“We like to tell big stories” was the premise Bungie to develop their new franchise, same as subtly and with the advice of Activision remained dormant for several years to grow into a titanic project. Since 2009 its existence, and with great confusion that was raised there was an increasing interest to the point where we could not ignore and the name is Destiny.
THE NATURE OF A NEW GENRE
Much has been said about the nature of the title. Rumors, speculation and conjecture have surrounded the history of the game.Some call it a hybrid genre MMO (massive multiplayer online) and first person shooter, while others call it merely a co-op campaign in Halo. If anything is certain, it is that we are facing a game like we had never seen before, a franchise that dares to propose new mechanics and with all certainty that the results will be fruitful.
The Birth of a new genre
Destiny is a mix of genres, is a new one for himself. We are at a moment of the game industry where companies feel the need to introduce new mechanics to refresh the experience of the players.Hence experiments are born as Titanfall, combining elements of various genres and propose their unique game modes.
However, Destiny feels differently. With a large creative burden, the game is definitely not a hybrid of genres, but mints its own identity as a “shared world shooter” : A shooting game in a shared world.Unlike traditional MMOs, where we shared a universe hosted on a particular server in Destiny game we match our level with people in real time to take on different objectives.
It is a first-person shooter game that takes the best elements of MMORPG genre to combine a new genre, taking the nature of an action game with great graphics and exploits to new levels.
We meet in a living universe, a persistent world that continues to exist even after the players out of it .Events that occur within the game will not be controlled by developers, but will evolve by themselves and whenever we go to the servers we will find a slightly different experience. Therefore, it is essential to have a permanent internet connection, because although not necessarily interact with other players in competitive or cooperative modes, yes witness the steady growth of the community and how the collective actions of the players change the worlds we visit.
After years of creating totally original and believable universe, Bungie was given the task of developing a new science fiction mythical concept. The adventure begins 700 years after the Golden Age, an era of progress and colonization of other planets thanks to the guidance of The Traveller, an entity of unknown nature that cares and protects all races. This fruitful old was stopped abruptly by The Collapse, a catastrophic event that ended civilization as we knew it. Thus, the colonies were ravaged by darkness and the universe as we knew it ceased to exist. All is not lost, because The Traveller managed to survive and protect the last bastion of humanity: The Tower, the last city on Earth.
The Light
Incarnated a Guardian, which will have a mysterious gift called “The Light” . With this power, a drone with us we will call “Ghost”. So, our mission is to protect the last hope of civilization and go to other worlds to find a way to revive The Traveller. However, we find that the planets before fruitful and prosperous, are now plagued by alien races who seek to end life on Earth. So the burden on our shoulders will not only find a way to revive our deity, but also defend our compatriots growing threats.
We will have three races to choose from: Humans, Awoken, designed from ghosts, vampires, elves and angels, and Exo, who take elements of characters like Master Chief in a fusion of the organic with the robot. The character creation system is quite extensive, and races look pretty different to match the personality of each player.
Moreover, we can choose three classes: Titan, Hunter and Warlock. These specialties represent what is commonly known as a warrior, hunter and mage. The influence and legacy of the MMORPG can be noticed in the personalization system. For both races and classes are inspired by symbolic figures of science fiction works such as Star Wars, The Matrix, Terminator.
Leveling up your Guardian
Apart from differentiating our style of play thanks to the classes, we will have a skill tree that will allow us to raise our level of specialization in certain types of combat. Gives us the opportunity to be a lethal machine, also we can take away and attack from afar thanks to targeted attacks; secondly, we specialize in crowd control and launch devastating attacks in the area, all thanks to the weapons and skills you unlock it and go up a level. How you survive in the game is how level up your character is to face enemies that are at your same level or bigger.
The progression system is simple: eliminate an enemy and earn experience points. Commission may also be obtained through the completion of missions. Our team also will level with us and we can customize it to strengthen its attributes by acquiring different materials and other.
See four alien races along our adventure, each more hostile than before. The Fallen, The Hive, The Vex and The Cabal will be our eternal enemies in each mission, and will have different attack patterns, and with an artificial intelligence that will amaze more than one. It is important to highlight the excellent work of Bungie to bring the classic enemies of RPGs and give them a look that fits perfectly into a world of science fiction.
Working with artificial intelligence is amazing. well as we can work together to design strategies of attack, so will the enemies. Attack opponents who come in droves, leaving only a few will change their pattern of attack, the other will flee and bring reinforcements.When faced with bosses at the end of a level, helpers will come to distract us and draw us to places where we are most vulnerable.Each planet is different, and the gameplay will no longer be repeated with each step we overcome. The goal as a guardian is to become legend, regain lost ground. If we fail, the light will go out the last civilization.
Beyond the main campaign, which will be completed in about 20 hours not including leveling up higher than level 20 in which you will need more light to upgrade, there are game modes that naturally complement the gameplay . By passing certain missions for each planet, we can unlock access to the next star and thus face new objectives. The story will be in increasingly intricate and exciting occasion, pushing to want to know more and rationing in perfect cutscenes faster pace than conventional MMO.
You can access the co-op to share our adventure in history with two other friends, or simply to perform patrol missions or hunting on each planet for Vanguard Marks. Go collecting this kind of money will give us access to weapons and legendary team exclusive our class, thus becoming the perfect Guardian.
On the other hand, we have the competitive mode where teams of six against six modes can battle in classic shooting game genre, like deathmatch or possession of territories. Our campaign leveling up parallels our multiplayer, but also get Crucible Marks , another currency which will give us access to weapons and special equipment for competitive play.
Destiny embraces new models that invite us to visit the game every day to participate in daily quests, search for different items and much more. The shops change their inventory every 24 hours, so every time we go we will have the opportunity to buy different features. Every week we can get a certain limit of Vanguard and Crucible Marks , to prevent some more dedicated players advance of unhealthy ways, and to give some balance to the progress of the community in general. There is also the Raid Mode in which six players will participate in one goal and the level of competition is raised even more. More to come on how Raid Mode is this coming week.
Conclusion
Destiny certainly presents a proposals that combine genres and propose a new look to science fiction. In matters of gameplay are not error-free, since there are details such as the inability to skip cut scenes, lack of interaction with NPCs, or balance of difficulty in some missions. There is no doubt that all these barriers be resolved as the game grows, for now, we must defend Earth.
PROS: Control, Boss Fights, Multiplayer Balanced, Character Customization, Leveling Up
CONS: Empty world to explore, somewhat repetitive, Lack of Social tools
We Give Destiny 8.8