10 Lessons Bungie Should Learn From Destiny 2s Season Of The Splicer – Forbes

Destiny 2

We have just a month left in Season of the Splicer in Destiny 2, and while at least one more story beat is to come, the bulk of the season is definitely over. As such, I thought it was time to reflect a bit and offer feedback about what I thought worked and didnt in this season. I definitely think its in the upper end of Destiny 2 seasons overall, but still, always room to make things better.

So, here are my points as I go through this past season in my mind.

1. Six Person Activities Need Six Peoples Worth of Enemies

I actually like Overrides quite a bit, but while yes, this is answering the communitys desire for six person activities, it falls a bit short because it quite simply doesnt feel like it needs six people in any capacity. Unlike Battlegrounds, which jammed in a zillion enemies for just a three person activity, Override constantly feels like it doesnt have enough enemies spawning for six people to deal with, often resulting in less frenetic fighting and more running around trying to find things that arent dead. Keep up the density stuff we saw in Season of the Chosen.

2. We Still Need Better Umbral Management

While I have enjoyed the focused Umbral system, and I thought that this one was better than the Chosen hammer charge one, its very clear that even with reduced Umbral drop rates, continuing to jam them into the same slot with Primes and Bright engrams is clumsy, and when thats full, you cant even pick up many legendaries or exotics. There has to be a less clunky way to do this.

Destiny 2

3. Make Sure Reissued Weapons Are Not Being Hamstrung

I will say up front I think Bungie did a great job with the new Override weapons and bringing back most of the VoG weapons, and the new perks and rolls on most of those are great. Hell, I even think a lot of the reprised FWC weapons are fantastic. But the exception here is the reissuing of a dozen moon and Dreaming City weapons which we dont just have to re-earn now, but the past god rolls we have no longer even exist for many of the weapons, and were replaced with much worse rolls, even if they now had new perks. This makes me concerns about potential reissues of beloved weapons, like if Sundial or Black Armory weapons return but without the perks that made people like them in the first place. Id just be careful continuing to do this, as I dont want Wellspring and Adrenaline Junkie replacing Rampage and Demolitionist on everything going forward.

Destiny 2

4. This Is The Right Path For Storytelling

A combination of in-game lore, dialogue featuring multiple characters, cutscenes and in-game conversations has made both this and Chosen some of the best seasons in terms of storytelling and delivery weve seen. How the story is being told is finally as good as both the content of the story being told and the lore supporting it. More of this.

5. Prevent The API From Spoiling Lore

I understand that datamines and leaks are one thing, but Bungie does need to do something on its end that prevents the API from uploading an entire lore book thats meant to be uncovered week to week from appearing all at once on sites like Ishtar. That results in significant story spoilers that really should be preventable, as its not even anything being mined, it just pops into existence and you have to choose not to read it.

Osiris

6. Iron Banner Remains 5,000 Miles Behind Every Other Activity

I dont know why Iron Banner is such a low priority for Bungie, but we are currently in no ETA mode on when changes are coming to it, and it remains the one place where it is literally impossible to target farm gear, and you can turn in thousands of tokens for zero drops of a specific weapon. Its getting old, and I maintain that Iron Banner should be prioritized even over Trials at this point, as more people play it.

7. We Gotta Figure Out Stasis Weapons

I know Bungie is going to have Stasis be a full element type in the game at some point, but the first two Stasis exotics are two of the worst in the game, Salvations Grip, which may actually be the most useless exotic in Destiny history, and now Cryothesia, the worst-feeling sidearm in the game and not worth its occasional freezes. Something has to change here and I know Bungie is afraid of breaking PvP, but this current design philosophy for Stasis weapons is not working.

Destiny 2

8. The Artifact Needs Updating

Ive written articles, Ive filmed videos, but let me say again that the Artifact system needs quality of life adjustments, namely that it should either costs less or nothing to reset it, or that we should simply be able to unlock all nodes over time, as the current system is highly discouraging build diversity and experimentation. The mods themselves are interesting and fun, the system they are trapped inside is not.

9. Updated Vault of Glass Is Good, And We Want More

I think the grand experiment of bringing Vault of Glass back as a standalone raid worked in the end. They updated it in a way that didnt make the raid a cakewalk, yet still felt true to the original, and I think the end result of this is that yes, players certainly want to see other old raids return like Kings Fall or Wrath of the Machine, even if theyre coming back with no impact on the story. The activity and gear alone is worth it.

Destiny 2

10. Master Mode Needs Adjustment

The idea of bringing Hard Mode back to raids is a good one, but rotating a single weapon tied to a single challenge a week seems weird, as does the idea that you feel the need to grind an absurd amount of XP for artifact power to better your chances. This needs some fine tuning, that seems pretty clear.

Bonus: The Transmog Grind is Bad

How could I forget this? Just reference the whole article I wrote about this last week.

Those are my ten picks for now, I may have more to come later, and feel free to tell me your own

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10 Lessons Bungie Should Learn From Destiny 2s Season Of The Splicer - Forbes