The entirety of the problem with Destiny’s design comes from two factors - the seamless drop in drop out co-op, and the investment system.

It seems Bungie wanted two things the make Destiny special: public events and journey style co-op. This necessitated creating the levels in a certain way. You need to design areas in which players would frequently run into each other on. If the levels were like Halo, long and linear, then there’d never be a spot where you’d run into someone else since everybody would be playing from beginning to end, then moving on to the next one. Bungie seems to have designed the spaces to ensure players meet - they made a few large exploreable wide open type areas, and the missions and patrol mode frequently have players going over the same locations repeatedly.

So while enabling the “shared world” aspects of Destiny, it’s a severe detriment to the actual missions and to the world as a whole. In terms of world building, it just makes the game feel smaller since all this stuff is happening in the same space. Rather than do what Halo did and have unique areas for each mission, all the missions have to happen in the common areas. If you look at The Dark within, you make your way from the cosmodrome landing point to the inside of the skywatch and destroy the moon wizard. Then, you do the Warmind, and you start in the exact same place as the Dark Within, and you trace the exact same path! You make it to the same room in skywatch, you just go farther. With so much repetition of space, everything feels smaller.

Bungie would have been much better served if there were 12 Reach sized levels, each designed completely for story encounters, and each a unique space. This way you could not only go to Old Russia, Chicago, Mumbai, Venus, Mars, and the moon, but to Mercury, Io, Europa, the Asteroid Belt, Phobos, Titan, etc. Same total amount of geometry, but make it more dense in terms of player engagement. So much of the space in Destiny is wasted because you are just speeding across with your sparrow. So much of the space in Destiny is wasted because it’s wide open designed to facilitate Journey style co-op. So much of Destiny’s space is wasted because it has to fit to many missions, which is why there is no variety other than bringing your ghost to a location and defending, instead of scripting encounters and designing spaces specifically around unique encounters. So while in terms of actual geometry it is huge, it not only feels smaller, but is less engaging (and makes the story feel smaller too).

So while designing a more typical fps campaign would have solved the issue of mission repetition, you would have to give up on Journey co-op and public events. Would that be worth it? The answer is a resounding yes. I feel like both of these things are merely novelties. Public events are a bonus, but ultimately just a minute or two of fun. If you get an eliminate the target one, everybody skips it because those are terrible. Running across other guardians is alright, but because there is little way to communicate it ends up functionally being no different than if they were AI bots. So all the concessions that had to made were not worth the tradeoff, since the hyped up “shared world” elements do not add much to the game, and the part that’s fun (the co-op) is just online co-op that Halo 3 and many games have had since. The loudest complaints about Destiny are that the social aspect is severely lacking, so those elements didn't even do what they were envisioned to do.

Likewise because of the investment system, Bungie needed a larger number of missions. If they only had 10 big ones, then daily mission bonuses would start repeating pretty quickly. People are more likely to want to repeat something short for gear bonuses than something long.

This right here is why Destiny is lacking, and why reviews are bad. These two selling points of the game not only are not that great or revolutionary in and of themselves, but their inclusion requires compromises to the level design, and in FPS games level design is hugely important. I feel like in most MMO games, level design is tangental because it’s just a place to fight, but in FPS it’s the space you are navigating and using against your enemies. So while the shooting mechanics in Destiny are great, there ends up being a lack of creative and compelling level design which hurts the game substantially.

Bungie can’t back out on it either. This is how Destiny has been build, and it’s got to continue that way for the next ten years. This is why you don’t bank on one thing like that. They lose the ability to change around what works and doesn’t since they can’t abandon the core of their game. It’s unfortunate. The only way things might change is if nobody buys the DLC and votes with our wallets. If the DLC is just mission packs and no new level areas, this is what should be done.

