Level, and I got to around 580 when I got bored of grinding because there was really nothing new to do unless you were a completionist.

Now, the first mini-expansion/update just dropped, and it's shit. Here's an idea of what these mini-expansion updates used to be. They'd give you a new zone and new quests to run around doing stuff in. They didn't level gate you out of content, as you didn't need to be at max level to play the content. You'd get two or so new strikes (think mini-dungeons). You got some story stuff. You could play for a good many hours seeing mostly new content. Bungie didn't like this model though, as fans always thought it was too low on content. TOO LITTLE CONTENT. So what do they do?

Well, with this new expansion/update/games as a service package, that old expansion models looks positively gratuitous with all the content it provided! The first new quest is to kill x enemy with x guns x number of times, something you've already done a billion times. Think vanilla WoW quality quest design. The first real "new" activity it gives you to do essentially requires you to already be at the old MAX light level of 600 because the quest suggest 610 (and when I died it said recommend 615). But even if you get past that (which I didn't because me and the two guys I was matched with were all 580ish lol, no chance in hell), you do the same activity again except at a higher light level. And then again, at a higher light level, all the way at 635. This guy talks about how shit it is as well. In addition to this, while increasing your level to 600 won't take too terribly long, getting it up past the old cap will be a really long grind according to what I've read. Most players first dip into their new $35 content pack will be a brick wall telling them they better grind out old content for a month or so first.

There's literally no new activity for me to do despite being pretty high leveled for this game, because I'm not one of those people who played it for months straight. And even for those people, like the author in my link above, you still have to do a significant amount of grinding of old content to get your level high enough to do the harder versions of that repeated event.

Maybe Bungie will release new content weekly, maybe one new quest a week or a new strike once a month. I don't think anybody really knows, and personally, I don't really care. Destiny is not, and never will be, a lifestyle for me. I'm not going to keep paying attention to a game every week just to see if it finally put out some content that I can to play. I already paid for the "season pass" so I'm screwed either way. It's just incredible to me how Bungie can't even be bothered to throw in a new goddamn zone or strike on the release day of their new expansion pass.

I honestly don't even know what to do right now. I really don't want to grind old shit, but I'll have to for at least 2 weeks if I want to play anything new. I feel like I've just thrown $35 down the drain. Had I known it would've been like this there'd be no way in hell I would've paid for it. This is the first time I've felt this way about Destiny, and it's deeply disappointing. Never again.

 

[sol_bad]

I haven't played either Destiny 1 or 2 but wwhat you are saying does make sense based on Bungie's history with Activision.

I have Destiny 1 on my wish list but I just saw this article.
https://www.pcgamesn.com/destiny-2/destiny-2-eververse-microtransactions-bright-engrams
Is the first game affected by micro-transaction even in it's complete form?.

 

[UltimateUnknown]

I only have Forsaken and got enough fun out of that for the month that I played. I haven't bought the season pass. Although I can't comment on the quality of the content, from the schedule that Bungie posted, it seems they are putting out content on a weekly basis as opposed to dumping everything in altogether. I assume this is based on the weekly content drops they did with Forsaken as well in the Dreaming city, which the community gave positive feedback on.

 

[SpaceNoodles007]

I played Destiny 1 for roughly 2800 hours. it was a really bad addiction and took a long time for me to get off it. When Destiny 2 came, pressured by friends and family, I ended up getting it too. I played 100 hours of it up until the first DLC came out. Then I saw the cycle of what was going in D1 all over again. I'm glad I never went back Every now and then I read on the game, but I know if I ever go back it'll be a trap.

The way I see it, the game was designed to keep you to continuously gamble with your time (and money through microtransactions) through the bad use of RNG. It never respected the time you put on it (or at least for me. I know a lot of lucky players out there who got the gjhallahorn from the beginning). So reading this about Destiny 2 is really no surprise.

Honestly, I feel like there should have never been a Destiny 2. They could have just continued to add expansions and expansions to the first game.

 

[CuNi]

Well technically this was hinted at last week when the update came and patched in the Annex and the forge saboteurs. They already were between 605 and 615. I've seen them melt low level new players on nessus as one of them spawns right at the central fast travel point, right next to the cabal mining drill event.. What a sight to hear him shoot once and kill 2 or 3 players, haha.

