Note: If you haven’t read my article about my concerns towards Destiny last week, I suggest you do so as this acts as a follow-up to it.
The Internet has exploded over the last week with the recent release of Bungie’s latest game Destiny. Some people claim that the game was overhyped, failed to deliver the experience the developer promised or was just an underwhelming video game in general. With reviews scoring all over the place from various established outlets, it’s very hard to come to a set conclusion as to what Destiny has accomplished. There is no denying its commercial success being the most pre-ordered new IP in history and selling over $500 million worldwide, but there is a serious stigma as to what the community has to say about Destiny. We, Gamer Headlines, have reviewed and have expressed our thoughts towards the First-Person Shooter with MMO elements in other articles, and, while I played 20+ hours of Destiny over the last seven days, it is time for me to add my grain of salt into the debate as well. I am just going to say it right from the get-go: Destiny is not a bad game, it is just an underwhelming one that had way too many high expectations.
What Critics Had To Say
Since Destiny is a big game to explore and takes a lot of time to fully experience what it has to offer, the game’s reviews took some time to make their way onto the web. Now, seven days later, most of the big outlets have posted their impressions regarding Destiny. The overall conclusion is: The reactions are quite mixed.
As we take a look at some of Destiny’s popular reviews, the game currently has a Metascore of 76 and a User Score of 6.4 over on Metacritic, a website that compiles the opinions of the most respected critics writing online and in print as well as the ones from fans.
- Post Arcade
Daniel Kaszor writes:
So here’s the thing: I love Destiny. I love every minute of it. I love repeating quests. I love grinding for gear. I love doing it all with my friends. I love the tactics you need to succeed. I love how colourful everything is and the matte-painting like vistas. I love the stupid arch-Shakespearean goofy self-seriousness of everything. I love how distinctly weird Peter Dinklage’s performance is. I adore the soundtrack.I played 20 hours of the game over the course of a day-and-a-half and I want to play more right now. This game has its hooks in me fiercely. And that’s why my review’s score is a 9.5. However, I very much could see a player being turned off by having to repeat missions, by overly-long boss fights and the very specific storytelling techniques or the fact that everything feels ripped out of a pulpy sci-fi novel that thinks it’s important.
Final Score: 9.5/10
- Cheat Code Central
Matt Walker writes:
I could sit and talk about Destiny all day long, but my wife summed up best what Destiny was to gamers. “It’s like Halo and Borderlands got together one night for some great fun and had a beautiful baby.” I personally think she hit the nail on the head, but there are obviously a few things that imply other genres stepping in as well. It’s because Bungie knows the areas they need to play it safe, and because Bungie knows the areas they want to attempt to explore and make better that I am glad this is the game I have waited for all year long, and why I feel this is another example of why the next-gen console cycle is ready to take off into new, exciting, and interesting ways. Destiny, simply put, might just be the game of year, but definitely makes you want to join the next generation.
Final Score: 4.5/5
- GameTrailers
Brandon Jones writes:
It feels like there’s something missing in Destiny, and by year’s end that void may be filled with more modes, missions and planets. For the time being we’re prepared to brave the beautiful wastelands of our solar system over and over because the freestyle combat across huge maps can have surprising variations between different play sessions. We’ve had enough wow moments to justify the time and effort to unlock them, and the possibilities of what Bungie could do next in this newly minted galaxy is intriguing based on what we’ve played so far. Destiny has not achieved greatness, yet. It is however, extremely fun to play.
Final Score: 8/10
- Electronic Gaming Monthly
Josh Harmon writes:
With a lifeless world, a hazily plotted, repetitive campaign, and an endgame that quickly resorts to a slow grind for marginally better loot, Destiny fails to deliver on the promise of its concept and the enormous potential of its gameplay systems.
Final Score: 6.5/10
- GameSpot
Kevin VanOrd writes:
You might summarize Destiny by the way in which it wraps up its story. Once the final, hackneyed closing scene finishes, fireteam members are awarded the same weapon, regardless of class, and a handful of currency. This reminder of how wholly unspecial you are is the big finale of a lavishly produced but troubled game that excels in the basics but lacks creativity and heart. It is role-playing grind in shooter form–an empty house built on a firm foundation.
Final Score: 6/10
- Polygon
Arthur Gies and Philip Kollar write:
As just another game, Destiny is a confusing combination of often at-odds elements — it presents itself as ambitious, almost boastful, while seeming strangely safe and reserved. It wants to eat its cake as a shooter, and have the longevity of an MMO — but it lacks the combat sophistication of the former, and the deep well of content native to the latter. For all the wonder of its presentation, the swelling potential suggested by its (excellent) score and the basic foundational strength of its controls, Destiny often feels like a collection of its influences’ biggest problems.
Final Score: 6/10
- Giant Bomb
Jeff Gerstmann writes:
There are cool little flashes of brilliance in Destiny, but a lot of it feels like a game designed by people who weren’t sure what sort of game they were designing. Is it a loot shooter? Sort of, but the loot isn’t very good. Is it an MMO? No, but you’ll occasionally encounter other players out in the field. A story-driven shooter like the Halo franchise? Sure, if you don’t mind digging through the developer’s website to find those little bits of lore. Clans? Again, they exist on the website but don’t surface in-game in a meaningful way. The pieces are there, but too many of them feel malformed or half-realized to make Destiny recommendable.