The other problem with the design is the way PvP and PvE are intertwined. This is fine if you like both, but if you like only one you are in trouble. If you only like PvP, you are more or less forced to play PvE since that’s the easiest way to get good guns. Even though the damage is normalized, gun skills and things like stability / rate of fire are not. Unlock outlaw on your gun, and you will reload much faster after a firefight than someone who doesn’t have a gun with that. If you have a beast of an autorifle with high impact and stability, you will school fools with bad ones. What you bring in matters a huge deal, so whether you like it or not you must engage in acquiring weapons.

I feel like Destiny PvP should have worked like Halo 4, with selectable loadouts for everybody, and have Iron Banner be where you bring in your PvE guns. I like both so it doesn’t impact me as much, but there are times you are fighting with people who have shitty guns and just have no chance against yours.

No voice in matchmaking is shameful. If I go into a strike playlist, I should be able to hear my other two teammates. If I go into the crucible, I should be able to hear my team. If I invite someone in the world to my fireteam, they should join without having to drop back to orbit and reload. Players whom you do run across in the world should not phase out of existence when you cross a loading barrier to a new area.

Lastly, the investment system sucks big time.

I think your wrong about the game design.

I think Destiny is exactly what it was designed to be.

It is a game, in every sense of the word.

It is very literally, a game first, story second. (Which is a shock to a lot of us Bungie fans this time, I must admit).

I could make a point here about "If you took the story out, it's a rock solid game" but I don't have to, because Bunige already did! :P

It is, by design, made to string you along, to keep you wanting more, dangling that carrot of whatever strikes your fancy, in front of you.

It never really forces you to do anything, yet everyone keeps trudging along, willingly.

This isn't a shot (I promise), but Destiny is probably *the* best time-waster that I've ever played. The replay value is astronomical.

Those of you who lament that there is "nothing left to do" frankly should have paced yourselves.

Destiny is a marathon, not a sprint.

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Yes, Destiny has many, many flaws and of the reviews I've read I don't see any reason to disagree with scores of 6\10 or 7\10. In fact, I think it's fantastic that we have a AAA game that didn't get an obligatory 10/10 because it's a huge studio and publisher. That leads me to believe the scores are honest.

A 6 or 7 out of 10 doesn't mean it's a bad game, or that it's a failure. It means that it is average. And to me, that's what Destiny feels like. New, but average.

We've become desensitized to that scoring system, just like product reviews. If something is an 8/10 or less, it must be shit. If a product is 3.5 starts out of 5 it's shit.

We're all jaded.

Destiny wasn't going to be the second coming of Christ or something.

Those of you who got hit by they hype train and now have sour tastes in your mouths, deserve it. Had you tempered your expectations and not let your minds run wild, not chased every pre-launch tidbit or invested yourselves in a franchise that hand't even launched yet FFS, maybe you'd be having a better time. Your tears taste delicious to me. I set the bar low. I went in with no expectations, and because of that, I'm having a great time with friends. Yeah, there are things that are total bullshit about Destiny that should not be. But there is potential here.

Not everything has to be a goddamn %110 hit all the time.

+ I applaud Bungie for trying something new. I await the string of copy-cat games we'll see in the future.

+ I think we can only go 'up' from here

- I hate the rule of 3. Everything in this universe is guided by the rule of 3.

- Destiny is the least social, "social" game I've ever played. Rule of 3.

+ Co-op experiences with FRIENDS are great!

- Co-op experiences in explore mode are underwhelming.Sometimes it works out. When it does, it still feels like a big "Meh" though.

+ Boss fights require team work!They are intense!

- Boss fights are just giant versions of regular enemies. How... original.

- The story is lacking. All the good bits aren't even in the fricking game.

- Clearly, basic story and plot elements are being withheld from the player because of future DLC and sequels, which is not how this should work, AT ALL.

- Companion app is required to know anything. Didn't anyone learn anything from Halo 4?

- I smell micro transactions in the future. Need 100 spin metals? $2 please!

- MP is pretty much required to get cool shit to use in story. It is not separate from the campaign experience. It should be. Again, did we learn nothing from Halo 4?

+ Gameplay is top notch. Satisfying.

+ Enemies are interesting.