Anyway I'm happy with this pacing and distribution. It feels like you have to earn stuff instead of getting it shoved down your throat. I'm already looking forward to this weekend so I can grind out some prime engrams.

I think they should increase prime drop chance till power level 575 though as 550 is really somewhat far behind. And forges are supposed to be hard. They are like a mini escalation protocol. The only thing I really miss is any kind of new zone. It feels boring to visit old zones over and over. But at the same time, you got Osiris and warmind in the last pass and now you get 3 DLC's.

 

[Ar¢tos]

Yep, Black Armory is the worst kind of grind fest ever. I'm basically ignoring it. I'll slowly infuse higher gear into mine, do my milestones and whenever I get to 610+ I will think about it. I'm not gonna grind just for it. Doing the machine gun quest thing was already a massive no fun chore.
And making powerful gear drop at +1/+2 and primes at +4/+6 is just ridiculous and another artificial way to extend the grind and force players to keep playing.
Can't wait for the Ghorn quest when Anthem releases, it will be like 400 matches of Crucible, 500 of gambit and 600 strikes.... (Ghorn or whatever they think will keep players away from Anthem).

 

[Ogbert]

Yeah, it’s bad.

The grind is most assuredly back. Still trying to get through the 40 Gambit matches.

 

[iconmaster]

Won’t get fooled again?

Bungee just keeps getting away with it somehow.

 

[Ogbert]

Bungee just keeps getting away with it somehow.

I actually love D2 - it's my most played game this gen. I've also just picked up a new rig, with a 4k widescreen, and the PC version if *incredible*.

I understand the complaints, but I think Bungie get an unfair press. People keep on coming back because the core gameplay is wonderful. Best in class shooting mechanics, great optimisation, lots of guns and lots of stuff to do.

Yes, it's a grind and Black Armory is a bit naff, but it wears its heart on its sleeve.

I think D2 is AAA gaming done right.

 

[Ennosuke]

I played D2 at release on my xbox one, I had a lot of fun! But after a certain point I felt closure with the game and sold it. A month ago I saw that it was for free on PC and also here the gunplay is perfection, so much fun! I decided to buy Forsaken on PC and it was the right decision. Still playing through it and probably I will look into buying the year pass as well, let's see!

 

[BTHR Zero X]

I spent a good 1500 hours in Destiny 1 i have not paid for even the base Destiny 2 game, i got it via PS Plus, and can't even bring myself to finish the story....

 

[zwiggelbig]

Question: how many hours u got in the game?

 

[Ogbert]

Question: how many hours u got in the game?

I reckon I've got about 400 - 500.

I just find the core gameplay incredibly fun.

 

[VertigoOA]

I agree that it sucks that you’re locked out because of power level but I also don’t think that’s a big deal for already maxed out players. The forge should be open to lower light players. The power lvl grind is unchanged and if you’re not at max power already you do indeed have a long ways to go. I do sympathize with players who aren’t hardcore daily players

Only curse of Osiris and warmind added new zones. The dark below and house of wolves did not. I do value the raid and forge activities more. Crucible drops are no longer part of dlc. Crucible stuff drops on its own separate time table (usually with an event like iron banner or a holiday event).

Furthermore all the black armory content is on a roll out schedule and only the one forge has rolled out. Another comes out along with the raid on Friday. Another follows and then the Niobe labs activity which is expected to be a dungeon.

Everyone is so quick to bitch and moan and it’s literalky impossible to actually gauge the content when it hasn’t rolled out.

You didn’t by a singular $30 dlc. You paid 30$ for 9 months of time-gated rolled out dlc drops.

 

[AV]

Quick question from someone who's never really touched Destiny - is it worth picking up either of them cheap to blast through the content? Not bothered about end game, just want to see it. Can I do it with randoms?

 

[Ogbert]

is it worth picking up either of them cheap to blast through the content?

Without doubt.

Lots of guns that are fun to shoot.

 

[VertigoOA]

Quick question from someone who's never really touched Destiny - is it worth picking up either of them cheap to blast through the content? Not bothered about end game, just want to see it. Can I do it with randoms?

The end game is the fun part. And you can do a lot of the end game and get a lot of enjoyment out of it with randoms. I wouldn’t suggest Destiny if you’re just going to burn thru the content. And... I wouldn’t suggest the vanilla version either, simply because the weapons are less interesting due to not featuring random rolls or the extra perk. If you jump in you get forsaken.

