Playing Destiny regularly for the past ten years, through all its memorable highs and painful lows, has been a huge leap of faith for me and my fellow Guardians. This uneven saga didn’t always feel like it was leading somewhere worth following, but with Destiny 2: The Final Shape it seems our faith has finally been rewarded. After some extremely rocky server issues on launch day, followed by two days of non-stop gameplay, what I’ve seen so far has been overwhelmingly awesome. The campaign (lacking a proper finale right now) is one of the best in the history of the series, the new Prismatic subclasses are exactly the shock to the system that its sandbox needed, the new weapon set was literally a blast to mess around with, and the fearsome enemy faction Dread adds welcome variety and difficulty to the battlefield. There’s still a lot left for me, including the endgame raid I’ll be fighting this weekend and the conclusion of the story locked behind it – but as the end of this 10-year saga takes its final form, Destiny is more fun. than ever before and I can’t wait to see if it can stick the landing.
If you’re extremely late to the space opera party, The Final Shape is the latest (and quite possibly the biggest) expansion to developer Bungie’s ongoing, magic-infused multiplayer FPS. As an immortal guardian with a murderous bent, I’ve had the privilege of defending humanity from all sorts of alien threats over the years, from evil warlock insects to an extremely boring robot army, all while looting cool weapons and armor, unlocking sweet cosmic magic. abilities, leveling up and juggling so many currencies, menus and poorly explained RPG systems that your head might explode Arc of the Covenant style if you don’t have a friend to walk you through it. After seven years of expansions, patches, and seasonal updates, Destiny 2 has grown into one of the best and twelve worst games you’ll ever play, all wrapped up in a live service package unlike any other. That’s great; I hate that.
The Final Shape has the unenviable task of wrapping up the main story of good vs. evil that randomly takes place from the first Destiny. Although this story was mostly a veritable jambalaya of overused tropes, sci-fi gags, and lore so convoluted one player had to make a ten-hour YouTube video to explain it, brings the heat at times with some truly compelling characters and meaningful stories like 2022’s The Witch Queen. So far, The Final Shape seems to count among those rare cases of solid storytelling that finally focuses on the big bad that has been hinted at from the very beginning to settle the fate of the universe.
That arch-nemesis comes in the form of The Witness, and while I wasn’t blown away by the character’s opening reveal or the setting that took place over the last two years leading up to this finale, The Final Shape’s campaign packed with gritty cutscenes. which explains a lot ultimately sold me on this existential horror. I won’t go into details to spare you spoilers, but The Witness ended up being a much more interesting villain than I expected, the threat facing humanity finally feels real instead of some distant shadow we have a date with, and I’m excited that we’re finally getting some real answers to the questions we’ve had all these years.
That said, there are still plenty of points in The Final Shape where Destiny’s usually more sloppy storytelling continues in that tradition, such as in the story’s middle act, where it veers into some drama with the stoic and dedicated Commander Zavala, who suddenly (and only the the rarest whiff of vindication) becomes an emotional loose cannon that adds some undeserved tension to the mix. There are also a few side stories with obscure characters returning from periods you may not have played or stories you probably haven’t read, which mostly distract from the conflict at hand without adding much—a sort of par- for-the. -of course the narrative of fate that has been bugging me since 2014.
But ultimately, whether The Final Shape can deliver a satisfying conclusion remains to be seen. While I liked the main story of seven missions that can be completed in so many hours, it doesn’t have a real ending yet – instead it sets up the raid that unlocks today and serves as the last big battle before. the eighth and final mission of the campaign, which probably wraps everything up. Here’s hoping Bungie gives us something at least as good as the rest of the campaign with this one, as it’s largely delivered a satisfying finale so far.
