Destiny 2 - Beyond Light

It’s been quite the ride getting here, but here we are. I was a little bummed out that we had to wait for this season to start, thanks to the pandemic, but so far it’s been well worth the wait. At the time of this writing, we’re a little over a month into the new season, and things started off with the second live event in Destiny history:

Unfortunately for me, I was still at work when all that happened so I missed out on the emblem. But at least I got experience it thanks to this video.

So let’s examine this new season (which honestly feels like a whole new game) of Destiny 2 bit by bit.

Light Remodeling

As soon as I was able to log in, I decided to look around and see what was changed since they said it was basically a whole new game. They weren’t wrong. The new login / character select screens are very well laid out, looks very slick.

The Tower loads ridiculously fast now, there’s no longer a hiccup of any kind when running up and down the steps between sections. I went to check on a couple of notorious NPC’s in the Tower once I thought to look: Benedict and Ada-1. Benedict’s room in the Annex near Drifter sits empty, not a trace of the sinister frame to be seen anywhere. Ada’s room is now inaccessible, the iron barred door is closed. A piece of the floor to her room can be seen in the dim light, a hint of seasons gone by.

Hello? Is there anybody in there?

Was sad to see that The Farm was gone from the map of the EDZ as well as all the scannable lore objects from all the areas that I checked. And Lore, I LOVE the new layout for the Lore section in the game. Seeing miniature versions of all the Lore book covers is very nice. I kinda dig the new layout for Triumphs and such as well. Happy that I don’t have to see Triumphs/Seals that I didn’t finish anymore.

The Cosmodrome

It’s so nice being back here after all this time. Save for a few glaring absences to the layout, it’s more or less as I remembered it. This time around though, it’s a bit more lively than before with Fallen appearing quite a bit more frequently than the original.

The old colony ship that once held Cayde’s stash at the top. Since the top was burned off during Rise of Iron, it was a nice nod to the fact that Cayde is dead.

Shaw Han, the new vendor in the Cosmodrome. My, my, what a handsome man he is. And thankfully all his bounties don’t take too much time to complete.

These fuckers are back! It was just like old times when the season started and all 3 of them appeared as ?? to me when I aimed at them.

Just like I used to back in the day, I still find myself camping at Skywatch (yay fast travel!) and participating in the little war between the Hive and Fallen, doing the frequent patrols and Warsat public events. Even the old loot cave is still here complete with the pile of bodies and voice talking about sating Rahool’s bloodlust.

Also somewhat dismayed to see that all the changes that happened during Rise of Iron have been seemingly removed or straight up undone entirely. The section of the wall carved out by Splicers? Fixed. Holes in the ground where SIVA nodes had erupted from below? Filled. And the Plaguelands is missing entirely. Tisk tisk tisk.

While it was good to be back, there’s still yet more to cover.

Home.

Go Beyond Light

The opening cinematic is done very well, but the line about "we don't know why these planets are gone" is kinda dumb. It does a good job of setting the stage though, for what’s to come.

Immediately upon seeing Variks in the opening cutscene, I thought that I would feel a lot more angry than I do, but I guess it's been so long now that I just don't care anymore. I don't feel anything toward him what so ever. I didn't even care that he was nearly killed by the other Eliksni. His new insect chittering is annoying.

The dark, oppressive cold of Europa is a fitting juxtaposition to the year that was 2020. Random snow storms are a nice touch but somewhat annoying when you’re grinding in a hurry. Delving through the sordid history of BrayTech and Clovis Bray himself was a treat for a while, but as is the case with this game, after a few weeks it became less fun and more of a chore.

The story of your Guardian wielding the power of darkness/evil is just so tired and cliché that I both do and don’t want to see where Bungie goes with all this. It was fun hunting down all the Fallen head honchos on Europa and putting a stop to whatever they were planning. It was also a treat finding the massive Riis-Reborn section of the map that I didn’t even know was going to be there. Once again Bungie caters to my love of exploring old and abandoned cities. It was neat to see how the Fallen and repurposed this old Golden Age city to suit their needs, but at the same time it was sad to see a relic of times gone by ruined by those four armed freaks. Eramis and her rag tag band of misfits were a nice diversion, but the real meat this year came during the first of December.

As The Crow Flies

Yeah, he’s back. I gotta say, I was a wash of emotions when I saw him again, alive. And to find that he’s been working for Spider of all people. It was a bit of a shock to see the man described in lore entries brought to life in the game; knowing how he had been suffering since his revival. But to know that Spider planted a bomb in his ghost in case he tried to escape…I was more upset and revolted and sickened than I was liberated from the weight of the emotions I’d been carrying since Cayde was killed. Bungie really knows how to take this feeling that I don’t really have a word for and turn it up to eleven.

The events with a new allied Crow definitely overshadowed anything that was going on over in the frozen wastes of Europa. It’s definitely going to be a historical moment when and if Mara Sov learns that her dead brother is alive and is a puppet of The Traveler. A reckoning will come, for sure.

Crow’s little side story of hunting down enemies working for Xivu-arath was fun the first couple of weeks but I quickly grew bored of it all and haven’t really logged in since the last week of this years’ Dawning (picking up on a pattern here?) but at least this year I bothered to finish the event. Any time I brought cookies to Crow I couldn’t help but feel a little sad and a little numb or unfeeling.

Final Thoughts

As is the case with the game I like to love and leave, I’ve currently milked Destiny 2 for all the content I can get out of it and moved on to start the annual ResetEra 52 Games challenge (which I probably won’t beat again this year) but I’ll definitely bee keeping an ear open for when something interesting happens. This year started off a bit later than usual but definitely grabbed my attention quickly, I just wish the game was able to hold it for longer.

Trying to solo any of the new high level Lost Sectors is, in my opinion, impossible. I’ve tried just about all of them and haven’t really made much headway no matter how much I raise my Light. Ultimately it’s a futile and ephemeral thing to try to obtain, these triumphs, but the chase is part of the thrill I suppose. Until next we meet…