June 5th 2024 - Finality
As I write this, I have taken about a week off from work. It’s Summer now, temperatures are warm but the sky remains overcast. I don’t mind, I like overcast days. I’m eating breakfast, going to go put in some laundry, and then dig into the newest expansion for Destiny 2, The Final Shape, the apparent to the saga of Light vs. Dark that’s been going for 7+ years.
I got into Destiny 1 a little late. I remember watching the reveal at some E3 or other with friends but not thinking much of it. Later on while taking a very short-lived job at a Gamestop I managed to snag a copy on discount for PS4. This was around the time of the Taken King expansion? And while I can’t remember too much of my time with it I was pretty taken in by it all. It felt good, the world interested me, and I liked getting cool new guns (including the rare exotic!) Didn't step into the PvP Crucible much but Destiny PvP has never been for me. Kind of keen to try out Concord though, which straight up looks like Destiny PvP spun out into its own game.
Fast-foward to the release of Destiny 2. I'm pretty sure I was there at launch for that one? Not too far off from it. I had skipped the last stop-gap expansion for D1, Rise of Iron. I was thrown into a city besieged, a god caged, and the best tutorial for a new player this game has probably ever had! It was fun! I didn't like that shotguns had been relegated to the heavy weapons slot, you moved slower in general, a bunch of things... but I enjoyed my time with it! I got to the end and was greeted by a galaxy bathed in light, included some pretty ominous black pyramid ships.
And it's kind of been a blur from there. It's been a 'default' game I can log into and shoot some guys whenever I can't think of anything else to do. But the game has changed and evolved in so many ways since then. Systems are gone, replaced by systems that have since been replaced by other systems. The game went to PC where I have been playing it since at a nice 60+ FPS. Huge swaths content have been shoved into the 'Destiny Content Vault' to ostensibly be taken back out someday. I met my favorite greasy space uncle, The Drifter. We've been through a Trump presidency, most of a Biden presidency. Bungie went independent from Activision and then got bought out by Sony. I did my first raid with a PUG (ironically it was Vault of Glass, a D1 raid taken out of the vault). I played through Halo 1 for the first time and had a blast. Bungie laid off a ton of people. I moved out of my parent's place and got my own apartment. Bungie announced Marathon, an extraction shooter set in the world of their old FPS series... Marathon. Apparently it might be a hero shooter now? Who knows. This game has been going for a while. I'm not sure if it should have.
I don't know how much i'll keep playing Destiny 2 after this expansion and the first 'episode,' which is what they're calling seasons now. I definitely don't play it as much as I used to! But I still generally like the game for all its faults. I don't mind being the Destiny guy in multiple friend groups. It's kinda nice to be a guy people can come to for knowledge and the current read on it. I'm ready for the 'end' of it much in the same way I was ready to see the end of Kingdom Hearts when 3 came out. I'd like to get back to Final Fantasy XIV after this, I was a bit of the way through Shadowbringers and have Endwalker queued up right afterwards. But inevitably, I will still check back in on Destiny whether it's a new expansion or potentially even a Destiny 3. ⚪