 

[Cybrwzrd]

I got to 613 last night, will probably be 620+ by the end of the week. Just have to be smart with your upgrade path (and have 3 characters at 600, which frankly is a breeze to do once you have one).

I can kind of see your problems with the annual pass, but the 35 dollars paid for 9 months of updates. They even posted the road map that explains when all of the new content is going live. Destiny needed a subscription model all the way back in D1 to provide revenue to keep frequent updates, and this is Bungie testing the waters.

Going into it expecting everything on day one to be available to you is just grasping at straws.

 

[VertigoOA]

I got to 613 last night, will probably be 620+ by the end of the week. Just have to be smart with your upgrade path (and have 3 characters at 600, which frankly is a breeze to do once you have one).

I can kind of see your problems with the annual pass, but the 35 dollars paid for 9 months of updates. They even posted the road map that explains when all of the new content is going live. Destiny needed a subscription model all the way back in D1 to provide revenue to keep frequent updates, and this is Bungie testing the waters.

Going into it expecting everything on day one to be available to you is just grasping at straws.

And I played 8 hours last night and got to 609. May have to use an alt but I’m in no rush, but I’m used to how to handle content drops at my own pace. But taking 8hrs and still not being able to beat the first forge is a bit much... and some can’t even access it. That should’ve been handled better just because it’s new content people want to see now... they paid for it ya know

They really should’ve just had the first forge be like 580... it would’ve toned down the bitching.

 

[ookami]

Destiny needed a subscription model all the way back in D1 to provide revenue to keep frequent updates, and this is Bungie testing the waters.

The problem in my opinion is that there is not enough content for a subscription model around the price of a classic MMO.

 

[VertigoOA]

The problem in my opinion is that there is not enough content for a subscription model around the price of a classic MMO.

They’re still providing more content within the same time window than d1. It’s too soon to bitch about the roll out when it’s all time gated and behind light level roadblocks.

People want constant content but they also want expansions sized drops way too frequently. We’re not getting that over the next 9 months for just 30$. For what we paid, two raids alone justifies 30$. Last year’s season pass only gave us too smaller raid lairs for 40$ And we’re getting a lot more this time around.

They really do need to go a sub route. It’ll be more expensive overall but they can solve a lot of the sku issues and only have one version. No player base separation

 

[Cybrwzrd]

And I played 8 hours last night and got to 609. May have to use an alt but I’m in no rush, but I’m used to how to handle content drops at my own pace. But taking 8hrs and still not being able to beat the first forge is a bit much... and some can’t even access it. That should’ve been handled better just because it’s new content people want to see now... they paid for it ya know

They really should’ve just had the first forge be like 580... it would’ve toned down the bitching.

Rock and a hard place. If they make the first forge too low, then it will have been out leveled. I certainly get the bitching, and there should have been a little more story content to keep people busy at first, but Bungie is going to have people bitching about things no matter what they do.

Mind you, I thought the two shitty expansions last year were garbage, and stopped playing because of them for months. This isn't a big deal to me.

The problem in my opinion is that there is not enough content for a subscription model around the price of a classic MMO.

I wouldn't pay 15 a month for destiny, but I would pay half that.

 

[SkinnerSw33t]

It's OK. I think my biggest gripe is how lackluster the first forge is. Hopefully, they get more interesting going forward.

Looking forward to the raid and the new gear, but not sure this season will hold my interest too long. Probably just going to stick to one toon as well.

I know you can't expect Forsaken every three months, but gawd, those two months were glorious.

 

[ookami]

They’re still providing more content within the same time window than d1. It’s too soon to bitch about the roll out when it’s all time gated and behind light level roadblocks.

People want constant content but they also want expansions sized drops way too frequently. We’re not getting that over the next 9 months for just 30$. For what we paid, two raids alone justifies 30$. Last year’s season pass only gave us too smaller raid lairs for 40$ And we’re getting a lot more this time around.

They really do need to go a sub route. It’ll be more expensive overall but they can solve a lot of the sku issues and only have one version. No player base separation

I do agree with you, it wasn't aimed at the actual release but more at the content we had with each DLC. I feel like they still have to find the good spot between quantity and dev time.
The tools and engine they used were not fit at all for this kind of development. I hope they're getting there.

