Does Destiny need a "campaign"? (Destiny)

by CruelLEGACEY , Toronto, Saturday, October 21, 2017, 10:02 (2614 days ago) @ Ragashingo

I’ll also note that the Exo Stranger (Maya Sundaresh) and Chioma Esi (Maya’s wife) both have gotten new mentions and lore references in Destiny 2. For a character whose story is “done” they sure bring her up a lot. Now yes, it’s possible she never re-emerges from the fog of lore. Maybe they couldn’t get her voice actor again or they continue her story through Osiris. I’ll be happy if we get an actual conclusion to her story, lore based or not. But, what if she did come back as an in-game character? And gave a good explanation. How many of those complaints about her would vanish?

Take my feelings about the Exo Stranger and expand them to any hanging plot thread. How much will be quickly forgiven if a thread goes from hanging in a holding pattern to a spotlight thread?

I think that’s an important question, and ultimately it comes down to execution. “Bringing characters back” means more to me than just giving them another few lines in a cutscene. If the Prince makes another appearance, says a couple more mean things to our Guardian, then vanishes again... well that’s little more than fan service. And fan service is like lore; it’s good to have, but it doesn’t replace a compelling narrative with actual character development. I will say that there is great opportunity with the Prince, Mara, Eris, and The Stranger, among others. Their absence from the current plot leaves room to reintroduce them, reveal a course that they are on, have that course intersect with earth/the city/our guardian in an interesting way, and then deal with the fallout of that collision. I’d love to see Destiny’s expansions used to tell those kinds of stories. Smaller, character driven stories that don’t boil down to “OMG we gotta save the entire universe from yet another God/Emporor/Whatever”. Rise of Iron dipped a toe towards this approach, by bringing in the Iron Lords. Unfortunately, the story ended up being less about the ILs, and more about another “threat of the week”.