As a Guardian who has danced over many a slain Phogoth as an Awoken Hunter, to see the Queen getting into the fray in this latest cinematic trailer is pretty exciting. Hell, the entire thing is really exciting. One can only hope that the Taken King won’t simply open with this scene and end up using it as the narrative backbone of the entire game.
“Mara Sov bows…to no one.”
– Mara Sov
For those who have never looted a cave, the first real expansion for Destiny (Bungie has differentiated between DLC and expansion, which has nothing to do with the $40 price tag) is due in a few weeks on September 15th. Bungie just wrapped up a roughly month-long information dump today with a live stream dedicated to the new “Court of Oryx” public events coming to the game.
I have to admit, while not blown away, I was impressed with how Bungie seems to not be fooling around with the whole “we take user feedback to heart” thing. The community has been clamoring for a more open-ended world, more freedom, and more interesting design. In particular, today’s event showed off boss design that goes beyond the typical bullet-sponge. While it was nothing we haven’t seen at some point in The Legend of Zelda, like enemies that have to be killed simultaneously or enemies that can only be hurt by other enemies, there is progress being made and the stream looked legitimately fun.
Not only that, but the environment looks less like a small field to run around and grind for engrams (Destiny’s primary source of loot) and more like an intricate labyrinth with puzzles to solve. You know, like most other RPGs. While I’m sure just the word RPG doesn’t test well in focus-groups, it’s not too surprising that the mechanics of the genre are what the community ended up wanting more of in this game.
Finally, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the gigantic swords. You can never get enough of those, and now they will be permanent gear in Destiny. I’d also be remiss if I didn’t point out the obsession with Led Zeppelin in the marketing campaign and how much that must be costing Activision (see trailer below).