 

[VertigoOA]

I don’t think they’re having issues with dev tools. They’re pumping out enough content imo and what they’re promising looks like plenty, we just have to wait and see what it actually is. Most likely a lot of her annual pass content is done with the likes of vicarious visions or high moon studios. We’re not going to see another forsaken sized content drop for another 9 months.

People are just judging this content when the smallest fraction of it is available currently. I don’t mind the roll out and in fact I would prefer if they gave us another week before the raid so I can actually play it with a good shot at completion before it gets spoiled within the first 24hrs but that’s the game.

I just sympathize with those who were expecting to play it and not have to grind a month of milestones to see what’s new. Getting to 600 was a mission for even hardcore players.

Sometimes it just seems that players whine too much when expecting another sequel sized expansion 3 months later.

 

[Cybrwzrd]

I know you can't expect Forsaken every three months, but gawd, those two months were glorious.

Sometimes it just seems that players whine too much when expecting another sequel sized expansion 3 months later.

That's the problem, people expect that. WoW is able to produce massive content expansions every month because they have millions of dollars pouring in every month with subscriptions. And, then when I mention subscriptions, they expect Destiny to be able to do the exact same thing, but the reality is there just aren't enough players to give enough revenue even under a subscription model to support WoW style development with the art assets and quality we expect from Destiny.

Hell, the forsaken story isn't even close to being complete yet. The drip feed we get from Mara every 3 weeks is enough to keep my interest.

 

[strange headache]

My main gripe with the Black Armory update is that you can only get it through the annual game pass. I might have bought it separately because I enjoyed Forsaken, but I'm certainly not going to buy an annual pass for a game that I won't be playing for the whole next year. This is merely a ruse to bind players to a game for the foreseeable future and Bungo can f*ck right off with that.

Forsaken was fun for a while, but the leveling soft caps are just an unnecessary pain in the rear to artificially squeeze more longevity out of the game. As a more casual gamer I find it really frustrating and I pretty much gave up on the game around 550, when I noticed how insidious the whole leveling system really is. Apart from the weekly and daily "powerful gear" rewards, there's really no point in playing the game if you want to progress. It makes playing the other content rather pointless, because droprates are just plain horrible.

I liked the shooty parts and the new content for a while, but of all the loot orientated games that I've played, Destiny is among the worst offenders of artificially limiting your progress. They somehow assume that soft caps on gear progression will keep people playing for longer, but apart from the most loyal core audience, most will jump ship out of sheer frustration long before ever reaching 600.

 

[Texas Pride]

The season pass on top of the expansion was bullshit. Shame on anyone supporting that blatant anti consumer trash. So it's hard to give a fuck the OP got took here if I'm being honest. Outside of major expansions Bungie has been accused and guilty of recycled content drops before. Like a new mission in a old zone just backwards. This annual pass on top of a expansion price practice Activision is trying to make standard needs to die where it stands. If you support this kind of shit it shouldn't be surprising you most likely got taken advantage of.

 

[Spukc]

I actually love D2 - it's my most played game this gen. I've also just picked up a new rig, with a 4k widescreen, and the PC version if *incredible*.

I understand the complaints, but I think Bungie get an unfair press. People keep on coming back because the core gameplay is wonderful. Best in class shooting mechanics, great optimisation, lots of guns and lots of stuff to do.

Yes, it's a grind and Black Armory is a bit naff, but it wears its heart on its sleeve.

I think D2 is AAA gaming done right.

i played d2 when it came out for about 250 hours then it really turned into a super slow grind,
never cared for the raid or those timed based ones.

i will get this game again when it's finished and i plan to enjoy it a lot

 

[zeorhymer]

Destiny 2 is an MMO. All of the post content is designed just like MMOs are. They're designed for max light people who have nothing else to do and have done everything. If you are sub 600 light, you are not going to enjoy it unless you grind your way up to 600. The catch up mechanic to get higher light is very accessible and you can hit the max level in a week or so time. The content is designed to make you grind just like an mmo does.

