I think the newest 'become legend' add better captures what I'm looking forward to but is still not quite representing what I see in this game. The ad campaign has really failed to grab me

PS4 exclusives, all that random nonsense, whack DLC decisions; none of that has been enough to decide my console purchasing decision. I guess what I'm saying is, I've been liking what Bungie's been showing me. I like that they've been willing to show actual gameplay of their game even more than a year outside of launch, even if there hasn't been much. I enjoyed the Beta a lot, even with its many problems. I'm buying this game, period.

What it boils down to is that Bungie and Destiny actually have zero influence on my console purchase decision strictly because I know I'm getting this game no matter what. I may not be at a "new Halo (non-343)" level of excited, but I'm ready to pick this thing up and get going. Hell, I took off work for Destiny's launch.

It's a new experience, and good or bad, the one thing I was able to confirm solidly from the Beta is that it's fun. There's laughter. There are things to do. My friends and I can turn on the serious mode and play for keeps at any time, or turn it off and explore and chill. The Beta got stale because Old Russia is stale. The Moon was neat. I really want to play on Venus and Mars. I also can't wait to see what options are available to clans.

If in the end the game is a disappointment or boring or doesn't hold my attention, I'm hoping their expansions will keep it fresh. Or that they're quick to implement fixes to things that aren't working. I have high hopes, but I'm guarded. I was critical enough of a lot of things in the Beta to know what I'm getting into, and I'm okay with what I'm getting into. I'm thinking this will all be a fun and good time.

That said, I'm still much more excited for Destiny than I was for Halo CE. Since y'know... I didn't know till later that I'd be playing Halo for years. :)

Actually... excited might be the wrong word at the moment. I've mostly just been frustrated since the Beta that I can't just pop it in and play it whenever I want to.

I don't know how you know that.

Obviously it's impossible to know what the whole game is like, but a lot of people thought that the playspaces didn't really feel all that substantial and involved in the alpha and beta. Bungie was saying that each space was going to be like a whole Halo game, but in terms of how much it felt like there was to do, a lot of people though Old Russia was perhaps more like a Halo level, even if the raw scale was high and there was a fair amount of "stuff" and several missions.

Though even as raw scale goes, in that old E3 presentation, we were flat-out told that we could go explore the skybox at the opening of Old Russia if we wanted to. It's not hard to see how some people felt let down by the actual scale of the playspace.

Judging a game's quality by the space you can see or perhaps glitch into in a beta is a flawed metric.

It's a silly way to "judge a game's quality," but it's a plausible assessment of aspects of raw scale.

Have they really been that explicit? I honestly don't get the disappointment in the amount of content based on the beta or the number of planets or any of that.

Not explicit*, no, but I don't understand why people use that as an argument that expectations can't be expected to have been higher. They talked about and showed concept art for locations that ultimately didn't make it, right alongside talking and concept art for locations that did make it in. Whether or not they explicitly said "you can go to these places", they painted a larger picture.

*Aside from the thing about exploring those huge skyboxes. And possibly the thing about Saturn.

I'll grant the bit about "you can go there" at the reveal of Old Russia, but the beta still felt pretty massive to me. By the real estate metric I still think we will have reasons to be impressed rather than disappointed, but at the same time that's a limited measure by which to judge a game's over all quality.

I don't know how you know that.

Obviously it's impossible to know what the whole game is like, but a lot of people thought that the playspaces didn't really feel all that substantial and involved in the alpha and beta. Bungie was saying that each space was going to be like a whole Halo game, but in terms of how much it felt like there was to do, a lot of people though Old Russia was perhaps more like a Halo level, even if the raw scale was high and there was a fair amount of "stuff" and several missions.

Though even as raw scale goes, in that old E3 presentation, we were flat-out told that we could go explore the skybox at the opening of Old Russia if we wanted to. It's not hard to see how some people felt let down by the actual scale of the playspace.

Judging a game's quality by the space you can see or perhaps glitch into in a beta is a flawed metric.

It's a silly way to "judge a game's quality," but it's a plausible assessment of aspects of raw scale.

Have they really been that explicit? I honestly don't get the disappointment in the amount of content based on the beta or the number of planets or any of that.

Not explicit*, no, but I don't understand why people use that as an argument that expectations can't be expected to have been higher. They talked about and showed concept art for locations that ultimately didn't make it, right alongside talking and concept art for locations that did make it in. Whether or not they explicitly said "you can go to these places", they painted a larger picture.

*Aside from the thing about exploring those huge skyboxes. And possibly the thing about Saturn.

It looks fun, and the beta was a blast... But I just don't have much hype for this thing. I'm trying to figure out why. The new live action trailer did nothing for me. The game doesn't seem to live up to Bungie's promises in terms of story or scope. It just seems like a fun weekend time-waster that I'll get bored with after a couple months.