- Spawning is still terrible and immersion breaking.

+ Exploring is fun. Hunting for things is fun. Finding them is even better.

- Quests are repetitive and masquerade as interactive. After you do one of each type, you see that they are the same thing with different variables depending on what planet you are on:

• Kill [number] of [enemy type] because [faction] needs [widget] for [reasons]
  
• Go to [location] and literally stand there because ["survey"] for [reasons]
  
• Kill specific "high level" [enemy type] because [opportunity] for [reasons]
  
• Take your ghost and "scan" [object] because [reasons]
  
• Kill [number] of [enemy type] because they have high presence in [area]
  
• Did I miss anything?
  

There are many other points and analogies people have made that are spot on. (Good foundation, empty house blah blah blah).

Lastly, the investment system sucks big time.

And yet, you still play.

You're all talk Mr. Miller.

Your threads and topics are full of criticism and hard analysis, but you seem to be just as hooked on the Destiny drug as much as everyone else here. You are still in the investment system. You are the investment system.

That.

Now that, is interesting.

I bet you can quit smoking anytime you want, you just don't feel like it :P

In my defense, I'm someone who didn't pay too much attention to all the tidbits. I tempered my expectations. The one thing I expected it to be was "Bungie-Quality." Deep, rewarding story and gameplay. I've not finished the game yet and I'm kind of already bored. So I don't fit the "mold" of people you say are tired of the game, and yet, here I am. Tired of the game. I want to love it, but I barely have time to play it, and the time I spend playing it doesn't excite me all that much. :/

In my defense, I'm someone who didn't pay too much attention to all the tidbits. I tempered my expectations. The one thing I expected it to be was "Bungie-Quality." Deep, rewarding story and gameplay. I've not finished the game yet and I'm kind of already bored. So I don't fit the "mold" of people you say are tired of the game, and yet, here I am. Tired of the game. I want to love it, but I barely have time to play it, and the time I spend playing it doesn't excite me all that much. :/

There is no reason to defend yourself, because you just listed everything I didn't call out.

I called out the people who got hit by the hype train. You indicate you did not.

There is a difference between knowing what Destiny is and say, keeping up with the news to know what edition you might want to buy

vs

keeping up with the news, following their twitter, facebook, weekly updates, scouring concept art for the slightest 'clue' to things that may or may not exist.

Being excited about a game releasing and being a zealot about it are very different things.Hope that makes sense.

Yes, Destiny has many, many flaws and of the reviews I've read I don't see any reason to disagree with scores of 6\10 or 7\10. In fact, I think it's fantastic that we have a AAA game that didn't get an obligatory 10/10 because it's a huge studio and publisher. That leads me to believe the scores are honest.

A 6 or 7 out of 10 doesn't mean it's a bad game, or that it's a failure. It means that it is average. And to me, that's what Destiny feels like. New, but average.

We've become desensitized to that scoring system, just like product reviews. If something is an 8/10 or less, it must be shit. If a product is 3.5 starts out of 5 it's shit.

We're all jaded.

We don't think like that because we're jaded. We think like that because that's how reviewers actually tend to rate games. They operate similar to letter grades in schools; 7/10 isn't "average," it's bordering on failure.

And regardless of what the scale means in any kind of absolute sense, a 75 metascore is quite low for a Bungie primary title. Which merits some discussion regardless of what you think the score means relative to games in general.

And yet, you still play.

You're all talk Mr. Miller.

How many times do I have to explain: I ground it out so I could do the raid come tuesday. That is supposed to be super cool, and as of now there's no way to do it unless you are 26. It was miserable, and just letting people do it straight away would have been a bazillion times better. If the raid is dumb I will be pissed off and just play PvP from now on.

I'm there, so now I don't have to grind or engage with the investment system. PvP is still fun.

Eh, I have to get back to the quality time I'm having playing Destiny PvE with my friends. I've even been playing with friends whom I haven't played with in a long time.

I'm waiting for Claude to review your review before I invest any more time in it.