Forsaken was fun for a while, but the leveling soft caps are just an unnecessary pain in the rear to artificially squeeze more longevity out of the game. As a more casual gamer I find it really frustrating and I pretty much gave up on the game around 550, when I noticed how insidious the whole leveling system really is. Apart from the weekly and daily "powerful gear" rewards, there's really no point in playing the game if you want to progress. It makes playing the other content rather pointless, because droprates are just plain horrible.

When people were given everything on a silver platter at the beginning of D2, there were lots of complaints and people just stopped playing because they got everything and nothing left to work towards. Bungie went back to the MMO playbook and added the grind back in to keep people playing. Casual gamers didn't like it, but they had to make a choice, either give everything to everyone and have no one to play the game or bring it back to the grind to keep the core people playing. They chose the latter so they know they have a source of income.

 

[Tygeezy]

The season pass on top of the expansion was bullshit. Shame on anyone supporting that blatant anti consumer trash. So it's hard to give a fuck the OP got took here if I'm being honest. Outside of major expansions Bungie has been accused and guilty of recycled content drops before. Like a new mission in a old zone just backwards. This annual pass on top of a expansion price practice Activision is trying to make standard needs to die where it stands. If you support this kind of shit it shouldn't be surprising you most likely got taken advantage of.

It really depends on how much content you get for whether this is low value or not. The expansion was 40 dollars and I think the season pass was 30. So you're talking about 70 dollars for a years worth of updates plus expansion. I play a lot of rainbow six siege and that costs 30 dollars for each new season (yearly) and all you really get is access to the new operators without having to grind them out, some skins, some in game currency to buy micro-transactions and a discount on microtransactions. Everybody gets the new maps that comes out without having to buy the season, but I buy it because I play the game enough, don't want to grind out operators and support future development for a game I really like.

Compare that to wow where each expansion that comes out roughly every 2 years will cost you 40 dollars. And then the subscription which is akin to a season pass will cost you 144 dollars a year. You have "free" games where people end up spending much more than the standard model of games. In conclusion, if you play the game a lot, and you are happy with the content, it isn't anti consumer or poor value. I think it's really hard to give a verdict on week 1 of a planned year long update.

 

[Trogdor1123]

The horde mode sounds so fun. I play with my brothers in law a fair bit and it's good fun. Were really looking forward to this expansion. I hope it's good as it sounds

 

[Cybrwzrd]

Compare that to wow where each expansion that comes out roughly every 2 years will cost you 40 dollars. And then the subscription which is akin to a season pass will cost you 144 dollars a year. You have "free" games where people end up spending much more than the standard model of games. In conclusion, if you play the game a lot, and you are happy with the content, it isn't anti consumer or poor value. I think it's really hard to give a verdict on week 1 of a planned year long update.

Precisely. I've paid out cash for multiple Prime Warframes accessory packs, and a few Prime Warframe vault packs. Shit I can literally get for free (except for the cosmetics) just by playing the game. I enjoy that game, want to reward the devs and I have spent hours playing it. I also have played a lot of Destiny over the years, and spending 70 bucks for an expansion and what is basically the subscription fee seems like a phenomenal value to me.

People just want to bitch. If the content came out and was easy, people would complain that there was nothing for the hard core to do after raids or competitive crucible.

 

[Tygeezy]

Precisely. I've paid out cash for multiple Prime Warframes accessory packs, and a few Prime Warframe vault packs. Shit I can literally get for free (except for the cosmetics) just by playing the game. I enjoy that game, want to reward the devs and I have spent hours playing it. I also have played a lot of Destiny over the years, and spending 70 bucks for an expansion and what is basically the subscription fee seems like a phenomenal value to me.

People just want to bitch. If the content came out and was easy, people would complain that there was nothing for the hard core to do after raids or competitive crucible.

Path of exile is similar. You have people with thousands of hours that will buy supporter packs that they release for each new league and expansion that range from 30-60 dollars that gives you skins, in game currency and the soundtrack. I think both warframe and path of exile have pretty good models considering you don't have to pay anything to get a ton of content. I'd say with both games you need to drop some cash if you want to do later or end game content which takes a ton of hours to get to anyway.

 

[Raven117]

I mean, I think its a matter of tempering your expectations. I don't think any of us were quite ready for the "content" drop that happened yesterday.

All Bungie has to do is re do the power soft cap curve to get everyone over 600 more easily. Then tap the breaks around 620. My bet is that it does NOT stay the way it is. As of right now....the only people that can enjoy the new DLC (even within the next few weeks), are those that were already at 600. And that was no small feat back in vanilla.

