I Finally Get the Appeal of Destiny 2
One thing that you should know about me is that I’m an absolute floozy when it comes to in-game seasonal events. This is especially true for Halloween-themed events. Regardless of the game, if I own it or have access to it, I’ll boot it up every October to check out the spookiness.
Some games go more into this than others. There are games that will half-ass it by providing a Halloween-themed skin or side mission, but others will really lean into it. For example, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla gives Ravensthorpe, your main hub, a Halloween-themed makeover that is filled with quests, loot, and mini-games. But it’s Destiny 2 that really impressed me this year, and in doing so, might have finally made me get the Destiny 2 bug.
In the 8-9 years that Destiny has existed, I’ve tried and tried to get into it, but there’s a fundamental aspect of that game that doesn’t work for me. I don’t vibe with the repetitious nature of that game and firing my way through waves of enemies with a few strangers for the off chance that I receive some loot in the form of a gun that I’ll never use is a “nope” for me. Destiny 2’s Festival of the Lost doesn’t sway from that recipe. In fact, it doubles down on it. But for whatever reason, it finally clicked for me.
The quests of this seasonal event are fairly standard: Kill X amount of enemies with a particular gun; take out 100 high-level bosses; collect Y amount of XP while wearing a certain mask. These quests cannot be completed in a single playthrough and require you to play these same 3-4 maps over and over again. That’s usually a dealbreaker for me, but apparently, if you add some jack-o-lanterns and spooks, I’m a bit more tolerant.
At the end of my matches, I would head back to The Tower and see how far I had progressed in my goals. Seeing those numbers go up and those progress bars fill up provided me with a shot of dopamine that this post-2020 body desperately needed. This also encouraged me to go play through some of the older Destiny 2 content that I had never clicked with.
Upon starting a side quest that I hadn’t touched before, I was given gear and weapons that were over 200 points stronger than what I was currently using. Again, seeing those numbers increase as I bury bullets into enemies is so satisfying. It encouraged me to go back to the Witch Queen DLC to see if that new loadout could help me finally beat that boss that I was struggling with – it didn’t.
Spending a few hours with Destiny 2 this last week has helped me appreciate the small things about that game that makes it so unique. I love the way that the weapons in that game feel. There’s a weight and feedback to those that Bungie has mastered throughout these last few decades. On top of that, the sheer amount of customizing that you can do with your character is so vast. I’m playing as a Hunter and the ability to craft what I want that character to look like and what I want their skills to give me this sense that my character is truly unique. In a game with millions of players, that’s not easy to pull off. And it goes so far beyond gear and analytics too. The overall story and lore might not be very interesting, but the design of the levels, weapons, and characters are all top-notch. Even if I’m not invested in the story, running around various worlds and climates with a new gun, and watching it take out enemies faster than the one that you had previously is a thrill in its own right.
“Festival of the Lost” may be coming to an end, but thanks to it, my time with Destiny 2 may be just beginning.
