Even if that would be totally predictable and cliché.

Considering there's only one safe place left on Earth, wouldn't it make sense that it's kind of empty everywhere else? Why would non-Guardians be out in the wilderness when the Traveler's protection is only limited to the City?

There aren't even many enemies around. They all spawn in the same place, if you walk ten feet away they'll respawn right back where you just killed them, and they just about never stray from those areas. And again, if they do stray and die, they'll just respawn right back there. ODST was obnoxiously empty, give or take the random enemies you'd come across. In a way this feels worse because, while there are enemies, they just stand around and do nothing until they see you and get killed.

And the Tower is the home of the Guardians, so again it would make sense that there's not tons of non-Guardians to interact with.

Dancing/pointing/waving only works for so long with random Guardians who you have no ability to chat with due to voice chat restrictions. In Mass Effect, my Normandy felt more alive, social, and organic with nothing but NPCs than the Tower does in every way, shape, and form.

Now if we ever get to go into the City below the Traveler, and it feels just as empty, that would be a problem.

Agreed.

Oh the hilarious times I have.

BUT that being said I will throw my 2 cents in. So far I only have experiences playing as a hunter. I am sure I will have many more opinions once I try as a warlock as well, Titan doesn't interest me in the least, it's definitely not my gameplay style.

Environment- You will be hard pressed to find me not liking any of the environment offered here, I am a post apocalypse junkie so this is right up my alley. Halo was a little to sterile for me to feel comfortable in. I love the dirtiness of this and the decay. Wasteland environments are my favorite so it's hard for me not to constantly want to be outside in the Mothyard.

The Tower- I dislike the tower. It makes me feel weird. I never know what I am supposed to be doing there or if I am doing the right thing. I don't understand why players can't interact with each other, it doesn't make sense to have tons of players that you can see wandering about but not having anything else to do with them. I felt bad snapping at Rev the first night when he wandered in and asked what I was doing and my immediate reaction was "I don't freaking know what I am supposed to be doing!!!"

I am hoping that once the actual game releases we find out that the tower is used for so much more. A lot of the characters in there are interesting and I want to know more about them but right now it seems like all the tower is good to for me is buying extra special ammo, and turning in my engrams not a whole lot else. I agree with Paddy that an area for barter and trade would be nice as well as you could link up with other members in a group.

The Story and Characters- The only thing I can really say is that I hope I get to see much much much more during the real game, I think it was a mistake not giving beta players more to go on story wise. So far I have not really cared about the story, just interested in shooting things. And I can play any game and shoot things, I want the Destiny story and characters to really get to you and hook you. So far not looking good.

The Gameplay- Being so new to this I liked it, I did have some problems in the beginning trying to figure out what the hell I was supposed to be doing and where it was. Once I figured a bit of that out I

Arsenal- I like the guns but there seems to be an absolute excess of them. Like Rev said, same guns with different upgrades. I do love being able to throw knives though and I prefer the Hunter melee in this, being able to stabbity stab things is super cool rather than just punch them in the face. Gets me really pumped up for the upgrades once the bladedancer is available. I like the golden gun too.

Crucible- I dislike it, not a fan of getting so turned around I can't figure out where shots are coming from. My game play needs a lot of work, so much of my frustration may just be that I am still learning but I felt really outclassed and really overwhelmed in PVP. Much like Kapowaz I think I will only play so long as I can stand getting my ass handed to me each round.

Right now I am enjoying shooting and stabbing things and hopping about in the wastelands and getting in big firefights......but I want more than that. I hope Destiny provides it.

The music is very, very good. When I first started hearing things, my immediate thought was this is the third disc of the Halo Reach soundtrack.

Wait, there's a version with a third disc? Where do you get that from? Mine has only 20 tracks listed equivalent to the two disc version on Amazon (I think I bought it from sumthingelse.com).

If I'm not mistaken, he's saying it feels so much like Halo Reach's soundtrack that is could be the non-existent third disc to the Halo Reach soundtrack.

Ironically, the first half of PoA feels far more alive and vibrant than all of Destiny. It had crew members running around, and characters to get to know. Most of it was scripted, but it felt like the world was more populated. Destiny feels very empty, even in the tower.

