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Destiny 2 is attempting to correct itself (again); how much leeway should we give devs?

Arkage

Banned
I feel like most threads I create on gaming side are just to shit on Destiny 2, so here's a positive one. I created a new thread for it just because I thought people should know Bungie is trying to do better. I feel like most wouldn't care to read it if I just bumped the old thread with new info.

As I stated before, the DLC had a major problem in which to play the new content you needed to already be at the old max level, which very few players were unless they played content, a majority of which is recycled, regularly for months and/or every single day. And even if you were at the old max, you would likely need to grind to climb up the new cap a bit to have a fighting chance at beating the new stuff. Bungie has done two things to correct this.

1) They reduced the level requirement to complete the first parts of the DLC content. Not by much, but enough to cut your grind down by a week or so.

2) They will increase the speed at which you can climb to the old max cap, which is vital for those who didn't play much end-game stuff with Forsaken, or for those who want to level up alts.

So, in the end I'm going to keep playing D2. My Titan just broke the 600 threshold this week and I may start trying out forges next week as well as possibly starting my alts back up next week after the speed increase. But I can't help but feel Bungie is fighting a never ending cycle of "make the game suck less" rather than "make the game more awesome" for the majority of it's fanbase. There have been so many missteps or misreadings that any momentum they gain from a new release gets hamstrung. And while many were complaining that Destiny 2 got worse because of making it more "casual" there are persuasive arguments that, no, the problem is just that Bungie isn't good at reading how their system revamps will play out in real life.

This has made me wonder if any of you have experience a game that has really turned you on and off and on again with things like rebalances or patches. Did something turn you off forever? Or bring you back in after a lapse?
 
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Punished Miku

Gold Member
This is just MMO-lite really. I played FFXI for 5 years, and if the biggest controversy was that you had to grind missions for a week, it would be the most casual friendly MMO ever at that time. I think the shooter fans that aren't used to MMOs have less patience for this kind of thing. The MMO fans that are aren't used to shooters probably find this incredibly easy.

This has made me wonder if any of you have experience a game that has really turned you on and off and on again with things like rebalances or patches. Did something turn you off forever? Or bring you back in after a lapse?
Oh yeah, for sure. Soul Calibur VI right now is in the middle of a few steep imbalances that will get toned down a bit soon. The first balance patch goes live this Tuesday with 2B's DLC.

Balance is very tough to nail. Even back in the day, some of the most balanced games had multiple arcade versions before the console version that got released. I think a lot of devs have trouble forseeing everything that can go wrong. Once hundreds of thousands of people start playing it, you just see so much more.
 
This is just MMO-lite really. I played FFXI for 5 years, and if the biggest controversy was that you had to grind missions for a week, it would be the most casual friendly MMO ever at that time. I think the shooter fans that aren't used to MMOs have less patience for this kind of thing. The MMO fans that are aren't used to shooters probably find this incredibly easy.


Oh yeah, for sure. Soul Calibur VI right now is in the middle of a few steep imbalances that will get toned down a bit soon. The first balance patch goes live this Tuesday with 2B's DLC.

Balance is very tough to nail. Even back in the day, some of the most balanced games had multiple arcade versions before the console version that got released. I think a lot of devs have trouble forseeing everything that can go wrong. Once hundreds of thousands of people start playing it, you just see so much more.
Well, we got stuff like 18 hours boss fight with AV and the very guide se throw out was lol. Those of us been with xi got more patient than most ningen
 

Freeman76

Member
I think D2 is great but I have a good system for it where I play for 3-4 weeks pretty much exclusively then I wont touch it again for a few months or until a new patch/DLC comes out. It always feels good to jump back in, but it isnt a game I could focus on for months at a time as that would just piss me off in the end.
 

FeldMonster

Member
As someone who loved D1, D2 still doesn't satisfy the same way. The latest update is turning me off the game. I finally reached 600 a week before Black Armory dropped, so I was excited to finally try some endgame content. Except now I have to grind AGAIN to get to 650. I just want to try some the raids, especially Leviathan and Last Wish. Bungie needs to introduce a version intended for people who play less than 20 hours per week. Let us level quickly and play the fun activities. In fact, why have leveling at all? Simply introduce new content and let us play for, you know, fun!
 

kraspkibble

Permabanned.
i'm done with Bungie. they keep messing it up.

i actually liked D2 until Forsaken came out. what a waste of money. i have uninstalled the game and won't be buying D3.
 