I'm excited. For a few reasons:

1. The beta was a blast. One of my small reservations about Destiny was the worry that it'd feel wrong. Aiming down the sight, faster movement. These strange vertical movement modes. I was a bit afraid it'd be Call of Warfare or something. But nope, it felt great. And I even liked the multiplayer after hating it for a day. So, the core gameplay and shooting and moving is as good as any Bungie game. Maybe even better. If you don't care about any of the rest, knowing that Destiny is fun moment to moment is a pretty good mark in its favor.

2. I think this really is the game Bungie has wanted to make for a long long time. Go back and watch Halo's original announcement on the stages of Macworld. Jason Jones is up there talking about how Halo will be this vast, connected, coop game that you'll play with your friends. Halo was great. I specifically bought two consoles for it. But it wasn't that original vision. Destiny is much closer. We all know they went independent again to make Destiny, but I think it's more than that. I think they went independent because they now had the tools and talent and technology to finally make the game they'd always wanted to make.

The closest we've seen to that from Bungie in the last decade is Halo 2. Halo 2 obviously had its problems, but it was also a wide ranging, story packed, graphically impressive space opera of a game that set the tone and direction of the Halo franchise from then on. If Destiny turns out to be another Halo 2, broken ending an all, I'd be super happy.

3. Despite the small amount of story we got in the beta, I think Destiny is going to be more story-y than Halo. Look at Halo 1. It had a simple but effective story, but what did we know at the end of it? Did we know the motivations of The Covenant as a whole or its individual races? No. Did we know ANYTHING about the UNSC or Humanity other than short intro in the manual telling how the Pillar of Autumn fled a military planet called Reach? No. Did we know anything about the Forerunner other than they built the Halos and killed both the Flood and themselves with them? No. It's almost shocking how little we knew at the end of the first game.

Now look at Destiny. Sticking with only in game sources I can tell you that:

- The Fallen are space pirates with a rigid and sometimes humiliating rank structure who scavenge technology and who worship strange spherical "machine gods" who sometimes feats or absorb or power up on their souls.
- The Hive are a combative race who have burrowed into our moon, who build temples to their heroes, and who have one hero in particular, Crota, who was said to have killed a thousand Guardians with his sword.
- Humanity was visited by an object called The Traveler, had a golden age of exploration and colonization, was never destroyed by something call The Darkness, and is now venturing back out seeking to explore and find the strength necessary to resist The Darkness a second time.

And that's before the game is even out. Halo is a great series, but try telling someone who hasn't played it that they need to read at least The Fall of Reach and Contact Harvest to have a real understanding of the good guys and bad guys and see what happens.

4. Not only is Destiny the game Bungie wanted to make, it's also whatever it wants to be. The merger of scifi and fantasy that Destiny is doing provides for a huge range of storytelling and gameplay opportunities. Space pirates, seemingly undead zombies, an unstoppable expansionist military force, time traveling robots, a returning ancient enemy, and possibly dragons are day one for Destiny, but there's no way it ends there. The possibilities are wide open.

A game that plays very well, will be supported for a long time, and seems to have huge story potential beneath the surface? By my favorite game developer who has not made a bad game in over a decade? How can I not be excited?

The game doesn't seem to be anywhere close to what Bungie is promising. My biggest problem is that they seem to be saying that large spaces = lots of content. In reality, that just means more time on a sparrow.

I made this mistake. Don't assume.

I was also trying to figure out why I'm not excited for this game. Here's what I've come up with so far:

The game doesn't seem to be anywhere close to what Bungie is promising. My biggest problem is that they seem to be saying that large spaces = lots of content. In reality, that just means more time on a sparrow.

I don't know how you know that.

Also, there are only four planets/moon at release. (As an aside: based on the $30-$35 price tag of the DLC, Bungie is conveying that they think the two planned expansions will add 50% more content to the game. This equates or two new locations but since we'll be paying for this DLC, the "price per location" still remains roughly the same as at release.)

And your point is?

I'm aware that the beta had some ares blocked out, but people glitched into places like King's Watch and BUNKR RAS 2. As far as I can tell, most/all of these closed areas were found during the beta. That worries me because Bungie has been advertising that we didn't get to see nearly all of Old Russia and that it's really much bigger. It seems to me, though, the parts we "didn't see" were not particularly large (in terms of content, not necessarily space). They seem to provide one mission each. The missions we did get didn't seem that long, so I'd expect the other ones to be of similarly short length.

What are they advertising? I'm not sure where this comes from except that they've said we've seen only a fraction of the game.

We also got a decent tour of the moon and, again, people were able to glitch into a few of the locked locations. There were some places on the moon that I don't think were accessed but if they are anything like the areas people were able to glitch into, then they won't add much more, either.

Judging a game's quality by the space you can see or perhaps glitch into in a beta is a flawed metric.

Bungie has stated that the moon is the smallest of the four locations, which is fine. I'm not saying that by going to two out of four locations we got to see half of the release-day universe in the beta -- but it does feel like we got to see ~35%. Obviously, I will be glad if I'm wrong about this, but it is a contributing factor to my lack of excitement.