Considering there's only one safe place left on Earth, wouldn't it make sense that it's kind of empty everywhere else? Why would non-Guardians be out in the wilderness when the Traveler's protection is only limited to the City?

And the Tower is the home of the Guardians, so again it would make sense that there's not tons of non-Guardians to interact with.

Now if we ever get to go into the City below the Traveler, and it feels just as empty, that would be a problem.

I wonder if my difference in expectations for the beta have caused me to be more optimistic. I've heard and read from Bungie folks that this is a true beta test and not a demo. I've even been told that in private conversation during early access. I went in expecting to not see a lot of the little things the full game might offer. I expected it to be rough around the edges and unbalanced. I also knew that the build we are playing is quite a bit older than what they've got internally. I never expected this to be a good representation of the released game, but maybe just a glimpse of its potential. The potential I see is what has me excited.

The atmosphere is also ruined by fuck-twats that bounce around the tower and run circle around you or sprint to every place. So immersion breaking!

Looks like there's no way around it then. I will sprint from place to place because I want the busy work out of the way as quickly as possible. I'm sorry but I'm not wasting my time by slow walking.

I think what needs to be done is allow all shopping and bounty selection to be done from a menu in orbit, but still have the tower available to travel to if you really want.

It's one of those things where the idea is nice, but in practice just gets in the way.

In MMOs, cities are a place for everyone to convene, regardless of why. They're a place to socialise, to trade, to plan your next activity and a place to show off your hard-earned trinkets. Unfortunately Bungie has made a couple of mistakes here:

1. You can't be social in the tower; you may not even see your friends unless they're in the same fire team, but there's no way of chatting idly, so it's a lifeless place. The reason people dance is because it's one of the very few ways you can express yourself (unless waving counts).
2. You can't organise your next activity from The Tower, you have to go orbit to do this, and so I imagine a lot of people spend their downtime in a part of the game that has literally zero social interaction.
3. There is no trade (although that could be a good thing, it's hard to say what impact it might have if trade between players were possible).

The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that Bungie completely messed up by including Orbit as a staging area for gameplay. It should have all been from The Tower. I suspect the reason is they spent ages building art assets for the ships (including timed exclusives and presumably real-money purchased vanity ships later on) and weren't willing to cut it.

I just had to realize that I was subconsciously trying to play it like Halo I have to wonder if that's part of why some folks aren't getting it too.

I agree with this. I haven't played much Crucible -- competitive multiplayer isn't my cuppa tea as much these days -- but I know the few games I've played I've approached like Halo, only to get my head handed to me over and over. The last couple of games I played I tried correcting for this and found myself doing a tiny bit better. I'll likely invest more time in Crucible after launch, but for now, Explore has been my drug.

This is pretty much it. I was destroyed in the Alpha, but quickly during the beta it 'clicked'.

I really wouldn't base my story expectations on the beta. Imagine setting your expectations of the entire Halo franchise based on just the first half of the Pillar of Autumn.

Ironically, the first half of PoA feels far more alive and vibrant than all of Destiny. It had crew members running around, and characters to get to know. Most of it was scripted, but it felt like the world was more populated. Destiny feels very empty, even in the tower.

I just had to realize that I was subconsciously trying to play it like Halo I have to wonder if that's part of why some folks aren't getting it too.

I agree with this. I haven't played much Crucible -- competitive multiplayer isn't my cuppa tea as much these days -- but I know the few games I've played I've approached like Halo, only to get my head handed to me over and over. The last couple of games I played I tried correcting for this and found myself doing a tiny bit better. I'll likely invest more time in Crucible after launch, but for now, Explore has been my drug.

I absolutely love the PvE. Even in this small area of the beta I'm having hours and hours worth of enjoyment. I've been treating explore just like a big firefight game. Plus I enjoy just experimenting with the weapons and trying to do stunts on my sparrow.

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I've enjoyed the PvP. There's some balancing that needs to be done, but it's a beta test. If you went in expecting it to be polished you were setting yourself up to be disappointed. I actually like the feel of almost all the weapons. They might feel the same at first, but when you start paying attention to the little nuances between them they begin to feel way different from each other. There's a bigger learning curve to the PvP than I think a lot of people expected. It took me a while for it to start making sense, but when it did it became a lot of fun. I just had to realize that I was subconsciously trying to play it like Halo I have to wonder if that's part of why some folks aren't getting it too.