Regardless of how this story ends, the levels you’ll play and the new areas you’ll explore are some of my favorites. If you immerse yourself in the body of a god, you will explore the Pale Heart of the Traveler, a bizarre reality where memories, desires and fears manifest in the physical world. What begins as an idyllic but strange world begins to shift into a terrifying landscape as corrupted by the perverted wishes of the Witness, with plenty of crude hands and faces filling the environments. This gives it an uncomfortable and surreal quality that is a huge departure from the mostly grounded areas our Rangers have visited thus far. It’s also fantastic that we finally get a map that isn’t just a loop with a few small areas to explore, instead favoring a fairly linear layout that feels like traveling from the Shire to Mount Doom on an epic quest to set the world right. I’m still exploring its nooks and crannies, shooting and looting everything I can find, but it’s easily my favorite destination already.
Similarly, its missions follow in the fantastical footsteps of The Witch Queen by adding light raid mechanics and challenging combat encounters that provide more than the mindless shooting corridors that Destiny sometimes finds itself in. One level will have you jumping between two realities to solve a puzzle to kill a massive boss, and another will have you fighting your way to the top of some icy peaks, using a gale to propel you across huge gaps. Each level does a great job of teaching you a new mechanic every now and then, slowly adding to the complexity of the shooting and puzzle solving until the final battle somehow manages to do half a dozen things at once and take down an army of enemies. in one of the worst showdowns yet. I had a lot of fun playing the entire campaign solo on Legendary and I’m looking forward to going through it again with friends on my other characters.
One of the things that makes these missions so enjoyable is the first new enemy faction Destiny has gotten in six years, called the Dread. Even the two other enemy factions added in previous Destiny expansions were mostly remixes of existing enemies, so it could be argued that the Dreads are the first fully original faction yet, and what’s the difference. Grims, bat-like creatures that fly around, throw blaster fire at you and yell at you to slow your movement, are overwhelming in large groups, while Husks are melee thugs that rush you with deadly blades and send explosives at you creatures that fly at you if you don’t. not kill them in a specific way. Most of these additions are absolutely amazing and bring some much-needed variety to a sandbox that has stagnated over time. That said, there are a few less inspired ones: Attendants and Weavers, for example, look almost like disguised enemies from an existing race and pepper you with irritating abilities, including ones that make you move extremely slowly and for far too long, resulting in more than a few deaths. which seemed a bit cheap. Still, these are minor quibbles I have with a faction that has been fun to fight so far.
As always, Destiny’s latest expansion comes with a whole arsenal of unique toys to loot and take away from your enemies, and The Final Shape has some really nice additions. The Call, a small handgun that shoots mini rockets, is absolutely phenomenal, while the Lost Signal is a grenade launcher that fires loads of explosives that deal damage over time. My personal new favorite is an exotic called Hazardous Propulsion, which fires a barrage of missiles from your back whenever you use your class ability, which has gotten me out of so many tight spots lately – I’m totally obsessed. Destiny has always been famous for its gunplay, although the other aspects of the shooter haven’t gone to waste, so none of this is particularly surprising. But even for a game that’s known for its cool weapons and armor, The Final Shape so far stands out in what it has to offer. They really cooked on this one, guys!
The Final Shape also adds a new subclass to Destiny’s space magic repertoire called Prismatic, which allows you to combine certain light and dark abilities found in other subclasses to create interesting combinations. On top of that, it adds some new abilities, from grenades that combine different types of damage and status effects to do things like suspend enemies in the air and electrocute everything in the vicinity, to new super abilities that can let you throw giants . exploding axes onto the battlefield, then pick them up to wreak havoc on the enemy. The ability to control a combination of elements and abilities that were previously locked to their own specific classes is a major game changer and takes buildcrafting to the next level in terms of customization and playing with different options. I have yet to unlock all the options and at this point I’ve only played one character class (Titan) and I’m already equally amazed and excited by the options.
I’ve played about 30 hours of The Final Shape so far, and I’ll probably play another 40 over the weekend as I dive into the raid, finish the story, explore more side content, and try out more character classes, but I’m already having fun with what I’ve seen. I’ll be back with a scored review sometime next week, but The Final Shape has already delivered more ways than I thought possible – here’s hoping that momentum continues when Bungie releases the final act.