It's weird because, at release, I think there will be about two months worth of non-contiguous, "fresh" playtime in this game, which is more than a lot of games I do get excited for. The problem is that Bungie is giving us the impression that it will be way more than that. This makes me question how much they're exaggerating (or down-right lying about) everything they say.

Have they really been that explicit? I honestly don't get the disappointment in the amount of content based on the beta or the number of planets or any of that.

I remember the promises and hype for Halo ODST and Reach; I was disappointed both times. Bungie's track record for its pre-release PR on its two most recent games makes me very suspicious of anything they say. I remember a time when Bungie was proud that they didn't say much at all about their games before release. This shows me that over time, there has been a deep, fundamental change in what defines and drives Bungie. I don't trust/believe the new Bungie nearly as much as the old Bungie.

Wow. I couldn't disagree more. I thought they had excellent pre-release PR for the last three Halo games (with the exception of the ODST Recon expansion pack misstep). I wasn't disappointed with any of those games. The big faux paus was in the lead-up to Halo 2, and that game remains my biggest disappointment from Bungie (and it's still a pretty amazing game).

And on an unrelated note, the fact that I'm not nearly as hyped as other people leads me to be even less hyped. This is sort of circular logic but I feel like I just don't "get" Destiny because I'm not as hyped about it as other people. Or maybe on the other hand, that other people don't "get" Destiny. Either way, this leads me to be even less excited for Destiny.

I don't like to use the term hyped because that seems to imply a negative, overblown expectation. The OP was about being excited, and I'm excited because Bungie has always delivered fun for the 20 years I've been playing their games, and non-Bungie people I know have played more of the game than the beta and they are excited. I have reservations about certain aspects, sure, but I'm reserving judgment until I play the final game.

Needless to say, I will not be getting Destiny until well after release, if at all.

It will be a shame if your early judgments prove to be premature, and you don't play for a while, but it's your call.

P.S. This post conveys my personal impressions/feelings. Because of this, I don't plan to do much defending of my position even though I realize a lot of people here will disagree with me (it's a fan site, after all).

Of course.

The game doesn't seem to be anywhere close to what Bungie is promising. My biggest problem is that they seem to be saying that large spaces = lots of content. In reality, that just means more time on a sparrow.

Also, there are only four planets/moon at release. (As an aside: based on the $30-$35 price tag of the DLC, Bungie is conveying that they think the two planned expansions will add 50% more content to the game. This equates or two new locations but since we'll be paying for this DLC, the "price per location" still remains roughly the same as at release.)

I'm aware that the beta had some ares blocked out, but people glitched into places like King's Watch and BUNKR RAS 2. As far as I can tell, most/all of these closed areas were found during the beta. That worries me because Bungie has been advertising that we didn't get to see nearly all of Old Russia and that it's really much bigger. It seems to me, though, the parts we "didn't see" were not particularly large (in terms of content, not necessarily space). They seem to provide one mission each. The missions we did get didn't seem that long, so I'd expect the other ones to be of similarly short length.

We also got a decent tour of the moon and, again, people were able to glitch into a few of the locked locations. There were some places on the moon that I don't think were accessed but if they are anything like the areas people were able to glitch into, then they won't add much more, either.

Bungie has stated that the moon is the smallest of the four locations, which is fine. I'm not saying that by going to two out of four locations we got to see half of the release-day universe in the beta -- but it does feel like we got to see ~35%. Obviously, I will be glad if I'm wrong about this, but it is a contributing factor to my lack of excitement.

It's weird because, at release, I think there will be about two months worth of non-contiguous, "fresh" playtime in this game, which is more than a lot of games I do get excited for. The problem is that Bungie is giving us the impression that it will be way more than that. This makes me question how much they're exaggerating (or down-right lying about) everything they say.

I remember the promises and hype for Halo ODST and Reach; I was disappointed both times. Bungie's track record for its pre-release PR on its two most recent games makes me very suspicious of anything they say. I remember a time when Bungie was proud that they didn't say much at all about their games before release. This shows me that over time, there has been a deep, fundamental change in what defines and drives Bungie. I don't trust/believe the new Bungie nearly as much as the old Bungie.

And on an unrelated note, the fact that I'm not nearly as hyped as other people leads me to be even less hyped. This is sort of circular logic but I feel like I just don't "get" Destiny because I'm not as hyped about it as other people. Or maybe on the other hand, that other people don't "get" Destiny. Either way, this leads me to be even less excited for Destiny.

Needless to say, I will not be getting Destiny until well after release, if at all.

P.S. This post conveys my personal impressions/feelings. Because of this, I don't plan to do much defending of my position even though I realize a lot of people here will disagree with me (it's a fan site, after all).

A Wizard kills a kitten

Think of all the moon kittens next time :p

Actually, I have it on good faith that the Wizard is killing catgirls. As such, I have no reason to abstain, and every reason to continue.

Think of all the moon kittens next time :p