You chat to people in the lounge to discus which activity will be done and who will be the leader - (s)he goes to a departure gate - presses [] or the xbox equivalent to pick a destination from the navigator - the gate opens and two other people can enter with him and board one of those large transport planes that we see docking with the tower. The transport takes this newly formed team to the destination.

I wonder if stunt is doing Destiny?

I'm thinking more of an expansion of the Journey experience, rather than a contraction of the WoW experience. That's OK with me.

I like the way you put that.

Yeah, that's definitely a problem, but it's one we need to solve at a higher level.

I'd say it's one we should strive to solve at every level.

I hear you. I'm just not convinced that ‘no communication except between existing friends, pointing and waving’ is an acceptable outcome for a game that's ostensibly social like Destiny. I'd rather there be a more permissive system, then consequences for antisocial behaviour.

I think it can be.

Go back again to what Bungie called Destiny: a "shared world" shooter. It's not really about socialization as such. It's about making your gameplay feel like a part of something larger.

I'm thinking more of an expansion of the Journey experience, rather than a contraction of the WoW experience. That's OK with me.

Heck no. The reason the Tower is a tolerable and relatively peaceful place is that the game's built-in emotes are the only communication possible with non party members. What those people are actually thinking as they point, dance, bow and jump around is best left unheard.

Have you played any other MMOs? There's so much more richness and fun that can arise in shared (non-combat) social spaces like cities than just emotes. Give people the tools and they'll surprise you.

Not much. Eve Online for a few months.

That said, Destiny really isn't an RPG, it's a shooter. It has a different fanbase that are looking for different things.

I'd sort of like it if Bungie went all in and made an RPG, but it's clear Destiny is not that. That's fine, but it is first and foremost a shooter, which means it is very likely its audience is going to be fans of shooters, first and foremost-- what we've seen in Halo, Gears, and CoD. For me, that means that the change of having a thoughtful exchange really goes down when voice is allowed among users who don't already know each other.

That might be a sad and elitist thought, but that's been my experience so far in those games, and was NOT in Destiny-- because those options do not yet exist.

What about a lounge/bar/public space that is part of the tower, but is a "proximity chat zone." For example, you walk into the Last City Pub (or whatever) and proximity chat kicks on allowing you to assemble a fire team of strangers. That way, any sort of obnoxious player is minimized to one area and not the entire tower. If you don't like proximity chat, steer clear of that zone.

It does occur to me however that for a game which is primarily co-operative, the default communication black-out seems misplaced. It's generally in competitive games that the worst behaviour of gamers is exhibited, and it's not hard to see why: if somebody beats you, then some players might feel compelled to lash out verbally. But in a game where you most need more communication in a co-operative environment, I'm not certain that players would be regularly abusive. Players in MMOs can be offensive, but generally speaking having free text-based chat is more positive than negative, after all.

This is true. Running into obnoxious players in ME3 multiplayer, for example, is extremely rare. Practically non-existent, I'd say (as an aside, I have a feeling this relative lack of douchery is part of the reason I hear way more female voices in ME3 than I do in say, a Halo multiplayer lobby).

I'm still not sure I'm sold on proximity voice for Destiny. ME3 has no competitive multiplayer at all, so the players who focus on that exclusively aren't present for the most part. Destiny does have competitive multiplayer though, and it's not super hard to move between the modes. Inevitably there's going to be some cross-over.

We’ve seen the feedback, and there’s quite a bit of ongoing discussion happening around this right now. I don’t have a definitive decision, but I can say that the team wanted to err on the side of promoting and fostering positive communications between strangers in the world, and knew that friends were going to find simple and effective ways to enable voice chat with friends through the Fireteam audio channel, and platform chat. We hear you, though. Please keep sounding off with feedback. We’re just getting started!

From the Q&A JDQuackers linked here.

1. I'd like even if it was something like our guardians saying hello for each proper wave [a proper wave being the non-spammable appearance it makes in the history of emotes text panel]
I'd like the Tower to feel busier with real people, like an MMO hub honestly.
Similarly, I want their to be some on tower minigames you can play with people, e.g. chess [except be 'FUTURE CHESS'] kind of like Playstation Home.

2. Agreed on both A & B counts, little to add.
For C, the fov.. I wish this could be improved by launch or after.
I doubt there's even a possibility of it, which is a shame.

Hopefully the fully 100% confirmed PC Destiny Third Strike: Alpha Arcade edition coming in 6 months allows us the regular suite of graphics options.

I understand why Bungie has gone the direction of less chat interaction due to online jerks and such, but a lot of players enjoy chat despite these jerks. Why can't they give players the option to choose rather than force something only a segment of the population enjoys, it would be so easy. Of course, I say this with no regard to technical limitations or resource sacrifices required for these options, but limited chat just seems like a step backward in terms of video game innovation.

I never thought that games of the future would not feature options that seemed standard 4 years ago. (I say this in regards to lack of full party chat in multiplayer modes)

I dont have an 11 month, but I work daft hours and house share, so while I'm in the voice chat camp (at least in matchmade fireteams. Maybe not in the wilds, and definitely not in the tower), more context-sensitive stuff would be nice.

On a side note, being able to run all my audio through my controller and headphones without trailing cables at 3am is a massive bonus to the PS4 compared to the PS360. Is that an X1 option too? That needs to be standard across the board I think.

That's pretty sweet. I have a pair of tritons, but to be honest, they are pretty goddamn terrible. Lousy sound quality, poor build quality. I'd rather hook a pair of Grados into my conttroller and be on my way.

Unless Im totally wrong and it was just a one-time bug, or maybe I did it wrong. I didnt try it a second time, caise it was such a pain the first time round. If anyone experienced different do let me know.

No, that's exactly how it worked ... really not a great user experience. This is why I tried to join fireteams while I was still in orbit. Doing it after being on the surface already was annoying.

Yeah, first time it happened I thought something had gone wrong.

I was stood literally right next to a guy in the Skywatch, and he invited me to a Fireteam. Except despite being right next to him, pointing, dancing and killing with him, it didnt just open up a chat channel. Instead I flew off into Orbit (so I could sign some official Fireteam paperwork?), and dropped back down into Old Russia. In a completely different part of the map, so I had to trek all the way back to him.

That is not a seamless cooperative experience.

Exactly what happened to me. It's not good.

So when you join them it has to load you into a Fireteam proper, same as with Guardians you run into in the Wilds.

Unless Im totally wrong and it was just a one-time bug, or maybe I did it wrong. I didnt try it a second time, caise it was such a pain the first time round. If anyone experienced different do let me know.