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[MythicReclaimer]

This mentions the engine difficulties but not the actual storyline of the game, which is mentioned by Staten in the documentary here.

To me, it sounds like the game was nearly complete by the 10 month to ship mark at which point they went back to square one and spent 9 months making what became our Halo 2.

It mentions the engine troubles which directly relate to the story of the game. If a developer does not have the time to properly complete levels and gameplay in the campaign to coincide with the story then there will be cutbacks/change in story which they clearly talk about in the video by saying "the last 1/3 of the game was lopped off" for the engine difficulties and being overly ambitious from the get-go. They speak about building /tweaking the Halo engine to a point that it simply was not going to work on the original Xbox and "tossing out tons of content/features" (or I should say ideas that they wanted to do but could not because of the engine, limitations of the original Xbox, and ultimately time constraints) because of this and the obvious time constraints it created is why we got the Halo 2 that we got. How you get "game was nearly complete by the 10 month to ship mark" is beyond me.

The truth of the matter seems to be they had a story they wanted to tell in their original vision of the game but could not accomplish it by ship time due to development difficulties and hardware limitations so it was eventually somewhat folded into Halo 3.

A far cry from saying Microsoft forced them to cut finished content for DLC and/or Halo 3.

 

[lifa-cobex]

I hate to be THAT guy but I'd need a bit more than just a response like this from the CM to confirm it's not legit. Not trying to say it's factual but this is far from what I'd consider proof that it's not.

Your not being THAT guy.

 

[gamechanger87]

Everyone in this list is an awesome and talented person who has contributed to your gaming happiness except me. And they love you too. Also, no need to be ambivalent about Jones, he has programming balls of diamond clad titanium. And Bungie is one of the few dev houses I can think of that still has a huge core of original or old school people - Jones, Butcher, Chucky, Parsons etc.

Frankie, you are still going to contribute to our happiness in a little more than a month!

 

[marianitten]

It mentions the engine troubles which directly relate to the story of the game. If a developer does not have the time to properly complete levels and gameplay in the campaign to coincide with the story then there will be cutbacks/change in story which they clearly talk about in the video by saying "the last 1/3 of the game was lopped off" for the engine difficulties and being overly ambitious from the get-go. They speak about building /tweaking the Halo engine to a point that it simply was not going to work on the original Xbox and "tossing out tons of content/features" (or I should say ideas that they wanted to do but could not because of the engine, limitations of the original Xbox, and ultimately time constraints) because of this and the obvious time constraints it created is why we got the Halo 2 that we got. How you get "game was nearly complete by the 10 month to ship mark" is beyond me.

The truth of the matter seems to be they had a story they wanted to tell in their original vision of the game but could not accomplish it by ship time due to development difficulties and hardware limitations so it was eventually folded into Halo 3.

A far cry from saying Microsoft forced them to cut finished content for DLC and/or Halo 3.

Why not just release a % of the complete story... and release the rest in patches? Like any other MMO does? I mean, the story right now is not complete. "The real fight is out there" .. WTF?

 

[MythicReclaimer]

Why not just release a % of the complete story... and release the rest in patches? Like any other MMO does? I mean, the story right now is not complete. "The real fight is out there" .. WTF?

We were discussing Bungie's development of Halo 2.

Regarding Destiny, I have no idea how they go about fixing the current iteration of the story other than to obviously add many more story elements in future content whether it be through cinematics, NPCs, even the UI with a highlight feature of weapons, enemies, places etc and incorporating the Grimoire into the actual game and gameplay.

 

[Steel]

They've already sold a ton, I really doubt they care that less than 5% of thier user base is upset about the lack of story.

They'd probably be worried about their expansion and sequel if people start putting down the game early. And I don't think anyone is happy about the lack of story.

 

[jaosobno]

I have a feeling that this game will need some kind of 2.0 version which will be a major overhaul. Otherwise, this franchise doesn't have legs for a 10 year run.

I planned to buy all the DLC but why would I do that now? Why should I get more "press square to deploy ghost" missions with no story whatsoever?

 

[lifa-cobex]

I planned to buy all the DLC but why would I do that now? Why should I get more "press square to deploy ghost" missions with no story whatsoever?

I'll be really interested to see all the DLC sales.
Aside from those who pre bought it, I'm predicting it wont come no where near to the game sales.

 

[Exploratory]

The beta was a great indicator for the actual game. anyone who paid attention, could have known what to expect in the full game ...

This is not true and people need to stop saying this.