BTHR Zero X

Member
I spent over 1400 hours in Destiny 1 after playing the Beta for 2 I never picked up D2 at all. I got it free from PS+ and I have tried but omg It took me until yesterday to even finish the story on my Titan.

I still have not paid for any DLC or anything and I am not even sure if I will. I am at 265 light which seems to be the cap for me without DLC.....
 
Bungie became trash ever since they joined Activision. First game was ok but thats it. I completely skipped 2 and don't think I'll ever give it a chance.
 

royox

Member
Got D2 with 2 exp and forsaken for 6€ and it gave me like 100hours worth of gameplay. Best purchase of my life lol.
 

r3dzombie

Neo Member
I was at 600 before BA released, two weeks later im at 605 after completing all milestones (except for the raid). They need to fix the progression system, its broken, completely broken.
After what seems like dozens of powerful drops only my primary, secondary and head are over 600, Ive had drop after drop for the same three slots, its a completely demoralising (or bugged) RNG system they have in place.
 

120v

Member
i've about had my fill, uninstalled the game a few days ago. if anthem and division 2 weren't on the way i'd soldier on but i'll just wait and see what they do with Destiny 3
 

Ivory Samoan

Gold Member
I'm loving BA and pretty much the general direction of the game and the community.

For the record, I spent a good 800+ hours in D1, then 300 odd at launch for D2, dropped it prior to Osiris, now have picked it up again with Forsaken and BA.

It's currently, with Gambit being included especially, the most fun I've had in Destiny right now - but then again, I like a good grind.
 

Tomeru

Member
As someone who loved D1, D2 still doesn't satisfy the same way. The latest update is turning me off the game. I finally reached 600 a week before Black Armory dropped, so I was excited to finally try some endgame content. Except now I have to grind AGAIN to get to 650. I just want to try some the raids, especially Leviathan and Last Wish. Bungie needs to introduce a version intended for people who play less than 20 hours per week. Let us level quickly and play the fun activities. In fact, why have leveling at all? Simply introduce new content and let us play for, you know, fun!
The old raids are still the same light level. You can try out last wish as its still 580ish. And the rewards from that would be above 600. Levis rewards drop at the 380 cap I think. Still a very good raid imo. All content pre black armory is 600 max anyway. You are in a good spot to start end game as youll ever be.
 
Forsaken is the best Destiny has ever been. While I'm kind of apathetic toward Black Armory in general, Destiny 2 is still amazing overall.

Gambit is a fantastic game mode that keeps me coming back even during lulls. The rush of burning your primeval down in a tightly contested match is so good.

The B.A. grind does seem a little much for the average player, though. I don't mind it, but I get why people are complaining and Bungie is reacting.

I'm not sure I agree with the criticism in the OP, however. Destiny is an ever-evolving game with a lot of moving parts, and Bungie is always trying to make it better.

Destiny 2 at launch was a big misstep, but I don't think the idea they should get it perfect the first time around is fair or realistic.
 

Aurelian

my friends call me "Cunty"
It's an online game with RPG elements -- there's always going to be adjustment. That's not to give Bungie a free pass (it has made some genuinely bad decisions), but I wouldn't fault them for constantly adapting.

The main issue right now is simply that some elements can feel more like work than a game. Where you effectively have to pour 20 hours a week into it to get gear X or triumph Y. That's good if you're a hardcore fan, but by definition most people aren't hardcore fans. They have other games they want to play or, well, have too much to do outside of gaming.

With that said, I like that there's now always something to do, whether it's chasing after a new weapon or finally completing a triumph page. Before you'd have a burst of new things and then would have to settle for maxing out your Light level or completing that one side mission you'd been ignoring.
 

Arkage

Banned
This is just MMO-lite really. I played FFXI for 5 years, and if the biggest controversy was that you had to grind missions for a week, it would be the most casual friendly MMO ever at that time. I think the shooter fans that aren't used to MMOs have less patience for this kind of thing. The MMO fans that are aren't used to shooters probably find this incredibly easy.


Oh yeah, for sure. Soul Calibur VI right now is in the middle of a few steep imbalances that will get toned down a bit soon. The first balance patch goes live this Tuesday with 2B's DLC.

Balance is very tough to nail. Even back in the day, some of the most balanced games had multiple arcade versions before the console version that got released. I think a lot of devs have trouble forseeing everything that can go wrong. Once hundreds of thousands of people start playing it, you just see so much more.

