Destiny Official Review

So it's finally arrived. Unless you've been living under a rock for the past year you have probably realised that Bungie, lauded creators of Halo, have brought a new game to the masses in the form of Destiny. Labelled as an open shared world shooter and definitely not an MMO (Spoilers: It is an MMO!), it has finally arrived and now after a lengthy time of playing (not like some reviews who played 20 hours and called that a review), it's time for the facts to be presented.

First up let's be honest this isn't a Halo MMO. Yes there are similarities with both the mechanics and some of the enemies, but this feels and handles in a vastly different way to Halo. Your tactics from the Halo days may be beneficial but you can't rely on them. Destiny is it's own creation with its own universe and different feel to Bungie's previous outings.

When you start your adventure you are presented with three different classes and three different races to choose your Guardian with. Although the races are just aesthetic (and the Awoken race leads to some unanswered questions in a glaring plot error), it is your class that really defines your gameplay style.

The Titan is essentially your warrior, heavily armoured, able to do large amounts of damage when up close but quite slow compared to the other classes. The Hunter is your basic rogue character, specialising in guns and stealth, but slow to regenerate health. The Warlock is your wizard quick to regen health and specialising in devastating special attacks. However on top of this each class currently has a secondary sub-class available later in the game.

This creates a split between the characters, you're Titan can now play as a Paladin style character, offering support to your fellow players, the hunter becomes a close combat specialist with devastating melee attacks and the Warlock can switch to different style of magic offering a different style to its attacks.


Now this may seem like a daunting prospect to new players who have never experienced an MMO style game before but Bungie cleverly drip feed your abilities to you  as you play meaning you are given time to get used to each new skill as it unlocks. Even when you finally unlock all your skills there are lots of tweaks to play with making your character very much your own unique avatar, adjusting each element to your gameplay style.

The gameplay itself plays out across the planets starting on Earth and progressing to the Moon, Venus and culminating on Mars. Each planet has its own collection of the various enemy races from the hierarchical Fallen, the mysterious undead-like Hive, the robot masses of the Vex and the warlike  Cabal. Each enemy has its own unit style and you'll have to constantly adjust your tactics to take out them as you meet them.

As you can expect from Bungie, the game play is very much a classic FPS with an array of weapons at your disposal though in line with an MMO this are either found, earned as rewards or bought from vendors. The guns all feel different and with various stats on each one making subtle differences you'll eventually find just the right gun for your style.

The game consists of various missions spread across the planet usually requiring you to shoot your way to an area to hold off waves of enemies or take out a particular boss. Nothing particularly original there but its enjoyable and never gets dull due to the fact you can regularly change the difficulty to adjust to your skill level. Aside from the story missions (which can be done either solo or co-op), you have the co-op only Strikes, essentially dungeons which are slightly tougher and will require team mates to help conquer. Recently Bungie introduced their first Raid, super tough dungeons which will require a full team of 6 and from what I've gathered add puzzle elements, platforming and completely different gameplay tactics to conquer, though I have yet to touch one yet.


On top of this as you can expect from Bungie is a strong MP element too. Playing in a much similar form to Halo these are mainly team based modes essentially requiring you to kill the other team more than they kill you. Although all level bonuses are removed, don't expect if you are low level to have much luck against the higher level characters due to the more powerful skills and specced out weapons whose additional abilities can sometimes make the fights one-sided.

However this is definitely a team based MP, a good team can hold out almost indefinitely when holed up in a bolthole through good tactics and communication. This is not a mode for lone wolves as the traditional run and gun will just get killed over and over again by an organised team, stick with your team mates and work together for victory is definitely the motto for the MP.

So far so good, but now here is where the contention of the game comes in and will determine whether you will enjoy Destiny or not. To get the most out of this game you will have to put a lot of hours in. Getting to lvl 20 is very easy as you gain xp from killing enemies and completing missions allowing you to unlock your abilities and the extra modes as you go. However once you reach lvl 20 you've basically finished the tutorial and the real game really starts.

After 20 the only way to level up is by getting rare or above armour which will give you a new stat called Light. Collect enough Light and you will go up another level. It is at this point that other parts of the game which seemed irrelevant start to become important. The bounties you may have ignored (extra missions requiring you to kill x amount of enemies or defeat a boss at a particular difficulty) now give you the XP you need to spec up your armour and weapons as well as giving you Reputation with various factions. Gain enough reputation and they will offer you more powerful weapons and armour.

