Destiny 2

[Zephlar]

The story is a bit of a weird thing. The problem that I see is that Bungie really flubbed when it came to rehashing the story. They simultaneously assume that you're new to the series and that you're a veteran. The problem is that the worldbuilding was done primarily in the previous game and poorly rehashed in the second. They don't really do much to get you up to speed when it comes to the world and characters, but they sure as hell make sure to tell you who the Fallen are. I dunno. Seeing as the traveler is well-established as the centerpiece of everything that happened in the first game, seeing what was happening to it was kind of an oh shit moment for me, but I can imagine your reaction being more like "what the fuck even is that thing?"

Yeah you fuckin nailed it. Especially The Traveler which I mean I guess we've kind of deciphered it's capacity and what significance it has to the guardians, but outside of that no clue what it is exactly or where it came from. I just know it holds extraordinary power. They really did a shit job on rehashing yeah. I think I'll just have to do some reading and get up to speed on everything. I have no intentions on ever playing D1.

[Spectere]

Yeah, you're honestly better off reading up on things. Even doing some wiki reading should help some things make sense. There's still a lot that hasn't been explained due to the story itself being incomplete compared to even the first Halo, but there's still quite a bit there that just wasn't explained in the second game.

And yeah, I enjoyed the first game for what it was, but I definitely wouldn't go out of my way to play through it. While shooting still feels as good as ever, the RPG elements are insanely grindy compared to D2, like to the point where you can hit the level cap in WoW before you max out a single subclass in D1 (that's not even an exaggeration!). D1 feels like an old school MMO in terms of that--progression, even after the revamp that happened in The Taken King, feels glacial when you get to a certain point. D2 does literally everything better.

[Zephlar]

I went hard this weekend. Really starting to get hooked on this game. PvP plays a lot like Halo so it took no time at all for me to get acquainted.

I'll be on tonight for sure if you want to join forces. I'm down for whatever PVE or PVP.

[Spectere]

I have plans tonight (one of my other friends works nights, so Monday is really the only night we can game). Sorry! I should be free the rest of this week, though.

I've been working on other things (personal projects, Diablo 3 season 12, etc) so my gear level in D2 ain't great (216 on my warlock, I think?) but it shouldn't take me too long to catch up.

[Zephlar]

No worries man whenever just let me know.

[Zephlar]

You up for Nightfall? Mary and I need 1 more it's a 3 person event. We have no friends on the game so I'm struggling right now trying to find us a group for Leviathan and Nightfall.

[Spectere]

I don't have any gear. I haven't really been playing--it just hasn't held my interest like D1 has, and most of my friends dropped off really early. ~_~

If you guys are still playing I'll definitely reinstall it and work on that (haven't installed any b.net stuff on the new rig yet!). I'd love to do some of the three person content with a premade group.

[Zephlar]

I don't have any gear. I haven't really been playing--it just hasn't held my interest like D1 has, and most of my friends dropped off really early. ~_~

If you guys are still playing I'll definitely reinstall it and work on that (haven't installed any b.net stuff on the new rig yet!). I'd love to do some of the three person content with a premade group.

We recently got back into it. We are really enjoying the current faction rally actually despite the bad PR. We've been playing pretty well daily. Typical evening/weekend schedule.

[Spectere]

Yeah, it kinda seems like ActiBlizzBungie have been just shooting themselves in the foot with a rocket launcher lately. Why do AAA publishers have this fetish for taking good games and overmonetizing them? Ugh.

But yeah, I'll try to get back into it a bit. I'm going out of town later this week, so I'll probably get it up and running next week at some point.

[Bobbias]

What gets me is how much worse mobile games are. I want to play your game, not constantly think about how if I dropped $50 I MIGHT get something good enough to actually progress.

[Spectere]

Yeah, but that's the model that AAA game companies are adopting. The main difference is that in the case of AAA games, you end up spending upwards of $120 on the game (including season passes, deluxe editions, etc) and then they try to rope you into spending a ton of money on microtransaction. Most of them even use the same tiers that free mobile games do.

Battlefront II has been the worst offender, by far. If Disney hadn't stepped in and shut EA's greed machine down it would have literally been a $60+ mobile game. It was quite literally pay to win.

[Bobbias]

Yeah they certainly getting worse. Still, most AAA games right now arent as heavily balanced around paying for a chance to progress in the game. I tried onmyoji revently and god damn that game is a cash grab. Gacha games are fucking brutal. That said I've finally decided to check out puzzle and dragons and so far i haven't hit a "grind for weeks or months or keep paying us till you get lucky" paywall yet.

Still, its fucking depressing. At least theres a ton of good indie games out there.

[Spectere]

I ended up hitting a pretty hard wall on P&D several weeks in. That said, that was several years ago, so things could have improved since then.

[Zephlar]

And yet here they are putting microtransactions back in BFII lol.

Sorry we didn't get this right! We'll make sure it doesn't happen again!

[Zephlar]

Also I just did a raid for the first time and I gotta say it was the most fun I've had in a LONG time. Having 6 people coordinating on mic to achieve the same goal in very challenging PvE setting was actually really nice. Took us 4 hours but we did it!