 

[Sirim]

After going back to that 2013 ViDOC everyone keeps pointing at, I noticed the ESRB notice says "This game is anticipated to be MATURE". Not sure if that's of any importance, perhaps there was a conscious shift in demographic during the restructuring that led to it being Teen.

 

[FyreWulff]

After going back to that 2013 ViDOC everyone keeps pointing at, I noticed the ESRB notice says "This game is anticipated to be MATURE". Not sure if that's of any importance, perhaps there was a conscious shift in demographic during the restructuring that led to it being Teen.

The original (out of date) contract specified a Teen rating would be preferred.

 

[Rogue_element]

I have a feeling that this game will need some kind of 2.0 version which will be a major overhaul. Otherwise, this franchise doesn't have legs for a 10 year run.

I planned to buy all the DLC but why would I do that now? Why should I get more "press square to deploy ghost" missions with no story whatsoever?

.

 

[Captain Tuttle]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

 

[Eusis]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

Guess it depends on your view point: is it better for something to be pure squandered potential, or to mostly do a decent job (as can be expected with the budgets they were developing on) but blowing it at the finish line?

I think the former is objectively worse, but the latter's frustrating to have and there's something to be said for not even getting the chance to really get attached to something. At any rate I think the bigger problem with Destiny is that there's just not much else meaty to chew into game-wise, if it faltered with the story but was mind blowing in the amount and variety of stuff you could do and really pulled ahead otherwise it'd just be a disappointment rather than the tip of the iceberg.

 

[Poodlestrike]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

Tough one. ME3's ending is a moment of concentrated awful, while Destiny maintains that level of... quality throughout the entire campaign. If we compare it on a moment-to-moment basis, then they're about equal, but Destiny's story is a hell of a lot longer, so I'd have to give it the nod.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

Destiny's story. Plenty of otherwise good works of fiction have bad endings. Destiny is simply not a good work of fiction.

 

[Teasing_Pink]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

ME3 ending for me. I rather enjoyed all the build up and mystery around the reaper origins, and loved a lot of the character arcs. Actually got misty when my favorite character

Spoiler

Mordin said "...had to be me, someone else would have messed it up", and started singing when sacrificing himself to save the krogan race.

Not many game stories have that effect on me, so when it ended it wasn't just a bad moment, but brought down something otherwise satisfying and ruined the overall experience.

Destiny on the other hand, started with nothing, gave me nothing along the way, and when it ended with nothing, it wasn't a surprise. Destiny's story and narrative presentation was terrible, but at least it didn't take a steaming dump all over something I really enjoyed.

 

[RE_Player]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

While ME3 had a severe drop in story quality from 1 and 2 at least it had a story. Destiny's story isn't even a story in my opinion.

 

[ComputerMKII]

While ME3 had a severe drop in story quality from 1 and 2 at least it had a story. Destiny's story isn't even a story in my opinion.

This

 

[Poodlestrike]

While ME3 had a severe drop in story quality from 1 and 2 at least it had a story. Destiny's story isn't even a story in my opinion.

No... it's a story. If it just had an absence of story, that'd be one thing. I can appreciate (or at least ignore) a minimalist approach. Destiny's problem is that it has a story, and it is awful. Like, I can run down the list of events, but I could not for the life of me care about them.

 

[Izayoi]

While ME3 had a severe drop in story quality from 1 and 2 at least it had a story. Destiny's story isn't even a story in my opinion.

Yup.

And all things considered, ME3 wasn't COMPLETELY terrible up until the very end...

Destiny is not only consistently terrible (story-wise), but really doesn't even have much of an "ending" to speak of.

It's a joke.

 

[RE_Player]

No... it's a story. If it just had an absence of story, that'd be one thing. I can appreciate (or at least ignore) a minimalist approach. Destiny's problem is that it has a story, and it is awful. Like, I can run down the list of events, but I could not for the life of me care about them.

You explained my position better than I did about Destiny. Yes it is a story but like you said it just feels like a list of events.

 

[Gator86]

I have a feeling that this game will need some kind of 2.0 version which will be a major overhaul. Otherwise, this franchise doesn't have legs for a 10 year run.

I planned to buy all the DLC but why would I do that now? Why should I get more "press square to deploy ghost" missions with no story whatsoever?

But you could deploy ghost in exotic new locations like a slightly different looking cave in the Cosmodrome. Be careful though, that cave's power is dark. Because reasons.

