Destiny 2: Forsaken; After the last two expansions, if we can even call it that, I wasn’t really that hyped for Forsaken even after watching the release trailers and everything building up to it. As a person who grew up with expansion packs and all the content they normally included I wanted something more and I really felt like Activision Blizzard was just milking the money cow that is Destiny 2 by releasing expansion packs that I could finish in five hours’ time.
The Warmind DLC; and the Curse of Osiris DLC; left me with a bitter feeling and like so other many gamers worldwide disappointed so when Destiny 2: Forsaken finally dropped I was; really surprised because I have spent the last several weeks playing it with my friends and going through everything they have changed because they overhauled pretty much everything and added several new areas to the game instead of two stupidly tiny ones. Not only did we get the Fallen Shores the area where our beloved Cayde-6 has passed away; but we also got the dreaming city home to the Awoken race and a lot more depth and story that the previous DLCs had lacked; adding lore books to the game that you can get by completing triumphs so you can learn more about the characters of the past, and present in Destiny 2.
A new game mode called Gambit where players try to kill creatures and summon a huge boss also and the thing that has had a lot of Destiny players very excited; a revamped weapon system with random rolls on perks so they can finally have amazing guns crafted to each player’s personalities and ways of playing and not to mention an entirely new weapon type the Bow; which has me utterly excited because I deeply enjoy playing with the bow.
But let’s focus on the main part of the Forsaken DLC and what they revealed so it’s not really an unknown thing on the internet; Activision Blizzard killed off my favorite character and despite being something that hurts because he is a character I feel I can relate too and have deeply enjoyed because of his witticisms. Cayde-6 has always been the heart of Destiny 2 for me at least, and probably a lot of players so in Forsaken as the title implies that is what he is. His murderers; the Scorn and Uldren Sov an Awoken from the first game; the Scorn is basically if the Fallen ended up with genetic inbreeding, okay not really they are tainted by different energies and consider Uldren Sov their father; but it is fun to entertain the thought of genetic inbreeding because seriously; they look really, really screwed up.
The Vanguard under Zavala’s orders will not pursue his murderers and with no one to avenge his death and what it means to the city your Guardian is the one who speaks up and says he’s going after his murderer; and that was when I knew and felt how powerful the revenge story was. Because it wasn’t the ghost that spoke, it was me and he was saying how I felt.
Forsaken unlike the previous DLCs that Activision has given us was very nicely written keeping in mind how each character would handle things and how they would act; regarding the events that have unfolded throughout the story in Forsaken. But it also introduces several new characters that help move the story further such as the
Spider; and Drifter characters I was not familiar with as I’ve never played the first Destiny game. As you progress through the story you get to learn more about Cayde-6 and how he came to be, what his absence now means to the Vanguard at the tower and to those around him even hearing how Failsafe felt about Cayde-6’s death and how an AI could feel about it. From losing Cayde-6 what it means to take the path of the bloodied revenge-driven hero, but you get to experience the loss felt across the galaxy on your journey.
Forsaken as a whole was very well done in both the changes to the gameplay but also towards the development of the characters from a writing perspective, giving something new to everyone who’s been playing Destiny 2 up to this point in time.
The only issue I feel a loss from besides Cayde-6’s death is how armor from the previous design of the game has changed so that they no longer compare to the new design; where newer equipment can have upwards of three different built-in modifiers improving a variety of the players stats overall the older equipment only has a mod-socket and its stats that can be tweaked if it has become a master-work.
Leaving them dated and not entirely useful to the new format Destiny 2 is using; the other issue is they have entirely removed all the previous armor and weapon mods from the game rendering both applied mods and ones in the player’s inventory useless. But not giving players the option to acquire new ones to fill the void as they were used to.
For me despite the newer mods being a lot more powerful and useful overall I am slightly disappointed that I cannot simply acquire mods as easily as I used to; or upgrade my previous armors to be as equal to the newer armors as I’d like to. But big changes require big sacrifices and the results of Forsaken are worth it as players are finally happy with what’s changing in Destiny 2 including me despite my cynicism towards my amazing-looking armors not being that great anymore.
There is just; so much in Destiny 2 now that I feel like this is what would be classified as an expansion pack, this is what I have wanted and waited for. But I do feel like Activision Blizzard may keep milking the money cow on DLC’s like most companies it remains a wait-and-see. Because if they finally took the time to listen to the players and give them something they want, and to keep them interested with the new daily and weekly missions so the players can help grind out the equipment they want.
I feel they are deserving of a chance to keep improving; Destiny 2: Forsaken is quite frankly really well done, and it really doesn’t feel like the same game anymore it feels entirely like a new game and I am very, very happy about that.
Also, I can replay story missions now and keep getting my revenge for Cayde-6 over and over again, and, that’s just swell. But on a serious and final note, the ending if you happen to have gotten the pre-order and were able to do the quest for Cayde-6’s gun the Ace of Spaces how it all ends, made this entire expansion pack worth it.
An autistic gamer with opinions on games who also enjoys making dumb videos on the internet!