Final Score: 3/5
As you can see, it is very hard to come to a distinctive conclusion as to what Destiny did right or wrong by reading these reviews. Some of them praise its scope and scale while other feel like it affected the game in a negative way. Ultimately, the only conclusion that can be made out of these scattered scores is that the player’s experience is the only one that will matter and not the one coming from other people.
Author’s Thoughts
In my What If Destiny Fails? article, I expressed some of the concerns I had regarding the game. Now that I’ve spent a decent amount of time with it, I can officially tell you if I was right or wrong about certain elements that have been discussed previously.
First of all, I was convinced that server issues were bound to happen as soon as the game released. Fortunately, I had zero problems with server connections all throughout my experience with the game and even when it was unlocked from my console at midnight on Tuesday. I underestimated Bungie and Activision as they were indeed ready to handle the high amount of players connected on the game at once.
Another one of my concerns regarding Destiny was with its gameplay. I had a feeling that, with it being a First-Person Shooter and from what I had played in the Beta, Destiny would be a little too repetitive with its general mission design. And boy was I right on that one. Previous Bungie games, or any other FPS for the fact of the matter, try to switch things up a little by adding memorable set pieces and variety in all of the missions. Unfortunately, that is not the case with Destiny. All of its missions are only about getting to a specific location, activating something with your Ghost, defending the area and rinse-repeat. Sure, it tries to add a sense of dread by throwing bosses and mini-bosses into the mix, but, ultimately, they are the same as regular enemies except they are bigger in scale and have a ridiculous amount of health. It’s the same thing for the Strike Missions as well. Plus, the fact that there is barely any sense of narrative within these missions doesn’t help the game’s story. I can’t even summarize Destiny’s story because it doesn’t make any sense and is just straight up uninteresting. It’s just a bland and generic sci-fi universe that did not capture my attention a single bit.
So, I’ve reached Level 23. What do I do now?
Not only is Destiny one of the most repetitive games I have played all year, it is also filled with questionable design decisions, most of them involving the activities during the End-Game. And that’s my main problem with the game. If you really want to enjoy what Destiny has to offer, you’ll have to get to Level 20, which is the game’s soft level cap. In other words: You need to play Destiny for 10-12 hours before it actually gets any good since reaching the level cap is required to purchase all of the cool-looking equipment located in the Tower main hub. Because it has certain MMO elements, I can understand that it takes a while to beef up your character, but what I don’t understand is the entire point of the End-Game. Is it to maximize your Guardian’s stats, or is it about taking on the same missions with a more powerful character? After reaching level 20, EXP can no longer gained after completing missions as ranking up now involves Light points on your armor.
This leads to the most tedious grind I have ever seen in a video game because you need to obtain a high amount of Vanguard or Crucible Marks to purchase equipment, which have Light points in them, all while having a certain rank for one of those categories. This makes sense, right? Well, it doesn’t because the game restricts the amount of Vanguard and Crucible Marks that can be earned in a single week to 100. If the player has no luck with the loot dropping system, which is totally random by the way, it will take him about a month to fully upgrade his Guardian with Legendary/Exotic equipment, and that is absolutely ridiculous. Even if you have the will and determination to grind your way through better equipment, the game limits your progress to a certain amount and that doesn’t make any sense to me whatsoever. Not only is Bungie removing players away from the game by doing so, it makes the initial grinding process meaningless. And that is where I decided there was no point in continuing along with my Level 23 Hunter that I have been playing as during 20 hours or so.
I could rant on and on about some of the problems that I have with Destiny as it a work-in-progress, but I cannot overlook the fact that, despite all of these complaints, I still managed to get some enjoyment out of the experience. However, like I predicted in my previous article, Destiny was able to capture my attention for a short amount of time, but I don’t see myself investing any more time into this game even if Bungie promises to add more content in the future. Destiny is a commitment and I’m afraid to say that I am not ready to commit to a single game quite yet.
Bungie did not even bother putting collision detection on other characters in the Tower
Wrap-Up
Destiny’s release simply proves that reviews don’t matter that much anymore because they are based on somebody’s own personal experience with the game and not your own. Did Destiny live up to the hype? I’m afraid this question cannot be answered because, with all of the reviews listed above, we can obviously see that a lot of people had different expectations regarding the title. If you are a fan of FPS games, you’ll obviously get some enjoyment out of Destiny as it blends in some of the best mechanics of the genre into a single game, but don’t expect the next gaming revolution like most of the community expected.
If you are still on the fence about Destiny, the only tip I can give you is to try the game for yourself. You are the only one that can determine if you enjoyed the game or not based on your playing experience. It’s as simple as that.
Have you had the chance to play Destiny? If so, do you agree with all of the points made in the various reviews and articles listed above? Let us know in the comments below and, as always, stay tuned to Gamer Headlines for all things gaming.
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