It will change. Too many folks wont have access to the content if it truly is only available to those who grind past 600.

 

[Gormenghast]

There is no way out of this.

In September or so Activision said the game didn't meet sales expectations. In practice it all means they need to either offer less at the same price, or increase the price.

If a game isn't doing well then you either reinvest, or jump to something else. It's obvious that they don't expect D2 to get any better, so all the development focus is moved now to D3. The current game is simply there with minimal support.

So how you handle the situation? You do your best to give players the ILLUSION of content, simply because there aren't enough people left working on D2. They just cannot produce more content when most of everyone is working on different projects.

The only real mistake is that they should have set those armories so that they scaled smoothly to the cap. Instead they dropped the first one too far ahead and created a big gap that prevents most people to even engage in that grind. It just shows how they are trying to artificially stretch the thing.

But it's going to be a grind of old content regardless, and it will be just that until D3 drops.

We’re not going to see another forsaken sized content drop for another 9 months.

You, likely, aren't going to see it again.

The rumor is that they'll do another year just like this one. No Forsaken, just another annual pass without any real content.

Their mandate is to get more money while spending less on the game, and the solution is these delayed-disappointments where you pay upfront for what on paper looks like a decent amount of content, but that is really nowhere close to what you'd normally get even when you bundle it all up.

They are simply selling less for more because it's all they can do while most of everyone works on D3. (plus all the rumors saying a part of Bungie is working on stuff that isn't even related to Destiny and that they might drop the franchise eventually)

 

[BONDO]

I got up to 605 last night with only one character.
Yes- I think its terrible a new update is out and we cant even (Us guys at 600) take advantage of it. At the same time....this is a roll out of content with this new annual pass. So I already knew coming it what I was expecting.
If I have one gripe is how similar the weapon creation is to Brother Vance crap.

To be honest...as a regular daily player. I think light levels are pointless.
It's just an extra grind and forces you to restart with infusing/using material or tossing out old gear in favor of whatever has the most light for the time being.

 

[Modu5]

Yeah I feel like it it was the right decision not to buy the annual pass. i was hoping for SOME story content or at least a new strike. I stopped playing after hitting 600 on all three characters. Can't imagine completing all those dailies only to be able to start the first mission.

 

[Trogdor1123]

I just wish they had done it where you could buy them one at a time

 

[Pejo]

Disappointing but not surprising in the least.

At least I feel like more people didn't buy into the "trust us, we understand you now!" hype behind Foreskin. I still haven't touched the game or purchased any additional content since release as a personal boycot. And I had hundreds of hours in D1. I honestly hope the sales continue to dwindle and people stand up for themselves a little, there needs to be a harsh lesson learned here, but apologists and enablers tend to ruin it for everyone.

 

[Mooreberg]

It seems like being months behind the curve is the way to go with this game. Much like my approach with the first game, after the base content I waited until the content roll up of everything bundled together (TTK and Forsaken legendary editions) and I'm glad. I played through Warmind last night with a friend and we were done in about two hours. If I had paid $20 just for that content, I'd have never touched the game again. The dollar amount Bungie has been tasked with attempting to bring out of people on an annual basis is out if proportion with the rate of and volume of content they are able to provide. The equation gets worse when you're not particularly into raids and don't like the PVP as much as other shooters. Interested to get into Forsaken now that I hit level 32, but I'm just really glad I don't even attempt to keep up with this stuff as it is rolled out. Considering expansions drop blue gear better than your already acquired exotics, keeping up with the "gear grind" have never seemed particularly worthwhile either.

 

[VertigoOA]

My main gripe with the Black Armory update is that you can only get it through the annual game pass. I might have bought it separately because I enjoyed Forsaken, but I'm certainly not going to buy an annual pass for a game that I won't be playing for the whole next year. This is merely a ruse to bind players to a game for the foreseeable future and Bungo can f*ck right off with that.

Forsaken was fun for a while, but the leveling soft caps are just an unnecessary pain in the rear to artificially squeeze more longevity out of the game. As a more casual gamer I find it really frustrating and I pretty much gave up on the game around 550, when I noticed how insidious the whole leveling system really is. Apart from the weekly and daily "powerful gear" rewards, there's really no point in playing the game if you want to progress. It makes playing the other content rather pointless, because droprates are just plain

There is no way out of this.

