This week, Bungie confirmed what many in the Destiny community feared. Destiny 2 will not continue past the upcoming June update, and the franchise’s future as a whole seems cloudy at best. Bungie will continue to make games, as it stated in its message regarding Destiny 2’s conclusion, but those experiences beyond new Marathon content may not be seen for a while.
There will be plenty of time to consider the future of Bungie and what may be next for the Sony-owned studio, but it feels more appropriate to look backward and appreciate. For me, and for a lot of folks out there, Destiny 2 was a one-of-a-kind experience. There won’t be anything like it, and the impact it had on a lot of people’s lives will be long-lasting. It may seem strange to talk about a video game like that, but Destiny 2 was something special, and I’m sad to see it end.
Most Bungie Developers Are Working on Marathon Instead of Destiny 2
A new report indicates that the majority of the team working at Bungie has been assigned to work on Marathon instead of Destiny 2.
You might be asking why there is even a need to eulogize or reflect on Destiny 2 when we didn’t do the same for Destiny 1. Bungie’s 2014 smash hit didn’t need a “funeral” because it was already set up with a successor. Destiny 2 had been announced well before the “lights turned off” on Destiny 1, and we knew there was something to look forward to.
Now, the future is so uncertain that I don’t know if there will ever be another Destiny game released by Bungie. And as a follow-up report has revealed, it doesn’t look like many of Destiny 2’s foundational development team members will be around to chart a path forward for Bungie. Past and present, those people who helped define the premier looter shooter in the genre deserve recognition for the tremendous work they did, for the memories they helped create, and for the countless they inspired.
Destiny 2 Stumbled at First, But Hit Its Stride in Year 2
I, like many people out there, was a dedicated Destiny 1 die-hard. I had three versions of the same class, ran raids every week, and was committed to the grind for those perfect rolls. It wasn’t until my first Vault of Glass completion that Destiny truly clicked, but once it did, I became obsessed. In summer 2017, I had the rare opportunity to play Destiny 2 early, and even though the preview session lasted for two days, it only took two minutes for me to be convinced the addiction was going to continue with D2. Maybe Destiny 2 wouldn’t have that same initial wow factor as the first game – nostalgia is a heck of a drug – but the core concepts were tighter, the world felt more expansive, and the support surrounding the title was strong enough to ensure this was worth continuing to invest my time into.
But when Destiny 2 was released in September, it wasn’t all roses in the beginning. I prefer to look at the experience as a whole, but no one can deny that the game had its hiccups. Most will remember that the game originally launched with a two-primary system, and relegated many of the useful special weapons from D1 (shotguns, fusion rifles, sniper rifles) to the heavy slot. It was a change that was eventually reverted, something that became common for Destiny 2 throughout its lifecycle. A controversial change was introduced, the community backlash hit a groundswell, and Bungie changed things back.
Curse of Osiris and Warmind are no doubt some of the weakest expansions for Destiny 2, but they had elements that now feel like moments that hardened us as players. I’d dare say they even bonded us. Grinding Ikelos weapons from Escalation Protocol with a bunch of strangers was miserable at times, but I wouldn’t trade the time spent goofing with friends and cheesing bosses for anything.
Forsaken Turns Destiny 2 into a Phenomenon
Destiny 2 hit its stride in its second year in a way that made everyone excited about the future and, despite plenty of stumbles along the way, this was a pivotal moment that established the game’s identity, its popularity, and, for nearly a decade, its staying power. Whether it was Forsaken, The Final Shape, The Witch Queen, or any of the other numerous expansions that were released over the course of Destiny 2’s history, everyone had their favorites – moments that will be treasured forever. Heading into The Last Wish raid for the first time, for example, is a genuine highlight for a lot of people and is largely considered a pivotal moment where Bungie established how much it could challenge its community to collaborate and overcome seemingly impossible obstacles.
We saw this time and time again with raids. Those continue to be the pinnacle experience of Destiny 2, and if there is one thing that will be lost in all this, it will be that there are no more raids. Many have tried to create a similar experience to Destiny’s raids, like The Division’s Incursions or Ghost of Yotei: Legends’ raid, but there is something special about jumping into a brand-new endgame experience in Destiny, discovering how an encounter works, uncovering the puzzles, collecting new loot, and eventually toppling a really fantastic big bad that is second to none.
The story campaigns have vacillated from exceptional to over-before-you-know-it forgettable, but I think, by and large, the big releases stand out for the epic narratives. They’ve featured incredible character moments and opportunities to truly embody what it means to be a heroic guardian.
If you were into Destiny 2, then you no doubt were obsessed with chasing loot, and Bungie regularly found ways to give you more and more top-tier weapons to chase, exotics to collect, and interestingly designed armor pieces to put into a build. Loot fuels a looter shooter and there were so many iconic weapons to chase over the years. Some loot came easy and some needed a concerted effort to obtain. Others simply needed luck. However you got your favorite weapon with your god roll, each had a story.