Kidding aside, I'm more interested in Destiny sales data than more Destiny at this point. I expect the DLC to be more forgettable drek and I think that will probably strangle the remaining life out of this game. I'm hoping Bungie somehow pulls out a miracle and makes it worthwhile but I doubt they have the ability considering it took them 5 years to come out with whatever the hell Destiny is now.

 

[Deleted member 80556]

Destiny's totally worse in my eyes. At least ME has a good basis for games with lore. Destiny on the other hand has no basis for the next game. Unless the DLC somehow fixes all the story wrong-doings.

 

[Eusis]

No... it's a story. If it just had an absence of story, that'd be one thing. I can appreciate (or at least ignore) a minimalist approach. Destiny's problem is that it has a story, and it is awful. Like, I can run down the list of events, but I could not for the life of me care about them.

That would be a key reason it's easy to argue as worse rather than, say, Bubble Bobble. That has a story, but it's a basic excuse to, uhh, turn enemies into fruit... or whatever. Destiny has the set up to be an epic, possibly interesting adventure, but it just goes to "Go forth to defeat the aliens who bare darkness in the name of the Light and the Traveler!" while not really doing much else... yet drop hints that something may be up. But maybe those hints are just artifacts of a different period that was aiming for a TWIST, and without a TWIST we have a bunch of set up that feels like it should be leading to something.

It's a unique situation of being frustrated, in that they may not have even had anything all that great up their sleeves, but ultimately what they put out may be worse than hackneyed twists.

 

[CLEEK]

That would be a key reason it's easy to argue as worse rather than, say, Bubble Bobble. That has a story, but it's a basic excuse to, uhh, turn enemies into fruit... or whatever. Destiny has the set up to be an epic, possibly interesting adventure, but it just goes to "Go forth to defeat the aliens who bare darkness in the name of the Light and the Traveler!" while not really doing much else... yet drop hints that something may be up. But maybe those hints are just artifacts of a different period that was aiming for a TWIST, and without a TWIST we have a bunch of set up that feels like it should be leading to something.

It's a unique situation of being frustrated, in that they may not have even had anything all that great up their sleeves, but ultimately what they put out may be worse than hackneyed twists.

So you're saying the The Darkness is actually Baron Von Blubba.

 

[staticneuron]

But...you DO have to rely on loot.

After level 20, almost all endgame content (that is, strikes/missions/raids) is restricted based on your level.
How do you increase your level? By getting better loot.
How do you get better loot? Grind for reputation/marks (for factions) or grind strikes for the chance of finding said loot.

"Joining factions" is so barebones it's laughable. Faction leaders are just vendors that you need to gain favor with, forced to play certain game modes for currency (or, forced to grind for materials to buy said currency).

Bounties? Sure, that's something to do, but they're essentially grinds in disguise and the effort is just for better loot.

Weekly Raids are, again, the same missions over and over again but with modifiers.

I think the Light system is interesting, but it ultimately takes the agency of progression away from your character. A level 20 could luck out and get exotic gear after a Crucible match or a legendary engram and instantly bump to level 22, while a less fortunate but perhaps more skilled or more invested (in terms of time played) player could go days without getting the right drops or gear to progress, OR they have to spend days farming rep and marks.

Within a week I was able to not only get to rank 2 dead orbit but had enough to buy 3 pieces of legendary gear and also purchased an exotic from xur. It took me longer to get the helmet I wanted but I was already on the path to 30 without relying on loot at all. I was lucky enough to get some good exotic weapons on the way but my armor was earned.

It is insane trying to hope for loot to help out because I have yet to recieve legendary armor drop for my character outside of the fixed queens bounty.

And it takes no time to get the rep just do the bounties. Some of em are really quick and easy to do. It really wasn't a big deal.

 

[PrivateWHudson]

So if the story is an utter shambles, and according to 404 Bungie knows this, why not just focus on strikes? Strikes and raids seem to be the best and most consistently played content in the game while all the story missions do is force us to watch unskippable cut scenes ad nauseaum.

Also, having matchmaking for the strikes makes them way easier to get into.

I think they should abandon the while idea of story missions. Have your ghost die a quick death, and let us find the story areas through exploration. The NPCs could tell us about a fascinating relic in a bunker somewhere by the forgotten shore, and you just have to go look for it.

 

[PeakPointMatrix]

Someone mentioned earlier that early leaked impressions of the first version of the story were very negative, and it was similarly torn to shreds. Does anyone know where to find these impressions from the leaks?

 

[Jest Chillin]

Someone mentioned earlier that early leaked impressions of the first version of the story were very negative, and it was similarly torn to shreds. Does anyone know where to find these impressions from the leaks?

