On the other hand, it was a choice to enter a competitive game. Given how Destiny strongly encourages you to play with strangers (through means that we don't fully understand yet), I think I get the decision to leave voice chat off by default.

I've been thinking about what my first playthrough will be like, and I'm thinking I'm going to keep an open mind, and perhaps join other players, even though that isn't how I've traditionally liked to play Bungie games the first time. At that point I really care about immersion. I suspect Bungie is trying to balance two things, the immersion and the spontaneity of co-op, without the dubstep, abusive language, and whatever else you might get with live mikes.

- Other things mentioned: possibility of weapon power scaling to make competitive multiplayer fair, in game (storyline based?) events that will strongly encourage players to look beyond multiplayer, and that Destiny will have a faster competitive multiplayer time to kill than Halo did (booo!)

I get that it's really satisfying to have quick combat resolution. I just have always appreciated the long form battles that Halo encouraged. You could reasonably get around the map knowing that they could just ping you, giving you the opportunity to catch your breath between points.

It allowed for great teamwork where you call out that you pinged someone twice as they were running towards a mate across the map and they'd know to get the jump on them. It also forced you to have an "opening move" whether that was a bounced grenade, or some pot shots as you closed the distance.

I'm encouraged that he said that good players can still get away sometimes. Remains to be seen how fast they made it.

Yes. This concerned me. I'm always in favor of a good scrap versus a blitzkrieg win. I'm hoping he's indicating that a combination of weapon/grenade/ability is what will allow for these quick wins, and not triple-tap kills ala H:CE. The sprinting and sliding already seem to give off quite a bit of the CoD flavor. When he said the combat is significantly quicker than Halo, my heart fell a little.

~m

Oh there's definitely some substance to this theory. Direct competition between the players must bring out the... whatever-it-is in preteens and dudebros that fuels screaming and racist rants. Or, possibly those people just don't play co-op games in the first place. Either way, I've figured out which sort of game I'd rather be playing.

Yup. I also credit the divide between gamers with actual taste versus the more casual types that will largely surf the games zeitgeist. Iron Brigade (and arguably Mass Effect 3) are a little off the beaten path. I think there's a direct correlation there with respect to how mainstream a game is versus quality of ingame communication among the player base.

~m

I think the people expecting it to be halo will get mad when they find out it's not halo. I can't wait until people start sending 343 letters on how disappointed they are Master Chief wasn't in Destiny at all. Worst Halo game ever.

WHY CAN'T I EMBED

sucks for the people that are expecting a spiritual successor to halo, tho.

Why? They can just go play Halo 4

MunkyOoooooooooo

How SPACEMAGIC and such fits in, I'm not sure yet.

When a single person in the team is unaware of some place's call-out, a mark over whatever it is you're intending to convey is a lot simpler, faster and more accurate way of telling him what you want.

You are correct. Portal's 'ping' feature is indeed useful. I was thinking of gestures or stock voice clips.

Also, league of legends uses the ping system extensively.

I think the point is, these systems convey a different kind of information than verbal systems, and the complement more than replace. Non verbal systems are great for pointing out specific points, and grabbing attention, and asking for help. They are pretty lousy at high level strategy communications though.

And I don't necessarily disagree with you guys in a traditional competitive multiplayer setting, but talking about in general, especially when playing the story, having some guy run into the area cursing or yelling for no good reason can really jar you out of the experience. And since it is supposed to be a cohesive world even between cooperative and competitive I understand and agree with their decision to make it opt in instead of opt out.

Somewhat off topic, I am more curious how easy it'll be to get a group of friends playing a competitive match together. Is it going to be easy to gather X number of friends and play a friends vs. friends match? From the past games I expect it to be, but Destiny is such a different beast than Halo that I'm not sure what they're planning.

I think the point is, these systems convey a different kind of information than verbal systems, and the complement more than replace. Non verbal systems are great for pointing out specific points, and grabbing attention, and asking for help. They are pretty lousy at high level strategy communications though.

I'd like to wait until we see what the non-verbal communication options are before I pass judgment. I have made a few friends on XBL, but very few.

Nobody ever uses those seriously. It's simpler and easier to just say what you want into a mic.

Portal 2 and all Battlefield games since Bad Company 2 they are used extensively.

However, I have met enough decent and well-intentioned randoms to know that it's unfair to cast them all as hate spewing cro-magnon men, good randoms are out there. Even though the majority of randoms are exactly like you described, I feel Destiny's voice chat system for competitive multiplayer creates an unnecessary obstacle to meeting the good people online.

I'd like to wait until we see what the non-verbal communication options are before I pass judgment. I have made a few friends on XBL, but very few.

Nobody ever uses those seriously. It's simpler and easier to just say what you want into a mic.

Granted, not the best sample ever, but, is there something to it?