Arguably the most dangerous force alive, The Hive are a deadly ancient race hell bent on war. While their appearance seems more of a feral and radical race, they’re actually quite organized, with hierarchy of ranks and stature. With their current residence in the Solar System being on the Moon, with constant plans to advance on Earth, these beings originally came from the gas giant of Fundament in a galaxy far, far away. They are the most advanced race known to anyone, tapping into the Ascendant Realm which houses their gods, and constantly researching alternate dimensions. They also have the most connections with other races, most in particular with the Vex and the Darkness. They have been known to use The Darkness in their favor, creating The Taken in the process, which are just enemies who are possessed by the mysterious Dark force.
The biggest improvement was the most recent update fixing a massive number of woes that have been plaguing Destiny 2 since day one and adding certain improvements where needed. Sniper rifles are useful now; it’s been six months and a weapon choice has been entirely useless up to this point. For anyone who played Destiny 2 money guide, jumping back in now will bring you right back to when Icebreaker was popping Vex heads off from a comfy distance. This isn’t just a rant about snipers being bad and boo-hoo, this is just one major example of one of the many pitfalls Destiny 2 has been filling in. The best part is all weapon choices seem to have gotten a nice healthy balance. Every gun feels good to use and is reminding me more of old play in Destiny with the improvement of Destiny 2. Classes have also seen dramatic improvements; not once did I find myself using the Sunbreaker until this most recent patch.
Bungie did turn a corner with the laying out of the plan moving forward for Destiny 2, which was a nice gesture, but showing us the content road ahead isn’t what earns trust back ; it’s the work put into Destiny 2. Guardians have been putting in the work of playing the game. Many couldn’t keep up with the grind, but those that stayed see that brighter tomorrow that every NPC is always gabbing about to whichever Guardian will listen.
It was the third week which meant the Gauntlet room was up first; a room I hadn’t encountered yet. The mechanics were explained and I felt good with the ease at which this seemed like it could be done. The Gauntlet room only echoed what the world-firsters had stated; those seeking to guide others through the raid were going to have a hell of a time. A certain party member who also was a seeker wasn’t talking much throughout the two hours spent trying to get coordination down. They kept wandering off, not listening and generally being unhelpful. It ended with them dropping out of the fireteam never to return even with party invites thrown their way. It was time to call it quits. Defeated the third seeker and myself thanked the Clan that had been the guides for their time and parted ways.
A new set of class specific abilities are being added as well. These abilities stay the same no matter which subclass you choose, and are generally meant to help your teammates. Titans can plant down a shield, Warlocks can cast an area of healing and Hunters get a dodge roll similar to the one that was part of the Nightstalker subclass. The first two are activated by holding down the circle or B button and the Hunter's roll is done by double tapping it. They are all a nice addition to each class' set of abilities and are super tactical. They were all incredibly useful in both PvE and PvP.
It's been less than a year since Destiny 2’s launch, with highs and lows, but mostly lows. Players may have fallen off Destiny 2 faster than a Sparrow racing its way through…oh wait (I miss Sparrow Racing). It's this exact feeling, however, that Bungie is battering its player base with. For those who have come from Destiny and stuck around -- through gritted teeth -- and those who are newcomers to the IP, it's been like climbing a vertical mountain that's starting to invert itself on the way up. Slowly, Bungie has course corrected and it's filling in much of the gaps that should have been filled in to begin with. When an entire weapon selection is useless for much of the first year, something might be wrong, especially because it leads to one of the worst grievances of all -- not having fun.
While not able to pull a fireteam together that initial first day, something I’ve managed to do with all other raids in the past, I was content to watch others attempt this beast of a raid. It was exciting to see the first fireteam complete it in just six hours and reassuring. Then talks began to crop up and not the good kind. Here were the best of the best saying that it would take everything in a fireteam's power to pull off this raid. And why? Apparently because it was the most demanding raid out of all Destiny raids. They aren’t wrong.
[JH]: We have lots of contextualized moments in target locations where there are moments that, when you go back and play with your returning character, you get a series of lines that will acknowledge the experiences you’ve had. When we tackle the story, one of the challenges we had was about how serialized we wanted to be. We want to bring new fans into this franchise, but in doing so we need to make it accessible. So, the experience of a new player in this sequence is to introduce the Taken as if you’d never heard of them before. We wanted to make sure a new player got who they were without being bogged down with too much lore. For a returning player, however, you’re going to see it’s pretty different.
