Destiny 2 is a great game. But it’s also short on content for those coming either from the first game or new to the series. Sure, it’s technically a “new game”, but people playing MMOs, even ones that avoid the term, expect loads of content to keep them busy. Fair enough, Destiny 2 can claim it’s a whole new game. But the danger of taking an MMO and giving it a direct sequel is that you’re sacrificing all that older content to the garbage bin.
I get it – Destiny 2 is a retcon of the errors made in Destiny 1. It’s a much better game than its original was at the outset, but it’s also suffering from a lack of content because all the stuff players enjoyed in D1 is gone. We have the first expansion coming on December 5th, and another planned in the early Spring of 2018. So far, that’s all that’s been announced, outside of the likely holiday-themed content.
This is where I think Bungie is missing a big opportunity. The content and its delivery is much improved in Destiny 2. The open zones are far more engaging, the Public Events are a blast, and the Adventures are a great way to add supplemental side quests to the main campaign. So why aren’t there more?
For starters, Adventures should be repeatable more regularly and at any time a player or Fireteam wants, perhaps with adjustable difficulty levels. Yes, it’s still repeating content, but why ever limit the amount of content players can do? Let the engrams flow, Bungie.
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I miss this place.
But along those lines, and this is the thing I hope the Seattle dev is already working towards – the old zones of Destiny 1 should come back in D2. New adventures and Public Events should be added, and they should be given for free content updates between the narrative driven DLC expansions. I’d kill to go back to Russia. I never played a ton of D1, but I always adored that opening zone. It’s iconic, and to see it “gone with the wind” in Destiny 1 is sad.
When WoW made the decision to change old Azeroth with Cataclysm, it seemed like a good idea. But I’m not alone when I say I miss the original zones. This is sort of the same. Destiny 2 is basically a great expansion to the main game, but imagine if you could only play the new Warcraft content and never the old next time an expansion launches.
Of course, the same goes with Strikes and Raids. Bring them into D2, even on a sort of cycle, and let players earn old loot made anew. There are a whole host of new players to Destiny, especially on PC. And you’ve already made the content – why shoot yourself in the foot by keeping it away from players dying for things to do?
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I’m sure there are some harder technical questions to answer as to why, but I sincerely hope Bungie’s on the case.
I’ll answer the question I posed at the outset. I don’t think a sequel for Destiny 2 was a mistake. I think Bungie needed to reset the game to move forward with better systems. But I also think they’re doing themselves a huge disservice by abandoning the old content from Destiny 1. By all accounts, the main game and its DLCs only make the original game better over time. Cutting all your players off by keeping that content out of Destiny 2 completely is counterproductive.
