Casual players are the single largest audience in gaming; there’s no getting around it. This is the audience that every major publisher wants to appeal to; the one group that every development studio hopes will latch onto their game. After all, capturing the attention of the casual or mainstream audience usually means massive success and wondrous profit. So it’s understandable that they, publishers especially, would have a vested interest in making their games more accessible and appealing to that audience. Making that appeal often means simplification. The simpler the game is, the more accessible it is, the more mainstream appeal it can have. While there’s nothing innately wrong with making one’s game more accessible to the wider gaming audience, doing so always comes at a cost. Just as a game cannot be both simple and complex, neither can it simultaneously serve its niche and successfully appeal to the mainstream audience. Therefore compromises must be made, usually ones that rob the game of what made it special in the first place.

[DeeJ] We pick up the adventure where it last left off. You are a Guardian of the last safe city, except it’s not so safe anymore. The entire might of the Cabal military descend upon you. Dominus Ghaul leads the Red Legion, the most dreaded fighting force in Cabal Empire to scatter the Guardians across the Solar System and capture the Traveler for himself. So, in the opening act, we lose everything that makes us a Guardian. Our power, our weapons, our armor, it’s all gone. Scattered into the wild, we’re going to find new subclasses, new power, new weapons and armor so that we can become more powerful, regroup the survivors, and launch an attack to reclaim that was rightfully ours.

Following The Collapse, the remainder of Humanity was not too happy to see The Fallen mysteriously appearing. While Humans were picking themselves up after nearly being wiped out, these tribal scavengers swooped in to pick at the remains. With constant battles against the Guardians, most notably the Battle of the Twilight Gap, The Fallen were relentless with their assaults against The Last City in order to gain access to the Traveler. Unfortunately, they were mostly unsuccessful (with both sides sustaining high casualties), at least not until they were able to section off an area of Earth that contained SiVA technology, but that’ll come much later. One of the most well known tribes, The House of Wolves, went to battle with The Reef during this time, which they ultimately lost. Now, while The Fallen are plentiful, their houses have become disorganized and their allegiances varying.

You talk about the four-people having different and important roles in the Crucible. I’m curious as to why you didn’t add a fourth class. Every match will have at least one duplicate class. Doesn’t that defeat the idea that each player has an important role to play?

The Strike is a good place to start. It reveals a little more of the world players can expect, showcasing great improvements to Destiny. The most notable thing about the Strike is just how open it felt. Instead of running casually down one big hallway that twist and turns, the Strike makes use of all the space available. The number of paths available was astounding and never has it been so easy to get separated from the group, meaning communication (or keeping an eye out) is key. Party members can’t just run ahead to go off and do their own thing; the Strike actually requires some teamwork and that’s a good thing. More than a few times, imminent danger is awaiting any careless Guardian who might think "I’ve got this." The mechanics of it all also helped with this feeling, giving the Strike enough complexity, but not so much that it felt bogged down. It’s hard to get an exact read, though, because this is only one Strike and without leveling of any sort, it might just seem tough. This is how every Destiny expansion has played out. Things feel like they were getting more challenging, but level up enough gear and light, and those Strikes become cake-walks. I even encountered some of this already, by just breezing past the giant drill without stopping. What looked like a challenging set piece became just a set piece. No interaction required.

We delivered a solid experience on all platforms we shipped Destiny on. With Destiny 2 being on modern hardware we’re able to create bigger environments, more elaborate activities for more players to enjoy, and put more enemy combatants on screen.

There you have it. While there is a lot more history and detailed information regarding specific individuals and enemies during the conflicts of Destiny, this is a broad overview of what happened throughout the course of the game. You should now be prepared for Destiny 2 when it hits PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on September 6, with the PC version coming October 24.

Which brings this full circle back to the Strike. With only one Strike to tackle, any Guardian checking out the beta will probably play this a few times. It was with my second group that more problems started to crop up. The beta is a stress test on Destiny 2’s system, so having such sparse…everything...became more noticeable. There is a limited arsenal in Destiny 2 at the moment, and when the party hit the boss, we started to wipe. After the third wipe I began switching out weapons in every combination imaginable, but we just couldn’t land it. Having played Destiny since vanilla, I’d say the skills are there. But here is Destiny 2 presenting itself as challenging, but there is always that inkling that it’s a façade. Again, every Destiny 2 missions expansion has done this. New encounters, new mechanics, new gear. It makes it all seem like the game has changed, but level up enough, equip the right stuff and that boss that was causing so much grief becomes laughable. One can only hope that this beta is not tricking players into a false experience, but that won’t be revealed until September. So, for now it’s the waiting game.