Problems with Destiny

by kidtsunami , Atlanta, GA, Sunday, June 16, 2013, 03:53 (3960 days ago) @ Reconcilliation

Problems with what I've seen so far:

• Gunplay looks uninspired and uninteresting, players were just shooting healthbars.

they seemed to be shooting heads making them pop, sliding into and slicing necks, powering up and one shotting, using grenade like magical abilities to crowd control

[*] Levels for players and enemies is a huge gamble and ripe for problems relating to difficulty

agreed, while the public events look great for having a few 20s rubbing shoulders with a 7 and a 3 while the whole of the enemy force could handle the disparate levels, I'm curious how the encounter IN the wall goes with a 20 running with a 3

[*] Cinematic events that leave questions about static-ness of the gameworld - for example the shot of a Fallen spacecraft jumping nearby which causes two towers to collapse. The next time you come through that area, do those towers stay collapsed, or are they upright again? If they stay collapsed, then what if you're not the first person through the area? What if you join your friends as they're going and the towers just collapsed and now that's permanently done on your profile and you never got the chance to see it?

I'm wondering if this will be a flag set for every guardian who witnessed that making it so you only getting matched into public areas with guardians who have had that flag set and the environment is in that new state.

this becomes an issue when you circumvent the matchmaking by joining a fire team with people who have different flags set, they may resolve this by having a master player who's flags are canonical for the whole fire team

[*] Unlockable leveled abilities implies grinding.

ugh, yeah, screw grinding

[*] Hollow level design, wide corridors, nothing to really interact with.

it's a bungie shooter, the things you interact with are co-op players and interesting enemies. The environments should lend themselves to that type of interaction.

[*] Mini-boss fights that aren't any more engaging than "shoot it a lot".

I'm thinking the difficulty level of the demo has really affected your perception of what they showed us. The spider tank had numerous states that it went in and out of demonstrating various forms of attack showing already a few strategies that I picked up from the demo. A coordinated fireteam would have to manage to stay out of it's main cannons focus while focus firing on specific legs to then applying their efforts against the core. As we learn more about the types of weapons and their effect on different elements of each monster (I imagine some weapons will be better against the armor on the legs and some will have a better effect on the core).

Oh and the Archon Slayer boss would have probably been much more interesting if Player 1 wasn't invincible.

[*] Speeders seemed pretty bleh. I couldn't really see myself caring at all for them.

they looked like an AWESOME form of transport. I saw how they physically interacted with each other and it looked like a lot of fun. Bungie always does a great job with the physics of their vehicles and they already have shown a glimpse of that in their demo.

Recommendations:
[*]Introduce interesting methods of killing various enemies. Halo had this in spades, so I was surprised to see it lacking so much. As an example: Hunters are mini boss fights when you encounter them, but they have certain behaviors and abilities that make them dangerous but counterable with the right strategy or weapons. Nothing like this was shown in the demo beyond shooting the legs on the spidertank and it's not even clear if that was necessary.

some of the later playthroughs showed some very creative ways for killing the enemies, especially loved the slide slice I saw in one of the demos

[*]Make the environment interactive! It's not just a matter of cover, it's a matter of interesting things to see and find, buttons that can be pushed to open up new avenues of attack or defense, loot that can be acquired, dangerous environmental hazards, books, video or audio recordings. STALKER did this really well with anomalies, mutants, humans, stashes of hidden loot, audiologs and related material on NPC's and scripted blowouts and other events. ODST did it to a lesser degree but still in the right direction. Even Halo 2 had dangerous environments with the train on Terminal. This is absolutely vital for an RPG-esque game. Make the players THINK.

scavenging isn't much a "THINK" thing. I'm all up for environments that are available for a player's analysis pre-battle that allow a thoughtful player to choose the best points of attack. I'm also for environments that move/can move that create a dynamic play space for players to explore/fight in.

scavenging though? boy was that one of the worst parts of bioshock infinite. I wasn't exploring the environment so much as vacuuming it.

[*]Lose the healthbars and introduce some other visible mechanics to indicate that an enemy is nearing death. Elites had this with their shields bursting and their battlecry animation before charging. Actually, thinking on it, most of the Covenant in Halo had such AI behaviors; clear indicators of imminent death are MUCH more immersive and interesting than healthbars!

yeah, I'm all for visible mechanics to indicate the enemy is nearing death. I believe though that some of the enemies are going to have such high amounts of HP to account for the number of guardians that may be firing on them that imminent death could be a very debatable concept. I've found it frustrating sometimes having popped an elite's shield and pumped a ton of bullets into them that I had no idea whether I almost had them or not. At the lower difficulties this was no worries as they'd keel over shortly after popping their shields.

I'd prefer there not to be health bars, but I think the wide variety of enemies and difficulties that Bungie is ambitiously going for requires them. I hope they're optional.

Other Comments:
[*]Competitive multiplayer needs to be more than a tacked on effort. It's what kept Halo alive, and in more ways than just 4 on 4 MLG team slayer: Hogball, Cat and Mouse, Infection/Zombies, Griffball, Forge. If Destiny lacks in this department, it will kill the game.

oh boy I can't wait to hear about what Bungie is going to bring to the table in this regard. I'm excited that they haven't said almost ANYTHING about it. I'm anticipating something clever from them.

[*]What I've seen so far really isn't selling me. I see potential, but it's unmet. The demo did a poor job of revealing anything interesting or solid about the game. It basically showed us what we already knew or expected. Which either means gameplay is still largely being worked (and so criticism has a good chance of changing things) or Bungie is being their usual obtuse selves about revealing anything about the game.

the demo did an AWESOME job about showing what is interesting about the game. We know that bungie can deliver on really interesting moment to moment gameplay. What we haven't seen from them or really almost anyone else, is how a shooter can provide you that awesome bungie experience while seamlessly allowing you to play with your close friends or randoms. They communicated VERY clearly to me the potential these "cross roads" will have.

Without revealing too much about their enemies that they are no doubt fleshing out and balancing, they were able to show us the core of what they're working on.

Here's to the future of shared shooters.