Destiny 2 Preview (PS4)

Introduction

The Tower, the home of the last remnants of humanity falls in this sequel to 2014's critically acclaimed Destiny. Destiny 2 is developed by Bungie, previously known for their work on the Halo series. Destiny 2 as mentioned previously will deal with the consequences of a Cabal, the main enemy force featured in this game, siege on the last safe haven for humanity. Like with Halo this game is a first person shooter but it also consists of mainly gameplay akin to MMORPG's

Destiny 2 is available for pre-order on our ESHOP, PlayStation 4, Battle.Net, and Amazon.

Story

Always the jokester Kayde-6 walks into the control room of the Tower joking about the lack of satellites, suddenly Cabal ships appear and all out war begins. That is the beginning of Destiny 2. Compared to the intro to Destiny which revives the main character and then offers a lot of in game dialogue this game has already taken a step up.

The main story of the full game will try to deal with the aftermath of the Cabal invading the Tower and taking over the Traveler. One of the things the beta offers is the mysterious disappearance of the Speaker who represents the slumbering Traveler. The beta also offers an interesting way to reset any characters being carried over from the first game by disabling the Traveler who is the cause of the Guardians powers. Within the ending cutscene of the beta, which only features the first mission of the full game, the Traveler is taken over by the Cabal and the Guardian is drained of his/her light and drops to the ground powerless. This allows the development team to retrain your guardian while offering an excuse for different powers and having a reset enacted onto your character.

Gameplay

The beta offers players a chance to try out each different type of guns which consists of sidearms, hand cannons, assault rifles, fusion rifles, and much more types of weapons. Each type of weapon also consists of different rarities of weapons, though the beta only offers Legendary and Exotic. This system is a returning feature from Destiny. Exotic weapons have special effects that only applies to each one like making enemies burst into a solar ray as one of the guns in the beta does. For those not familiar with this system Exotic weapons are the hardest type to receive in the game and at least in the first game were mostly random drops from raid bosses or quests. Even if you receive an Exotic weapon that you may not have wanted the game makes it worth your while to keep it as it will deal the most damage of weapon rarities.

Destiny 2 also offers each class two different power sets which are available from the start of the beta. The Hunter class is one of three classes, is more focused on speed and quick burst damage. The Golden Gun which is a manifested revolver offering 6 power packed shots, a special returning from the first game. The other special for the Hunter is the Arcstrider which is a mix of the blade dancer special from the first game and something new. The Arcstrider wields a staff of electricity which also increases movement speed while held and allows you to attack in quick rapid strikes. Each strike also shoots a little wave of electricity out which can deal damage to enemies.

The Titan class is the second class which is usually the team player of the group offering tanky effects as one of the specials for the class is the sentinel ability which allows you to take a shield out and it expands using void energy stopping you from receiving damage. The other special is that of the Striker which invokes the user in energy allowing them to ground pounds, charges, and lunges dealing area of effect damage to each enemy nearby.

The Warlock class is the last class offered within Destiny 2 and it is focused on outlasting enemies by stacking armor while also doing massive damage. The Voidwalker is the first special of the Warlock which allows them to throw a ball that explodes on contact dealing insane damage to all affected. The second special for the Warlocks is that of the Dawnblade which generates a sword of fire and also allows them to fly through the air raining fireballs down onto the unsuspecting enemies below them.

The beta for Destiny 2 is mainly focused on trying out its multiplayer matchmaking which games go fast and generally are pretty fun. There is a lack of any sort of cheating or trolling, but then again this is a beat and the only thing separating anyone from each other is class and player skill so the multiplayer is at the best it's going to get. The firefights within the story are also very fulfilling as it isn't impossible to play alone but at the same time, there is still a challenge. If this aspect is kept in the full game is another thing to be seen. One of my actual favorite things that the beta offers and I hope the main game continues is the fact that you are not fighting alone. Although it is only one segment there is a part where one of the supervisors fights with you and this added a feeling of teamwork with ai that the first game was lacking. Now, this isn't to say that there should be ai teammates automatically in your fireteam but the inclusion of other story characters fighting alongside you also removes the feeling of the "chosen one" aspect the first game had where everything that happened to stop the darkness was because of you alone.

One of the only worries that the gameplay causes is that it will feel to stale where the first game has been out for 3 years. The other huge issue is if this beta is treated like the first game. The beta for the original had all of these stunning features in the first level and then there were no more and a lot of the gunplay was removed from the final game, like enemies trying to dodge your attacks.

Graphics & Sound

Destiny 2 - A Long Day Trailer (Official)

Destiny 2 features one somewhat lacking feature, the graphics. Don't get me wrong, the graphics are impressive, but they aren't much of an improvement from the first game. One of the issues is the amount of money and time spent on the first game and releasing both on the same generation system offers an issue. Maybe with the sequel, if it is still released on this generation of console's either a new engine is created to run the game or the engine is redone and polished to offer better graphics for console gameplay. Hopefully, Bungie goes back through the game and repolishes everything to give it that fresh game shine. This isn't to say that the game may not look better or worse on the Xbox One or the PC.

On that note, the sound is improved on so much that it makes the lack of graphical change unimportant. The sound of the guns firing in this game is so much more realistic that when you are in a firefight wearing a headset it feels so much more real than the original. Compared to other games of the generation this isn't as strong of an improvement but this game is a Sci-Fi vs something like Call of Duty which is a military shooter. The soundtrack does feel like it has the chance to be amazing and to convey emotion like never before but this beta doesn't do the best of job's showing off the soundtrack. The sound fits the game's pace and style which in reality is all that should matter to the fans and to the developer. They didn't strive to do something the game wasn't made to do.

Conclusion

Overall the beta for Destiny 2 shows so much improvement on the original game that anyone turned away from the series due to a lack of story or lack of impressive gameplay should return to try the game out. The beta also shows off the way's the developer is trying to improve on the theory of the original introducing new specials and new ways to play the game. For people who like this game they may want to try and turn their attention to something else within the MMORPG genre like Diablo or if the main thing enjoyed in the game is the multiplayer and firefights Overwatch, which is another critically acclaimed game, may be a better choice. The impression given by this preview of Destiny 2 bode very well reviews for the full game and many happy fans. I had some major issues with the original but this game is going to fit very nicely into my collection and with work done to its few issues may be able to contend for game of the year.

The ideas and opinions expressed in this are alley based on the author and do not reflect Keengamer or it's affiliated.