Even then things become even more technical as at higher level missions, new elements come into play. Recently I discovered the coloured shields that certain enemies had related to one of three type of elements in the game, Solar, Void and Electric(??). You will soon be carrying around weapons of each element to help take down the various enemies you come across.

Graphically though the game is stunning. As you would expect from a company who gave us the landscapes of the Halo Universe, the planets are all beautiful with some stunning vistas that you can sit and watch and see tons of detail. With a dynamic timed environment too, you will see daylight changes and various weather effects throughout your travels. One thing for sure is Bungie have made great use of the Next-Gen technology. (Though the 360 version is still quite impressive too!).


However this does point out one of the glaring problems with Destiny. It tells you the very minimum, everything else you either have to work out for yourself or learn from fellow players. A lot of things are just not clearly explained until you need them. You may have been throwing away all the items you've been collecting which seemed to have no purpose and then later on you will realise you needed them to help upgrade your items. For a game as extensive and in-depth as  this its surprising that this has been left out, (fair dues I bought the digital version but I would assume from conversations the manual is not that in-depth either).

The story is also quite weak. Although there is a wealth of knowledge available in the Grimoire it is only accessible via Bungie.net or through a smartphone App (no love for WP though!). What story you do get is narrated to you by your Peter Dinklage voiced ghost but a lot of the time you will miss things as you are too busy staying alive to listen to his natterings. You know what you are doing but nothing is really explained why. Although to be honest this is just the start of a 10 year arc, at the moment it seems a little flat and pointless in what you are doing and there are a ton of unanswered questions.

The content itself is also quite small. A total of about 30-40 different missions but many being played out across the same areas meaning repetition will settle in for some, but the changing of difficulties allows for you to up the challenge keeping it somewhat fresh. Again this is just the start of the game with new content being promised regularly but it will seem you are doing the same things over and over again.

Overall though this is a great game, you will know early on whether you will get hooked or not. If you do you will be pouring hours into the game, levelling up and earning the best items and doing it all over again for each of the three classes. However if it doesn't grab you, you will get bored quickly and not enjoy it. I would recommend getting to lvl 20 and trying all the modes before giving up as you only get half a game till then.

I'll be honest the hype was never going to live up to the promise but this is an in-depth game which if you put the hours in will reward you for your efforts, It has its faults but this are slowly being rectified by regular updates (to the chagrin of some players!), but it is a solid title which with continued support will become a huge title.

I won't score this game as to be honest as until the 10 year arc ends we will never know how this game will be. But it is a very strong start and the continuing support and updates is very promising that this could be the consoles answer to WoW.

Great review mate. I agree that you only get out what you put into a game like this, I love it!

Nice review mate, and i don't blame you for choosing not to give it a score. It is definitely a game that grows on you as you play. I played some of the Beta, and when i started playing the full game i was a bit miffed at having to play through the same level missions i'd already done, which led to a bit of boredom. But having moved beyond that, i'm now really enjoying it.

Awesome review mate. Well done.

Nice review mate, really good read!

Great work Tenners. Not scoring it seems the right thing to do.

I'd love to play it but there's not much point for me. I simply don't have enough time to give it. I enjoyed the beta.

nice work tenners

thanks for your efforts pal

Great honest review mate.

For me this is a great co-op title but really doesn't work solo.

Excellent review. It does sound good but probably not a game I should be buying at the moment considering the time you clearly need to put in!

Just an hour after Xuur is gone I get another strange coin, my 13th one. Pfft curse you bungie!

Great review mate! I've been toying with getting a new game recently and it's either this or Forza, gonna have to weigh up the options!

nice review. fair to the game i'd say

Nice review Tenlo. Hopefully Bungie can make a good start into a great series over the years this game develops.


One question. What was the plot hole you referred to regarding the awoken?

Ah yes. Grimoire sheds some light on that in one of the free cards you could download with the Bungie Codes they sent out before release.

So I never noticed it as an issue. Do remember another Friend saying it while playing though but I immediately went into geek mode and explained it to him.

Extract from the Grimoire Card:

Great review mate, a game that I have not put anywhere near enough time in to