Exotic weapons were Destiny’s bread and butter; its calling card. Gjallarhorn, Hawkmoon, Ice Breaker, Anarchy, Thunderlord, No Time to Explain – everyone had their first, their favorite, and their most used. Different exotics had their time in the sun, before they were nerfed and a new set of weapons rose to prominence. Some of these weapons are so iconic that I’ll never forget their design or the sound they made. Destiny 2 had so many things going on, but the weapons you saw every day became just as much a part of your routine as your toothbrush.
The Ups and the Downs of Destiny 2 Hardened the Community
Destiny 2 players have been through a lot. There were low points throughout the last 9 years, and more often than not the game bounced back. For every Lightfall there was a Final Shape. For every Root of Nightmares there was a Salvation’s Edge. Power creep made things predictable, but significant nerfs had players getting their pitchforks out. Lord knows the PvP community has had a rough go in the last few years, and likely feel the most burned by Bungie, but many of them still held out hope with every update or balance patch. There is a popular meme in the Destiny community about the next expansion always being make or break. This time there will be no make or break. Guardians do not make their own fate.
The acquisition by Sony was a significant moment, but it wasn’t clear if it was good or bad for either party. That’s still kind of where we are at; it doesn’t feel like either party is happy with the marriage. Live service also took a turn and what once seemed like a burgeoning sub category for gaming has instead been turned into a pejorative. Games like Dragon Age: The Veilguard and Gotham Knights had live service elements ripped out once the backlash to the subgenre hit a fever pitch. And yet Destiny remained.
So much of what Destiny 2 achieved in terms of its mechanics, its storytelling, or its world building pales in comparison to its longevity. There are so few games that stick around this long and still feel like each new piece of content is an event. I have had many games occupy my time for long stretches throughout my life, but they didn’t stick around as long as Destiny 2. I felt like Al Pacino at times, thinking I was out before being pulled back in. There was a good reason for that.
The Friends We Made Along the Way
While there are so many elements central to Destiny 2 that I, and the rest of the community, will miss experiencing on a regular basis, I think most can agree it was the actual playing of Destiny 2 that we will miss the most. Getting together with friends or even strangers left me with some incredible memories. Hopping online with friends to do a raid for the first or the 15th or the 100th time might seem like the definition of insanity, but it was a bonding experience that I will never forget.
Even when there wasn’t something to do, even when you were just hopping around the tower, you could sink hours into Destiny 2, and it was fun because of the people that you were playing with. There was a FOMO to seeing your friends online even after you swore you were done with the game for the 40th time. I have friends I don’t get to see regularly, but who were online every Tuesday to run through our reset checklist. Yes, I can play new games with them, and try to every chance I get, but there was something about our experiences in Destiny 2 that had a gravitational pull that regularly brought us together. I made new friends out of strangers, I connected with viewers while I streamed Destiny content on GameRant’s channels, and I had some of the best times of my video game-playing life. I dare say Destiny 2 was the glue holding a lot of people and communities together.
From staying up all night to see if any team would beat Last Wish in the 24-hour window to regularly checking the Corridors of Time ARG to that final showdown with The Witness, there were moments from within Destiny 2 that are indelible, but they pale in comparison to the pointless conversations had in Discord while we ran the Inverted Spire strike for the 547th time. You just had to be there.
Those days of daily Destiny 2 grinding were gone well before today, but that doesn’t make those memories any special. I started playing Destiny 2 before I became a husband, before I had a kid, and before I was EiC of this website. It was a whole lifetime ago, but the life lived since has little pockets of Destiny 2 nostalgia sprinkled throughout. Sappy as it may sound, I want to thank Bungie for giving me a platform to regularly hang out with my friends. And to those friends, I want to say thank you for the ride.
What’s Next for Destiny 2, If Anything At All?
The big question on everybody’s mind is what might be next for Destiny. But honestly, I don’t know if Destiny has much of a future at Bungie. Obviously, you could start work on Destiny 3, but a third game in a long-standing franchise would have an uphill battle in order to find an audience big enough to sustain it in the same way that Destiny and Destiny 2 did.
Anyone who maybe was put off by Destiny 2 either at the beginning or over time would be less likely to invest in a Destiny 3 for any reason but sheer curiosity. And those who had no interest in Destiny or feel overwhelmed about getting into the series now would likely choose not to give it a try.
It seems more likely that Bungie would work on a game that has a similar vibe to Destiny – a looter shooter with strong gunplay and ability usage and some RPG systems. But I don’t think that making a game that is Destiny in all but name wouldn’t work either.
No matter how you look at it, Bungie is in a tough spot. The pressure from Sony has to be significant and with those major changes coming to Marathon in its second season, there is a feeling that Bungie doesn’t have much of a direction or a clear idea of what its audience wants from the storied developer.
Selfishly, I hope that Bungie just starts working on Destiny 3 and I get to continue these adventures with these characters that I still would love to learn more about; to expand my arsenal; to continue to experience those incredible raids; and frankly, to have an excuse to reconnect with my friends that I haven’t been able to play with as regularly as I’d like. But realistically, I know it’s time to move on and accept that the series that gave me so much is no longer going to exist. And rather than be bitter or focus on the negatives, I prefer to be glad that it happened and preserve those precious memories.
