Welcome back to another Jaggy's Corner where I discuss various video
game topics. Today I'm finally going to get some things off my chest.
Yes, it's going to be a rant, and I didn't want to do it, but here we
are.
Estimated reading time: 11 minutes
Brace yourselves, I'm going to rant hard about Destiny
2 right now and you should know that THIS IS A LONG
POST.
A couple of years back I scored myself a copy of a wonderful game
known as Destiny 2. At the time, I played through the story,
completed strikes, and found myself being hooked. The game showed me
beautiful scenery, a couple of awesome NPCs, and the power of its
community. I worked through as much content as I was capable of, and
found myself really interested in gambit - a PvEvP mode.
Destiny 2 has since brought me a great group of friends that have
better skills than I do. And for the most part, the game has been
awesome. However, lately, it has brought me significantly less joy.
Season of the Worthy, in my opinion, has been the absolute worst
season. And I'm not saying this because I am the only one that thinks
it's bad, other people I've talked to or others who have posted
articles
or Tweets have struggled with something this season.
So here is a very short list of issues I've had and I'll elaborate on
each one for the rest of this piece.
Again, be warned, this is long.
We
are the Beaver
We are in Season of the Worthy but in reality it is truly Season of
the Beaver. This is an issue that has become infinitely more
prevalent during this season than any other to date and the Beaver
error is one of several errors of different types that players can
encounter. While some players have had their games crash, others have
been shunted back to orbit causing a loss of progress in an activity.
I was kicked from three matches of Gambit earlier in the season and I
received a temporary half hour ban for something that was not my
fault. Also, imagine being kicked out of any competitive match
because someone ranked up their season pass. What if a person was
going for solo flawless pit of heresy or running through Shattered
Throne only to be Beavered? You get the idea. The Beaver screwed you.
No pun intended... (That's a lie...)
The best part is, Beavers are rampant in all areas of the game, be
that in PvE or PvP activities. But don't worry, it gets better. Some
friends and I entered Iron Banner. Of the four of us, three players
were constantly kicked out of the match (in rapid succession I might
add.) This occurred to those on the opposing team as well. About two
or three minutes in, the match consisted of me in the fireteam I was
running with and two guys on the other. Some of my friends were
finally able to connect for a few moments to see that we were
winning. Rejoice! But, one person was the odd one out. When he
reconnected, he ended up on the opposing team! (I will add that it
was my other half who ended up there. Even though we were in the same
fireteam, something screwed up and he ended up winning the match for
the other guys.) Now, this issue was unique in that it wasn't a
Beaver error code or an Anteater or anything, it was a Steam issue.
After the painful loss, my friends and I had to restart our Steam
launcher before entering Banner again...
Cheaters/Hackers
and the Playerbase
So, as I said before, I play alongside gamers who are way better at
shooters. Some of them have simply played Destiny 2 longer while
others play competitive PvP in other games. And throughout this
season, I've heard about the rampant cheating / hacking that plagues
the PvP sphere. Mostly this is related to Crucible or Iron Banner and
lately with Trials, but still, the amount seems to be higher than
usual. In fact, I'd argue that the increase in hacks and cheats stems
from Destiny 2 being on Steam but I'm not going to delve into that
right now.
The thing is, the players that I know are actually good PvPers
but they feel like hot garbage because of cheats or match
manipulation. I'd also like to add that the people I know aren't
looking to be competitive gods, but when several people have stopped
playing the game because of how shitty this season has been,
I find myself less inclined to play. I don't even PvP much and I'm
really tired of seeing / hearing how upset players are. This has led
me to stop wanting to play.
Now, Bungie has been cracking down on cheaters in the game. They have
even made it a point to disable the artifact level boost in Trials
and Banner, but I am wondering how effective they are at curbing the
cheaters especially since there is very little restriction or proper
rating to balance the scales. There isn't any region lock which is
frustrating when matched against players from the other side of the
world who have horrible levels of ping. Frankly, I think letting new
light players have boosted gear to the current Light level was a bit
of a misstep on Bungie's part. Couple that with the fact that Bungie
has to work through Steam's massive access to a player base has made
Destiny 2 easy pickings for the spineless cheaters out there.
Balancing everything has likely been a pain in the ass, though, that
is merely speculation on my part.
I already suck at shooters and I don't need to go into modes that are
rampant with issues just because weapons or armor sets might be
shinier. Until the game has a more level and fair playing field for
scrubs like me, I'm still going to avoid most PvP modes. For now, I
will stick to gambit which is much less frustrating.
Here's a clip
of a gambit match I was in. It's the closest to losing
I've been in a match and you hear my voice when we won.