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=132180041&postcount=417

 

[Florida_Man_5000]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

IMHO, Mass Effect is one of the greatest games of all time, ending and all. I have never had as epic an experience. The disappointing ending was redeemed by later story DLC and multiplayer, which came with free DLC that expanded the character counts, levels, weapons etc.. 404 said they wanted to be a Mass Effect MMO. Well they certainly didn't come close. I like Destiny, but I love Mass Effect.

 

[BreezyLimbo]

Lesson learned. And learned hard.

This actually killed my hype. Alot of people in the withdrawal thread back in the day were extremely excited, to the point where it was like "Wow, this is intoxicating"(And not in a good way.) It killed my hype for a good while, until 2 days from release. And then when it came out...well, to see the backlash was amazing. I'm kinda happy I tempered my expectations near the end but..never again.

Bungie as a company to me, is well, to me they've fallen to C-levels of production.

Edit-On a side note, on people talking about strikes being bullet sponges....they HAD to be bullet sponges. Because if they implemented actual mechanics to the Strikes, then when the raid unlocked, it would seem like more of the same to people.

So solution? Bullet sponge everything up to the raid.

 

[PanicFreak]

So now we have both Titanfall and Destiny out there. Which of the two do you think bungled their handling of SP worse?

Titanfall doesn't have a SP soooooooooo.....

 

[Compsiox]

I think they should abandon the while idea of story missions. Have your ghost die a quick death, and let us find the story areas through exploration. The NPCs could tell us about a fascinating relic in a bunker somewhere by the forgotten shore, and you just have to go look for it.

It's rated T. All the 10 year Olds would fail at the game and the word would spread and then bungie wouldn't get money.

 

[Izayoi]

This actually killed my hype. Alot of people in the withdrawal thread back in the day were extremely excited, to the point where it was like "Wow, this is intoxicating"(And not in a good way.) It killed my hype for a good while, until 2 days from release. And then when it came out...well, to see the backlash was amazing. I'm kinda happy I tempered my expectations near the end but..never again.

Bungie as a company to me, is well, to me they've fallen to C-levels of production.

Edit-On a side note, on people talking about strikes being bullet sponges....they HAD to be bullet sponges. Because if they implemented actual mechanics to the Strikes, then when the raid unlocked, it would seem like more of the same to people.

So solution? Bullet sponge everything up to the raid.

I disagree. Good instance and raid synergy is not rocket science.

There are TONS of unique mechanics in the raid. Ideally, the Strikes would prepare you for the raid. Raid mechanics are slowly introduced throughout the Strikes, and culminate in a capstone piece of content that integrates all of the previous mechanics in interesting ways (like how the Raid is now). If you really want to go all out, you introduce one or two raid-unique mechanics that really require players to think about an encounter.

Really, how hard could that be? ANYTHING would be better than burn boss > burn adds > burn boss > burn adds > repeat until you vomit.

 

[HiddenForbiddenHolyGround]

This actually killed my hype. Alot of people in the withdrawal thread back in the day were extremely excited, to the point where it was like "Wow, this is intoxicating"(And not in a good way.) It killed my hype for a good while, until 2 days from release. And then when it came out...well, to see the backlash was amazing. I'm kinda happy I tempered my expectations near the end but..never again.

Bungie as a company to me, is well, to me they've fallen to C-levels of production.

Edit-On a side note, on people talking about strikes being bullet sponges....they HAD to be bullet sponges. Because if they implemented actual mechanics to the Strikes, then when the raid unlocked, it would seem like more of the same to people.

So solution? Bullet sponge everything up to the raid.

That sounds like a terrible justification to me. Let's make everything else suck so the part that only 5% of players will play will be cool.

I joke 5% because not everyone plays raids in any game and even less so than normal here with the grind above 20 and no matchmaking.

 

[Chaos2Frozen]

Edit-On a side note, on people talking about strikes being bullet sponges....they HAD to be bullet sponges. Because if they implemented actual mechanics to the Strikes, then when the raid unlocked, it would seem like more of the same to people.

So solution? Bullet sponge everything up to the raid.

This strikes me as someone who has never played MMOs- A good developer would use the Strikes (normal dungeons) to slowly introduce mechanics for the players to get used to before dumping them into the Raid with a hardcore up version of it.

 

[Seraph_Nicholas]

Destiny's 'story' is pretty butchered, but it works for me, mostly because it makes me feel like someone jerked out of time and forced to go on a bunch of bloody errands I barely understand for people I only just met.