It's not the fact that max light players would have to grind missions for a week, it's that the vast majority of it's player base wasn't near max level to begin with because they never put out information saying you needed to be, and there was little incentive to chase max for those who didn't commit 90% of their gaming time to this single game. You could do 95% of "end-game" content without being near to 600. I've played my fair share of MMOs, from Vanilla Wow up to the 5th or so expansion, FFXIV, Conan, SWTOR (only for a bit), Secret World. The other glaring difference being that MMOS have metric tons more content compared to Destiny, though that seems to be partially due to the difficulty of making large scale FPS environments vs 3rd person MMO spaces. Also Bungie has always had shit tools according to Kotaku reports over the years.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
People speak of 800 and I just started the game up and my character is ~280, lol. I'm not gonna buy expansions to fix the game I paid for, and what I paid for wasn't good enough to warrant buying more of it (well, it came with my GPU, I was still super disappointed with it after all the hype for the series in general, I was hoping for a Halo finally on PC moment repeat and it was anything but that kind of quality).
 
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VertigoOA

Banned
Current Destiny 2 is best destiny. Has never left Xbox live top 10 while games like Forza, PUBG, battlefield v, fallout 76 can’t compete.

Black armory content being timegated doesn’t bother me (we’ve seen 60% of the content of the dlc) It’s been solid. I never really felt the power grind. The power grind was worse in the beginning of warmind where strikes were the hardest thing in the game. This is similar but once you get over that hump it’s a nonissue.

But destiny being popular means more bitch threads every week. Never change GAF...
 
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I have diffrent problem with those games - they are insanely expensive - first they want 60$ for basic game then there's $40 season pass usually followed by some additional DLC.

I liked Destiny 1 when I got it - they always kept big expansion insanely expensive so eventually I forgot about it. Then they got me back with free Destiny 2 - I'm liking it - but they again want 40 euros for expansion and best deal was cut to 30 recently.
 

VertigoOA

Banned
The price model is flawed. With each dlc release the game gets discounted accordingly too. So the price collapses quick.

The annual pass kinda solves but we have to see how it pays off over the next few months. We’re getting a better consistent flow of content but players really want sequel sized content way more frequently.

I don’t see how this can be done without going the subscription route. But even wow is having problems these days. Interesting time for mp games for sure.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
More and more this game is starting to feel like an experiment with how for they can fuck their fanbase and retcon new changes to sucker them, as well as others it has not reached yet, into the fold. Almost feels like a scheme with all these pricing models, etc..
 
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NickFire

Member
Nothing against OP, but how many times are they going to fix this game before it’s actually fixed? Been 15 months of fixing it at a premium price point to try all these fixes.
 
The price model is flawed. With each dlc release the game gets discounted accordingly too. So the price collapses quick.

The annual pass kinda solves but we have to see how it pays off over the next few months. We’re getting a better consistent flow of content but players really want sequel sized content way more frequently.

I don’t see how this can be done without going the subscription route. But even wow is having problems these days. Interesting time for mp games for sure.

Yeah. I'm interested to see how it'll play out. Kind of nervous about Division 2.

All DLC (at least year one) at no additional charge... So, where does the money come from? Mtx, obviously, and we already know that Ultimate edition owners get additional stash space.

Geez. Massive don't f this up. Please.
 

manfestival

Member
I got into the game but I am hesitant to buy any expansions. I got the game free cause of activision but once I hit the cap. It was just a grind with not much variety in content. The PVP seems like a broken mess. So far I think I have dropped like 15 hours on PVP and it is not rewarding or balanced feeling.
 

V4skunk

Banned
played d2 and 2 dlc for like 20 bucks over the summer. im done with it. im just not into mmos.
I wouldn't call it an mmo, far from it.
The game sucks because of lack of content, each expansion should have at least 2 brand new patrol areas with their own raid etc...
 
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Krappadizzle

Gold Member
Just don't give a shit about the franchise. I gave them a second chance with D2, don't care anymore if D3 even comes out. I wish they'd drip it and move onto a new series.
 

dirthead

Banned
Bungie's got Activision aids, just like Blizzard. They're defunct and not worth bothering with anymore.

This is how dumb the current incarnation of this company is:

They have a cool composer who is the only reason there was anything memorable about Halo in the first place.

They fire that composer. Yeah. They're washed up.

 

Krappadizzle

Gold Member
Hating Bungie is part of the fun of destiny!
I don't think people want to hate Bungie, I certainly don't. But it seems like Bungie's ethos and focus changed big time when they were bought by Activision, and all the fears that most people had absolutely manifested. It really feels like they've become beholden to their corporate entities and player/community focus just isn't the same as it was back in the Halo 2 days. I think more people are just disappointed that a once pristine AAA company has become just another corporate game developer that have no soul anymore.
 

