Bungie’s Ray of Light
Halo series developer Bungie’s venture into the realm of roleplaying games, Destiny, was my very first PlayStation 4 game, and I had an okay time with it, despite not having a full grasp of its mechanics, having been a tad too proud to play the game without the assistance of the internet. I would eventually move on from the game, although as has been the case with many videogame developers, they released several expansions and new storylines, ultimately assembling them into one neat package in the form of Destiny: The Collection, which its creators obviously intended for cooperative play.
The anthology occurs in a time when mankind has ventured into and colonized space up to the asteroid belt beyond Mars, with several different kinds of aliens wreaking havoc, and Guardians keeping peace in the inner region of the solar system. The narrative pretty much boldly goes where most science-fiction plots have gone before, although there is some decent mythos, and side missions decently contribute to the storyline. A databank summarizing the various plot points, however, would have very much been welcome, and given the unskippable voiced cutscene dialogue, the story somewhat feels forced down the player’s throat. All in all, the narrative never reaches excellence.
That leaves the gameplay to shoulder the burden, and Destiny in this department does well in many respects, being a first-person shooter and RPG hybrid, where the player creates a Guardian of one of three main classes, each with subclasses they gradually level throughout the game alongside their standard experience level of up to forty. Guardians can equip various gear and up to three different types of firearms, with all also leveling gradually, players able to enhance them through currency and items exclusive to certain planetary locales. Special consumable items, of which players will receive plenty once they reach the level ceiling of forty, can more quickly empower equipment.
In addition to first-person shooter combat against enemies, the player’s Guardian can also choose from several subclasses that each have special grenade-tossing and melee abilities, each of which requires a recovery time after use. Each subclass also has a powerful ability that takes longer to charge, although shooting and killing enemies aids recovery time, such as the Stormcaller Warlock’s lightning ability that allows them to electrocute foes with powerful bolts for a few seconds before going back into standard gameplay mode. Players gradually unlock new subclass abilities, although the game is somewhat vague in how exactly they accomplish this.
In the three social areas of the collection, players can identify equipment that enemies occasionally drop, take up bounties that provide rewards such as new equipment and experience, and purchase new gear, although gear tends to have an eventual cap depending upon how far the player has advanced the game. In space, the player can visit many locations within the inner solar system to undertake missions, of which there are several times such as “strikes” where they can collaborate with other gamers (although since the game is several years old, good luck in finding other people to play with), and where Guardians can resurrect one another as long as at least one is standing.
Players eventually reach a port in a mission where respawning is restricted, in which case if they die against the enemy (which can happen very easily, regardless of a Guardian’s level and equipment), they must restart at the last checkpoint, which can account for sizeable repetition in terms of gameplay if the player’s Guardian is the only one participating in a mission. Another interesting multiplayer feature is that Guardians can have battles royale against one another in a competitive system known as the Crucible. Again, however, finding others still playing the game can be a challenge in itself.
The game mechanics have plenty going for them, especially if the player has PlayStation Plus and is playing with other Guardians, although membership in Sony’s service is necessary to get the most out of the game, with many missions locked without it. Furthermore, a minimap instead of a radar would have been nice in showing enemy positions (although the radar ironically shows dots symbolizing other Guardians, with glowing red pie slices and a circular center indicating the relative locations of foes), and along with the inability to pause, even when playing alone, the gameplay doesn’t quite reach excellence.
The aforementioned lack of a pause feature is what hurts the game’s control the most, and is most unaccommodating to players who may receive unpredictable interruptions such as the need to relieve themselves or important phone calls. There are also significant loading and wait times when getting back into the game and before the various types of missions, with Crucible matches in particular having a long waiting period that ultimately fails to load a match after several minutes of inaction. There is also a total absence of in-game maps, with no clock showing total playtime, although the relative structure of the game is straightforward. Regardless, interaction could have been much better.
Destiny has some decent music at times, with good instrumentation, although there aren’t a whole lot of memorable tracks, as seems the case with most Western RPGs, and many points lack musical accompaniment. The main salvation of the sound aspect comes in the form of flawless sound effects and excellent voice acting, although some players might find themselves at times listening to other music while playing. Regardless, the aural aspect scarcely hurts the game.
One area where the game shines the most is its visual presentation, which makes excellent use of the PlayStation 4’s graphical capabilities in terms of realism for both the character models and their respective environments that have great viewing distance, with enemies also containing some nice designs and a noticeable dearth of reskins characteristic of Japanese RPGs. The combat effects are also nice, although texturing can sometimes appear blurry and pixilated when seen up close, and the camera can adversely affect gameplay. Regardless, the graphics help the game far more than hurt.
Finally, the collection has limitless lasting appeal, given the infinite optional story missions and plenty of PlayStation Trophies (of which I acquired around a third) and ability to create different Guardians with whom to play the game, although that fewer gamers are playing the game than when it first released can render the supplementary content irrelevant at times.
In summation, Destiny: The Collection does have some remarkable aspects such as its fusion of first-person shooter and roleplaying game elements alongside cooperative play, nice narrative mythos, good sound, gorgeous visuals, and endless lasting appeal, although it does have serious issues of which players need to be aware before purchase and play such as the potential repetitive nature, long loading and wait times, the lack of a pause feature, the derivative plot, and the lack of a memorable soundtrack. That those who purchase the game, especially if they have PlayStation Plus membership, will get the biggest bang out of their gaming bucks, is its main draw, but it certainly isn’t bucket list-worthy.
This review is based on a playthrough of over sixty hours of a copy purchased by the reviewer.
The Good:
+Decent fusion of FPS and RPG elements.
+Nice mythos.
+Good sound.
+Gorgeous visuals.
+Endless lasting appeal.
The Bad:
-Can be repetitive.
-Long loading and wait times.
-No pausing.
-Story goes where other sci-fi plots have gone before.
-Little memorable music.
The Bottom Line:
A decent time sink.
Score Breakdown:
Platform: PlayStation 4
Game Mechanics: 6.5/10
Controls: 3.0/10
Story: 4.0/10
Music/Sound: 7.5/10
Graphics: 8.0/10
Lasting Appeal: 9.0/10
Difficulty: Inconsistent
Playing Time: Infinite
Overall: 6.5/10
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