The music is very, very good. When I first started hearing things, my immediate thought was this is the third disc of the Halo Reach soundtrack.

Wait, there's a version with a third disc? Where do you get that from? Mine has only 20 tracks listed equivalent to the two disc version on Amazon (I think I bought it from sumthingelse.com).

The atmosphere is also ruined by fuck-twats that bounce around the tower and run circle around you or sprint to every place. So immersion breaking!

Looks like there's no way around it then. I will sprint from place to place because I want the busy work out of the way as quickly as possible. I'm sorry but I'm not wasting my time by slow walking.

I think what needs to be done is allow all shopping and bounty selection to be done from a menu in orbit, but still have the tower available to travel to if you really want.

It's one of those things where the idea is nice, but in practice just gets in the way.

I find I disagree about combat, at least in PvE settings. The Hive and Fallen don't look massively different (bipedal humanoids) but they're very distinct in behaviour and the settings they appear in. The green glowing eyes of the knights and acolytes are very distinctive at distance, whereas the Fallen tend to have blue lights on their helmets. I'd suggest you give the Strike another go, if you can; I found it one of the most exhilarating experiences in the game, a real thrill. The idea of teaming up with friends to do this, voice chat enabled, is really compelling. Maybe you've been unlucky with your weapon drops, but if you take the time to level one or two different uncommon weapons of the same type you'll find there's quite a lot of variation even between the same class of gun. It's a great touch that it actually gives you an opportunity to make interesting choices about weapons based on your own play style and preferences, rather than there being a 'right' choice based on numbers alone.

PvP is another matter. The combat in the original Halo was a breath of fresh air compared to the lightning reflexes needed in the Quakes, Unreal Tournaments and Counter-Strikes of the day; by slowing the pace down somewhat it made it a little more accessible and I found I could be pretty competitive. Since then the series has gotten progressively faster-paced and close-ranged (the days of finding a nice sniper spot in Blood Gulch are but a fond memory). The modern FPS multiplayer game seems to be about realism and guns that kill in two or three rounds.

Destiny embraces this philosophy wholeheartedly and (as Schooly D pointed out) this results in a very fast-paced game where getting the jump on somebody is almost the most crucial factor in a gunfight, and one that feels like being kicked repeatedly in the teeth for players like myself who yearn for a bit less speed and a bit more strategy. In years gone by I may not have been the most deadly marksman but I was pretty good at capturing flags and squatting inside the hill to win games for my team. With Destiny it feels like you need to be good at killing first and foremost, and if you're good at the rest so much the better. This probably means I'll only play it as much as I can stomach having my ass handed to me, but maybe with a bigger player base the normal distribution of player skill will make it more approachable. We'll have to wait for September to find that out!

This is a good observation and one I hadn't been able to put my finger on. I'm fine with my companion ghost. If he's a robot, the dry wit is nice.

There are no other supporting characters yet.

I felt the same way in the Beta, but I definitely think though that supporting characters are heavily hinted it, both in the trailers and in the beta. When you find your ship in the first mission there is a Hunter watching you take off, I suspect this is the same character you see in the Reef(?) in one of the trailers that tells you to trust no one. Then of course there is the Crow which has shown up in two different trailers in vastly different places. I think by the end of the game we're going to have a broad array of supporting characters, I just think the beta does a bad job getting that point across (which makes a certain amount of sense with it being the first 5 missions).

Thats fair. I guess my complaint then becomes the beta is doing a bad job about hinting to me what else it has up its sleeve--I obviously know I'll be traveling to other planets et al, but I really didn't get any indication my encounters with other characters would be any more meaningful than the "I would like to show you a menu" of the Tower. I just assumed the person you see as you lift off was just a cinematic version of the other internet people who run around in your world.

The atmosphere is also ruined by fuck-twats that bounce around the tower and run circle around you or sprint to every place. So immersion breaking! I deliberately slow walk in the tower and by doing that I find that I get to appreciate the details more, I notice more, and it feels great.I wish it could last longer with out dance parties around every corner.

Why the hell is that even in the game!?

Add another one to the DBO Bomont No Dancing Brigade. The tower needs more attractions and something like a trading post or crafter's market would do the trick. For this limited scope and area to jam, what else is there to do but slam?