Ovek

7Member7
As I stated before, the DLC had a major problem in which to play the new content you needed to already be at the old max level, which very few players were

In the EDZ forge original light level configuration you needed to be quite significantly higher light than 600 to complete it. Even with the light level reduction your going to have to grind to LL 615 to get anywhere with randoms in match making.

I was light level 600 when BA dropped and I though the entire thing was a colossal fuck up. I still do nothing coming out of the forges are worth the grind.

The next fuckup is the weapon frames that rotate every week and are locked to a specific forge, so for example if you got your self to a point to complete the EDZ forge this weekend and think you can grab some bounties from Ada-1 and eventually grab a weapon frame? Well fuck you because both frames are for the new much harder forge that has some seriously tedious grind to unlock. And next week they will be for the third even harder forge locked behind what I can only imagine is even more pointless Fallen punching.

If anyone here played Forsaken and stopped playing don’t bother buying the pass it won’t have any new content for you and the next content drop is for the “pretty good and then rapidly turned in to the most fucking boring game mode” Gambit soo.... yay?!
 

Raven117

Member
I don't think people want to hate Bungie, I certainly don't. But it seems like Bungie's ethos and focus changed big time when they were bought by Activision, and all the fears that most people had absolutely manifested. It really feels like they've become beholden to their corporate entities and player/community focus just isn't the same as it was back in the Halo 2 days. I think more people are just disappointed that a once pristine AAA company has become just another corporate game developer that have no soul anymore.
But activision didn’t buy them?
 

Dthomp

Member
But activision didn’t buy them?

People just like to blame Activision instead of holding Bungie accountable. Bungie signed a contract with Activision to produce 3 base games and a yearly taken king style expansion. Bungie however having a bigger staff then most devs still couldn’t meet the contract requirement and reworked a contract promising dlc revenue since making content is apparently too hard for them these days. Activision is not a great company, but they are not the bad guy here.
 

Dr. Claus

Vincit qui se vincit
D2 was a good, completed product that lasted about 40-50 hours. Plenty of time for an FPS. I honestly don't see why people hate this game, but love the grindy, no-content mess that was D1.
 

Bryank75

Banned
I have mained Titan since D1 and D2 nerfed them in every way, taking away abilities like headstrong, death from above, weapons of light, armour of light , Juggernaut and unlimited ohk shoulder charge, Titan skating , then nerfing lightning grenades and a few weeks after launch nerfing pulse grenades cause hunters were complaining.
They have stripped the class of its identity and given it a useless barrier that takes forever to deploy and a stat that does nothing (resilience) .

I feel the main issue is that the bungie forum is dominated by young players that use hunter and constantly push for hunter buffs and nerfs to other classes.
 

Rajack

Member
Holy shit there's some seriously unwarranted vitriol being spewed in this thread. WoW and Destiny 2 are both great games. even now. Devs are just human and with so many hands stirring the pot now, more than a few are bound to fuck up. Just forgive them and allow them to course correct. They deserve it and have more than earned it.
 
While it is a constant, painful reminder of Halo's lost greatness, I've had quite some fun playing D2 up to Forsaken.

It helps that I paid 20 buck for everything, otherwise I wouldn't have even thought about it.

Core gameplay mechanics are really good. That's what Bungie's still good at. Shoot, jump, melee.
 

Wimbledon

Member
I love Bungie, and i really want to believe they can do better. But i feel like i'm a women whose constantly being beaten by her violent husband, and because i love them, i believe they will eventually be better. I'm never had to HOPE with Bungie they always delivered to me but this game is like a roller coaster.

I was able to reach 600 before the BA dropped, and i gotta be honest i can't do that grind again. It's very tedious i feel like im trudging through it rather than enjoying it.

All my friends left before forsaken dropped, i haven't picked up the game for 2 weeks now, honestly i might just wait until they release the final expansion at the end. Cause how the games economy is setup, is cancer to me.
 
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I played through this when it was free on PlayStation and I found it to be a massive cringe all the way through. Clearly a game aimed at 10yr olds.
 

Vlightray

Member
Grind Grind Grind Shit loot..... Grind Grind Grind Meh Loot...... Grind Grind Gridn Shit Loot.....
Over and over and over it's a fuckn chore not a game and Run to kill shoot run to next so mindless.
 
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