The
Bunkers and Seraph Tower Events
I'll say it, this is the least engaging content I've ever experienced
regarding PvE content. I'm sorry, but I had much more fun playing
through the Vex Offensive and the Sundial. I even had fun getting
lost in the Corridors of Time which was a special community puzzle
that took weeks to decode. Plus, the story from the last two seasons
was way more interesting to me because it was the first time where we
encountered Barrier, Overload, and Unstoppable Champions. To defeat
them, players needed to rank up their artifact so that they could
modify the weapons they were allowed on. Since this was a new
mechanic, along with the seasonal artifact, Destiny 2 was exciting.
Leading up to this season, we were shown a video outlining that our
world was in trouble. We needed to do whatever we could to defend
against it. We are Guardians after all! Anyways, we were able to see
the integral roles that Zavala and Ana Bray (voiced by the awesome
Erika Ishii) play. Guardians were given a strong sense of urgency.
But then you actually play it, and it sucks. Yes I know. The world is
about to be hit with certain doom and I've never cared less than I
have with this current series of events.
Why you might ask? Well for one thing, I've never lagged so hard
during a public event in my life - even when I had a terrible
graphics card. This isn't some minor manageable lag either, the game
would actually lag hard enough to show me an EPIC SLIDESHOW. Never in
the history of Destiny 2 has my game had such a struggle during a
PUBLIC EVENT. It's so bad that no matter which computer I've played
on (mine or my boyfriends), I can't do much. I'm left to afk and die,
feeling like it was a waste of time. Yeah.. Thanks for that. Even
more perplexing is the fact that when the season first began, I was
able to participate in the public event without issue, so I don't
know.
As for the bunker itself, I find the daily clear of it angering. I
believe it is because the weapons we're given to take down the
special enemies are weak as shit. But what's more infuriating to me
is how do they keep getting into the bunker?! Are they using some
kind of portal or breaking the threads of time again? Come on...
Anyways, I know that Destiny 2 is a grind and I get that content
needs to feel worthwhile but even with 1000 LL, I am murdered
quickly. Light Level, it seems, is just a number...
I used to have confidence in this game but I've never felt more
deflated than I have in this whole season. See, in Season of the Dawn
I achieved my first 'real' title (outside of Wayfarer). I worked my
butt off to get the +20 artifact level. I managed to get the gambit
and crucible weapons, with a little help and some confidence-boosting
from my friends. I felt GOOD about myself at the end of the season.
Yet, Season of the Worthy has really kicked me back to kindergarten
and it pisses me off. I've spent so much time learning, practicing,
and improving my skills to end up in a corner where not only am I not
having fun, but neither are my friends. Considering that this is the
only shooter I play, Destiny 2 is in a bad place right now.
As for the bunkers and tower events, I honestly could care less about
them. I get more enjoyment out of strikes or gambit or even the odd
stint of Iron Banner than I do with the PvE content. Considering I'm
a predominantly PvE player, the fact that I would rather do PvP-lite
modes is not a place I expected to be in at this point of the game.
Other
Issues
At one point in Destiny 2, I did feel like I was skillful enough to
do some raids or help teach new light players a thing or two. But
there are several events that I can't run without dying 50+ times.
I'm a player that has a 1000 Light Level and can't run someone
through Shattered Throne or Pit of Heresy because I can barely do it
myself. I'm a player that runs strikes and somehow gets picked off by
an add from across the map in ONE SHOT. It makes me wonder, how did
Destiny 2 go from a game I loved to something that I'm sick of? I - a
player who started in Destiny 2 at Forsaken - have progressed from a
decent level player to a terrible one; it's as though my playtime has
not mattered.
The best character in the game is already dead. The lore is scattered
in weird places that are so disconnected to a point that most people
don't realize the how much lore is in the Destiny universe. And as a
writer, it bugs me to no end that one of the most interesting pieces
of lore was given to us by Saint-14 in the Corridors of Time event
which will never be experienced by new players. There isn't even a
recap video that they can go and watch to see what happened.
I will briefly talk about the mostly useless character stats too. I
used to stack resilience, but no matter how much resilience I had, I
would get one shot by trash mobs. It's like hunter shields don't
matter. And let's also remember that we are no longer invulnerable to
attacks for the two seconds we can dodge. Am I just doing hunters
wrong? Do I have to maintain only one spec to effectively play this
game? ARGH!
What the heck happened?
Final
Thoughts
There are so many other things I could talk about but the sum of this
whole post is: this season has been the worst ever. Even the PvP
players have been really annoyed with the game as of late and I can't
really blame them.
I've stuck with Destiny 2 and with Bungie because I believe that the
game will improve, but right now my hopes aren't high. Sorry Bungie,
but that's just the way I feel. Today, I can't love the game like
normal because I haven't really felt like I've been able to achieve
anything. And I'll be surprised if I manage to max out the bunkers
before the end of the season...
Until next time peeps.
Article by: Susan N.