 

[barit]

Just started a new class. When you finish the first mission and flying away with your new ship you can see a random dude staying around and watching you. Who the fuck is this ? Another player ? The exo lady ? I don't know. Like everything in this game it's so freaking pointless lol

 

[Chaos2Frozen]

Destiny's 'story' is pretty butchered, but it works for me, mostly because it makes me feel like someone jerked out of time and forced to go on a bunch of bloody errands I barely understand for people I only just met.

It's fine to start out as "I don't know what's going on and I'm following everyone else's lead" but at least give us the option to figure out what's going on for those players know want to know.

If Bungie just wanted to make a straight-up loot grind shooter then they certainly shouldn't have tried to shove the "legendary space fantasy adventure" angle down our throat.

Just started a new class. When you finish the first mission and flying away with your new ship you can see a random dude staying around and watching you. Who the fuck is this ? Another player ? The exo lady ? I don't know. Like everything in this game it's so freaking pointless lol

I'm pretty sure it's the Exo Lady.

 

[Fattony12000]

Jaime Griesemer - Joined Bungie during development of Halo: CE and was a lead/co-lead designer on Halo 2, Halo 3 and Halo Reach. Left shortly after Reach. In several interviews he clearly champions the concept of solid weapon balance both in campaign and multiplayer.

And here's his 134 page presentation where he talks about balancing the Halo sniper rifle.

http://downloads.bungie.net/presentations/Griesemer_Jaime_DesignInDetail_Sniper.pdf

Biggest cool guy in video games.

EDIT
Whoa, I posted a post about that, and other, cool Bungie PDFs on Giant Bomb nearly four years ago.

 

[Card Boy]

So what's worse? Destiny story or ME3 ending?

Everything leading up to the ending in ME3 was amazing.

 

[SketchTheArtist]

If you play Destiny for the story..... well, yeah. There's your problem.

 

[Xpliskin]

And here's his 134 page presentation where he talks about balancing the Halo sniper rifle.

http://downloads.bungie.net/presentations/Griesemer_Jaime_DesignInDetail_Sniper.pdf

Biggest cool guy in video games.

EDIT
Whoa, I posted a post about that, and other, cool Bungie PDFs on Giant Bomb nearly four years ago.

What a goldmine. All links are down, where can I find them ?

 

[Portugeezer]

Though I'm still enjoying the game, I'm very annoyed that it doesn't even come close to what they promised the game would on launch. I'm usually a sucker for PvE and often ignore the PvP, but since the exploration, quests, and narrative are so lacking -- I've gotten a lot of my fun in MP. Which is extremely unusual for me.

It's one of the most disappointing games in recent memory. If there's an award for games that Failed To Deliver, then this game has that locked.

I think Gametrailers actually does a "most disappointing game" list every year.

 

[GhaleonEB]

What a goldmine. All links are down, where can I find them ?

Here: http://halo.bungie.net/inside/publications.aspx

 

[Xpliskin]

Here: http://halo.bungie.net/inside/publications.aspx

Thanks a lot, this makes my day.
How could I have missed this.

I always assume everything's behind the GDCVault paywall.

 

[sobaka770]

If you play Destiny for the story..... well, yeah. There's your problem.

The problem is not playing the game for the story. The problem was with expectation, false marketing and knowledge that there was a story at one point.

The more I think about the story in Destiny, the more it pisses me off (unlike ME3 where I was instantly raging). It pretends to be so much with the intro cinematic, shown weeks in advance for marketing purposes by the way, big talks about the Traveler, the Darkness, saving the Last City on Earth. The game's motto is "Become Legend" the game is called "Destiny" - very pretentious words.

If the game was supposed to be loot farming and PvP, there's no becoming Legend here. Hell, Diablo 3 had at least a proper, albeit poorly written, storyline with you kicking ass and becoming, effectively a superhero.

What do we do in Destiny? Why am I the chosen one? Apprently I'm so very special that the Exo-Stranger was already observing me when I first got resurrected on Earth... was she there by coincidence?

Every mission in Destiny, every word is full of pompous crap: the "legendary" Sword of Crota, the "eternal" Vex, the "mythical" Black Garden. The Moon Strike states that a "terrible" darkness is being summoned on the Moon, and it ends up being a bigger version of the Ogre? This game is all tell but no show. You are told that you do great things, but the very gameplay is not supporting the premise. Darkness is just a bunch of warring alien races that you slaughter by thousands, Vex are just a faction, Black Garden is....

