The thing that bothers me the most about this interview... (Destiny)

by CruelLEGACEY , Toronto, Tuesday, June 23, 2015, 18:18 (3248 days ago) @ Miguel Chavez

The specific items that people are getting worked up about are trivial. No doubt about it. But as I'm sure you already know, it's not really about the specific items. People don't like feeling excluded, and they don't like feeling manipulated. I personally don't feel either of those things, but some clearly do and I can understand why.

I'm glad you don't! And like you, I completely understand why.

Here's where I'm taking it a step further. I'm using my smarts to *reject* the false feeling of being 'manipulated' or 'exploited' or 'deceived' - these are all pure constructs of my *own* creation. There is zero proof that Bungie is actually doing ANY of the above.

Just to clarify, it never occurred to me that Bungie would be looking for ways to manipulate or exclude their fans... when it comes to pricing, exclusivity deals, etc, Activision is the one with the final say (if I understand their relationship correctly). I believe Activision is 100% capable of attempting to manipulate the fan base. But please understand, I don't say that with any anger or resentment. These are the kind of "promotions" any major publisher would implement. It happens in business all the time. I switched banks a few years ago, and my new bank gave me an iPod as a "thank you". My wife, who had been banking with them for years, got nothing. It sucks. But businesses are constantly finding ways to "buy" new customers. At the end of the day, I don't think it's worth getting worked up about. We're the ones who choose to buy in to it or not.

TL;DR, We ARE being manipulated (not by Bungie, I don't think), but it's our fault if we fall for it.

This is a new thing - this rejecting thing - I think for many folks here and elsewhere to embrace. For too long we have had an environment where *any* misstep is met with derision, and anger, and the pitchforks come out. ALL I'm asking for is a reasonable attempt to curb those initial impulses. To sit back and wonder - wait, why am I getting so upset? Does my anger, and jumping on the bandwagon with fellow upset gamers, actually help? What is actually going on here?

Great point.

As others have pointed out, the bonus in-game items included with the new legendary edition are not the kinds of exclusive content that will get newcomers excited. People who don't already play Destiny are not likely to care about new dance moves, exotic class items, or the physical goodies in the box. The people who will care are the ones who already own the game.

I think this is supposition. I think they are following an established precedent of game-of-the-year collections. And I can easily envision folks that were on the fence, or thought Destiny was a crappy game due to the bad press it initially got, that they would love a package where they got lots of new goodies and loot to entice them to purchase the game.

Yes, I suppose it is complete supposition. But it makes sense logically, at least to me. If I've never played Destiny before, what is going to make me but this collection? All that content is a great bang for the buck. The ability to jump into Destiny as it is now, with all the refinements, is also a big motivator. Exclusive dance moves? A strange coin replica? Exotic class items? I don't even know what this stuff means. The only people who do are the hardcore fans who already bought the game (again, all supposition. This is just how it works out in my brain).

I'm about as dispassionate about this as I could be, but something about this still feels off.

All that said, I do firmly believe that it is too early to freak out about anything. Deej has said that he'll address this issue in the next update. I think we need to wait until we have the whole picture before we decide how we feel.

I'm with you! What I would add though is that *now* I'm hearing folks say "Oh look, Bungie is doing damage control and they're going to announce stuff to placate us all that are upset!" And this again feels like a misstep in seeing cause-and-effect. When TTK was announced, it was said that there was MORE TO COME.

Again, I can understand thinking "oh, that sucks" what I can't understand is the "let's turn this up to 11" outrage.

I don't want to be associated with a bunch of needy whiners as the core audience. It's embarrassing.

- M

For what it's worth, I do think the discussion here is generally a lot more level headed than most other places, even if you feel the specific complaints are trivial. Every now and then I get flashbacks to my Waypoint moderator days (shudders)... we have it GOOD here :)

I get it, but I still feel there is a miasma here that needs addressing.

Let me also take this moment to speak directly to you CL, a few days past you started a discussion that got me rolling in comments with others, and things got all heated and there was back and forth, babies were made, babies were aborted, etc. etc. And Kermit near the end said something like "it's too bad all this had to happen on CL's OP, he's the nicest of guys and doesn't deserve that." I had meant to write, no Kermit, this is EXACTLY why CL's a perfect candidate for these discussions - because a) you're a bonafide Canadian, with your nice laid back attitude - I feel no matter how barbed the words are, they just slide right off of you, and so that means all that anger BS can be set aside and we can discuss the meat of the matter and b) you are a good representative of those people I rail against - but in the sense that you are *just* on the periphery - you are a true addict to the game, many of your posts just make me shake my head, but it's exactly because you are the anti-Cody with the surface-level self-generating loathing against the ills against 'gamer nirvana' and fake persona crap, that actually makes you accessible and my wanting to engage with you.

Thanks for taking the time to write this. Just a few thoughts:

The reason I don't generally get worked up about stuff on the forums is that slowly over the years, I've formed relationships of some kind with many DBO regulars. Either through podcasting, twitter & Facebook, real life meet ups at PAX, or even just through playing Destiny and other games together. We all come here to talk about this game, share our ideas, likes & dislikes. Sometimes arguments happen, and that's cool! It's great! The world would be a very boring place if we all agreed all the time :) But I don't get worked up because I always tell myself that nobody here is going out of their way to piss people off or hurt anyone's feelings. I truly believe that. I can argue about Destiny with Cody or Cyber or Speedracer or a dozen other great people here on these forums, then a few hours hours later we're all playing Destiny together, having a laugh, and poking each other about the silly stuff we all said.

I think the reason things often go overboard is that there are so many regulars here at DBO, and we can't all have those kinds of relationships with each other. When you're only concept of another human being is based on their posts in a forum, it is difficult to give them the benefit of the doubt, to trust that they didn't mean for something to be hurtful even though it might possibly come across that way. It's ok for me to write a post that makes you think I'm crazy (as long as I'm not being a total jerk or hurting anyone)... We're still going to jump into the crucible together, chat on Facebook, see each other at PAX every few years, and have a great time. I don't need to agree with you on everything to like you and respect you.

You represent, to me, the insidiousness of how this game has sucked many of us fine people down the rabbit-hole. And with many paragraphs of discourse, excel spreadsheets, and talking over tea and biscuits, the addiction buried underneath is still there.. lurking and convincing some of us that it's perfectly reasonable to talk about moving 3 characters through nightfalls and weeklies, and weighing the minutiae of which gun perk gives us that .005% advantage (listen, Thorn is the answer - it will always be the answer) and therefore every other gun is a joke, worthy of sharding, etc.

In other words, you are my best chance of a breakthrough with the others. So for that I thank you, and hope to see you at PAX in a few months.

- M

This is where I don't think we quite see eye to eye. I LOVE to talk about the nitty-gritty stuff like specifics of weapon balance and other game design minutia. Partially because I love Destiny, but also because I find this stuff generally fascinating. I love learning about the process of making games, and a certain amount of reverse-engineering goes right along with that. We know designers at Bungie have to think about this stuff, so I like to try and figure it out as well.

I don't think these kinds of discussions are necessarily a sign of addiction (I haven't reached phase 1 yet ;p), nor do I see anything wrong with having them... as long as people just stay cool about stuff and don't get carried away against each other. I've gotten the impression from your posts in the past that you find this kind of stuff silly (please correct me if I'm wrong), and that's cool too. It IS silly. But some of us like it all the same, so I don't think it is something that needs to be curbed.