In September or so Activision said the game didn't meet sales expectations. In practice it all means they need to either offer less at the same price, or increase the price.

If a game isn't doing well then you either reinvest, or jump to something else. It's obvious that they don't expect D2 to get any better, so all the development focus is moved now to D3. The current game is simply there with minimal support.

So how you handle the situation? You do your best to give players the ILLUSION of content, simply because there aren't enough people left working on D2. They just cannot produce more content when most of everyone is working on different projects.

The only real mistake is that they should have set those armories so that they scaled smoothly to the cap. Instead they dropped the first one too far ahead and created a big gap that prevents most people to even engage in that grind. It just shows how they are trying to artificially stretch the thing.

But it's going to be a grind of old content regardless, and it will be just that until D3 drops.



You, likely, aren't going to see it again.

The rumor is that they'll do another year just like this one. No Forsaken, just another annual pass without any real content.

Their mandate is to get more money while spending less on the game, and the solution is these delayed-disappointments where you pay upfront for what on paper looks like a decent amount of content, but that is really nowhere close to what you'd normally get even when you bundle it all up.

They are simply selling less for more because it's all they can do while most of everyone works on D3. (plus all the rumors saying a part of Bungie is working on stuff that isn't even related to Destiny and that they might drop the franchise eventually)

You’re twisting actual rumors. Make sure to shove that back up your ass.

 

[VertigoOA]

I can’t use this quote software for shit so let me destroy this fool real quick.

Activision was not thrilled that it didn’t do better. The game did exceptionally well and still manages to be one of the top most played console games. More people play destiny than PUBG on Xbox... and have been for months. So PUBG is dead? Destiny also outperformed spider man in September when including digital revenue.

The annual pass is not a result of that. So as you sit there and give bullshit drive by criticisms like you know what you’re talking about is funny. They announced this months ago.

And you’re getting 9 months of drip feed content for 30$. And black armory is all time gated. So what are you basing any of this on other than complete bullshit and hyperbole.

And that rumor you incorrectly quoted dumb ass stated that there will be another big fall expansion in addition to another annual pass. So when you’re quoting leaks ... get it right jaborni

Of course they’re working on the third game. But that is not the bulk of bungie either. They have multiples teams working on different content.

The investestmwnt from the Chinese company actually pales in comparison to the Activision money. You’re overestitmating the importance of that.

5 years later they’re still crying about destiny being popular.

 

[VertigoOA]

I haven't played either Destiny 1 or 2 but wwhat you are saying does make sense based on Bungie's history with Activision.

I have Destiny 1 on my wish list but I just saw this article.
https://www.pcgamesn.com/destiny-2/destiny-2-eververse-microtransactions-bright-engrams
Is the first game affected by micro-transaction even in it's complete form?.

Neither game is affected by micro transactions aside from skins. The destiny 2 mt outrage was a farce of a bitch parade. There’s literally no real gear. And 98% percent of it drops in game effortlessly.

 

[Arkage]

I got to 613 last night, will probably be 620+ by the end of the week. Just have to be smart with your upgrade path (and have 3 characters at 600, which frankly is a breeze to do once you have one).

I can kind of see your problems with the annual pass, but the 35 dollars paid for 9 months of updates. They even posted the road map that explains when all of the new content is going live. Destiny needed a subscription model all the way back in D1 to provide revenue to keep frequent updates, and this is Bungie testing the waters.

Going into it expecting everything on day one to be available to you is just grasping at straws.

I expect something more than nothing on Day 1. What I got was nothing, and will be nothing for the next few weeks until I force myself to grind doing the same old grind I did for weeks and weeks already and that I really grew bored of which is why I stopped playing in the first place.

Also, the only way to get to 600 quick was to get Horror Story. Otherwise you had to play for probably 10~ hours every week including Raid stuff. That's a lot of time spent just to artificially increase your LL for no apparent reason. They didn't even warn you that this content drop would require 600+.

And the 9 months of updates include, as far as I can tell, zero new zones, zero new strikes. All they said was there'd be less story, or the story would be in the quests. OK great, I don't care about the story anyway really. But they said nothing about also cutting out the typical addition of a new zone and new strikes (at least as far as I know, but it's not like I watched their stream updates). And the content drops that will happen next week and the week after will likely be equal or higher leveled than the current forge that is already steeply out of reach with a 635 boss.