Spoiler

what the FUCK was that

???

This game has nothing! It has no character who has any personality. Voice actors are wasted: do you seriously believe they would hire Lance Reddick, Gina Torres and Nathan Fillion (Firefly cast: bonus points) and use them for providing loading screen voiceover and a phrase or two as Tower Vendors? If so, what a disappointment.

The missions are also wasted: we go from freeing an AI, to wielding a super-sword to killing the most dangerous aliens in the galaxy and nothing is joined, nothing makes sense. The Vex who live in all times are just the Fallen with Teleport. There's no indication that any "evil" alien race is worse than the other, apart from what you're being told.

And here's the biggest point: you are Fry from Futurama, stuck 1000 years in the future working as a delivery boy. Ghost tells you to kill aliens, you kill. Ghost tells you to go to moon, you go. Exo-stranger tells you to go to Venus, you go. Speaker tells you nothing, you don't ask. Cryptarch cheats you and gives you blues while keeping legendries all for himself, you don't discharge a shotgun in his face. What a push-around!

The most basic parts of storytelling are not present in Destiny: compelling characters, palpable storyline, hero development, coherent world. We got nothing: characters have at most one cutscene, apart from Ghost, who has no personality, the storyline is non-existent and overdramatic at the same time, your character is a non-entity, the world doesn't make sense. Was it too much to ask to have at least one of these things?

And that's what we're left with: a shell of a game where your protagonist is only defined by his or her clothes and endless grind. A shell of what it could be and a disappointment for sure. What a waste...

 

[rager]

The problem is not playing the game for the story. The problem was with expectation, false marketing and knowledge that there was a story at one point.

The more I think about the story in Destiny, the more it pisses me off (unlike ME3 where I was instantly raging). It pretends to be so much with the intro cinematic, shown weeks in advance for marketing purposes by the way, big talks about the Traveler, the Darkness, saving the Last City on Earth. The game's motto is "Become Legend" the game is called "Destiny" - very pretentious words.

If the game was supposed to be loot farming and PvP, there's no becoming Legend here. Hell, Diablo 3 had at least a proper, albeit poorly written, storyline with you kicking ass and becoming, effectively a superhero.

What do we do in Destiny? Why am I the chosen one? Apprently I'm so very special that the Exo-Stranger was already observing me when I first got resurrected on Earth... was she there by coincidence?

Every mission in Destiny, every word is full of pompous crap: the "legendary" Sword of Crota, the "eternal" Vex, the "mythical" Black Garden. The Moon Strike states that a "terrible" darkness is being summoned on the Moon, and it ends up being a bigger version of the Ogre? This game is all tell but no show. You are told that you do great things, but the very gameplay is not supporting the premise. Darkness is just a bunch of warring alien races that you slaughter by thousands, Vex are just a faction, Black Garden is....

Spoiler

what the FUCK was that

???

This game has nothing! It has no character who has any personality. Voice actors are wasted: do you seriously believe they would hire Lance Reddick, Gina Torres and Nathan Fillion (Firefly cast: bonus points) and use them for providing loading screen voiceover and a phrase or two as Tower Vendors? If so, what a disappointment.

The missions are also wasted: we go from freeing an AI, to wielding a super-sword to killing the most dangerous aliens in the galaxy and nothing is joined, nothing makes sense. The Vex who live in all times are just the Fallen with Teleport. There's no indication that any "evil" alien race is worse than the other, apart from what you're being told.

And here's the biggest point: you are Fry from Futurama, stuck 1000 years in the future working as a delivery boy. Ghost tells you to kill aliens, you kill. Ghost tells you to go to moon, you go. Exo-stranger tells you to go to Venus, you go. Speaker tells you nothing, you don't ask. Cryptarch cheats you and gives you blues while keeping legendries all for himself, you don't discharge a shotgun in his face. What a push-around!

The most basic parts of storytelling are not present in Destiny: compelling characters, palpable storyline, hero development, coherent world. We got nothing: characters have at most one cutscene, apart from Ghost, who has no personality, the storyline is non-existent and overdramatic at the same time, your character is a non-entity, the world doesn't make sense. Was it too much to ask to have at least one of these things?

And that's what we're left with: a shell of a game where your protagonist is only defined by his or her clothes and endless grind. A shell of what it could be and a disappointment for sure. What a waste...

well said...

 

[excowboy]

Snip

Yep.

I posted it in the OT but this seems like an appropriate moment to link Matt Lees Destiny: Abridged video again.