 

[Gormenghast]

there will be another big fall expansion in addition to another annual pass.

We'll see.

In the end it's all about faith. You have faith that Bungie's still invested in D2, you have faith that eventually the worthwhile content will arrive for this Annual Pass, you have faith that next year there will be another big content drop comparable to Forsaken.

You have faith, I'm skeptical because everything I read points in a different direction, and I don't see Bungie working hard on D2. What I see is minimum maintenance. These forges are minimum maintenance, gambit content for next season is minimum maintenance, and [redacted] for the third season is just a nebulous promise that amounts to nothing right now.

 

[Raven117]

We'll see.

In the end it's all about faith. You have faith that Bungie's still invested in D2, you have faith that eventually the worthwhile content will arrive for this Annual Pass, you have faith that next year there will be another big content drop comparable to Forsaken.

You have faith, I'm skeptical because everything I read points in a different direction, and I don't see Bungie working hard on D2. What I see is minimum maintenance. These forges are minimum maintenance, gambit content for next season is minimum maintenance, and [redacted] for the third season is just a nebulous promise that amounts to nothing right now.

Well, its a bit more than faith when you factor in what has historically been done with the franchise and the logical business sense.

I fully expect a larger expansion Fall 2019 that will pave the way for Destiny 3 in 2020 (and likely a cross-platform).

Bungie didn't make Forsaken for it then to drop the ball on the remaining content until D3. They did it to keep player interest. Sure, its a drip feed now with a strange design choice in terms of not re-calibrating the soft level cap of powerful engrams, but that will be ironed out Im sure.

 

[VertigoOA]

passing judgement on content that hasn’t rolled out is a bit premature. The criticism for being gated by power lvl is legit tho. I don’t feel it since I enjoy playing it in general and already as powerful as I can be.

The raid hasn’t launched yet. The other two forges haven’t launched yet. I don’t have any of the new weapons. We haven’t seen the raid. Haven’t seen the next dungeon.

And let’s say you were to look at this as three separate dlcs... then that makes black armory what? 10 dollars?

Even what’s listed looks like great value over the next 9 months.

There’s a lot of revisionist history. The dark below or house of wolves did not introduce new zones or enemies. The house of wolves didn’t have a raid and crota’s end is about the length of raid lairs from year one d2.

I will say this. I don’t think this annual pass appeals to the casual player however. It’s for hardcore destiny player. More weapons, more difficult end game activities. It just adds more layers and content to a game that I feel gives me way too much to do these days.

If you want story content better off just waiting till next year. They might roll out more forsaken story content but that’s still up in the air. While that leaked cutscene is the best story beat in the series yet that could just be it.

I kinda expect them to adapt the warframe thing and just release free story content whenever... not tied to power levels or any new gimmicks. Those should be the exotic quests that are coming but who knows.

 

[VertigoOA]

We'll see.

In the end it's all about faith. You have faith that Bungie's still invested in D2, you have faith that eventually the worthwhile content will arrive for this Annual Pass, you have faith that next year there will be another big content drop comparable to Forsaken.

You have faith, I'm skeptical because everything I read points in a different direction, and I don't see Bungie working hard on D2. What I see is minimum maintenance. These forges are minimum maintenance, gambit content for next season is minimum maintenance, and [redacted] for the third season is just a nebulous promise that amounts to nothing right now.

I’ve seen people say the same shit for 5 years. And that x game will kill it...didn’t happen, ever. It’s consistent just needs more growth and there’s plenty of room to improve.

What happened? Destiny is still huge. Was one of the top 5 most played games on xbl up until last week for 3 months and in the top 10 since May.

What signs point anywhere? It’s exceptional September numbers in which it outlerformed spider-man in digital revenue? Activision was also disappointed in black ops 4 despite it outperforming it’s predecessors. They want to compete with fortnite numbers and that’s not happening

Or you can check now and see it ahead of fallout 76. And those are weekly day to day charts that only include less than 48 hrs of black armory release.

Too another 5 years of crow

 

[Pjsprojects]

Well Im 540 on PS and 380 on X1 so lots of work to do!