I did it again. I didn’t start Destiny 2 on launch day and now I’m screwed.
My friends are all talking about getting their Sparrows and how angry they are about Shaders. Everyone is already in a clan and since I haven’t started yet there isn’t any room for me on any teams — everyone I know is already paired up and scheduled out with playtimes until… I don’t even know. All I do know is that I messed up. Or maybe I didn’t, and it’s not my fault that jumping late in the game with Destiny feels so unwelcoming to newcomers.
The first Destiny sailed right over my head. I briefly played the open beta when it launched and immediately knew it was out of my element. It’s not that I don’t play shooters; I don’t play multiplayer in shooters. Not repeatedly, anyway. If the game has a great campaign with a story that piques my interest, like BioShock Infinite or Wolfenstein: The New Order, I’ll happily boot it up in baby mode and bungle my way through. I’m not terribly great at shooters — JRPGs are my wheelhouse, the more complex systems, the better — but when all of my friends are playing something, I know I should probably get on board.
I Goofed
But I didn’t. When Destiny launched in 2014 I was playing something else for work that ate up what little free time I had, and when I finally got that time back the last thing I wanted to do was shoot things. So I watched others play, I watched gifs of funny dance emotes, and I read the Wiki article about the story. Or lack of story. And when I tried to pick it up several months later as the DLC started rolling out, I found that it was entirely too late for me.
Everyone I wanted to play with was leagues above me and didn’t have the patience to show someone new the ropes, or slow down on their Raids to help me get my bearings. And in watching other people fly effortlessly through the game, completing these missions over and over and over again because they could, I decided it would be fine if I didn’t play Destiny. I could appreciate Bungie’s work and feel good about their accomplishments in building such a strong game community without actually participating.
But now it’s September 2017, and I’ve done the same thing. I didn’t make time for Destiny 2 and now Destiny 2 has no time for me. I’m supposed to be writing articles about Destiny 2 and instead I’m running in circles because life, delaying the moment I actually try and start the single-player campaign. I have a lot to do during the day. And at night when I go home I lay in bed and play something more mindless. Or I don’t play anything at all, because when your job is to play video games, sometimes you just need a break from playing video games.
I Really Goofed
I hear there’s more story. I hear it’s better than the first Destiny. I hear it’s newbie friendly..
Destiny 2 has been out for one week and I’m already behind. Like in 2014, all my friends are done with the campaign. FANDOM is already publishing guides about how to get super special weapons and how to gain Light quickly and all this other inside baseball stuff. Maybe it’s just that I don’t have the patience to dedicate time to a seemingly never-ending multiplayer game when I have two dozen other finite things that need my attention. Maybe I’m being dramatic.
But the point is: the Destiny community moves quickly. It gobbles up new game content at the speed of light. And then it forms into groups and does the same Raids and Strikes over and over and over until new content comes out. I’m glad my friends are having fun. But after one week everyone has already slid past their initial hype levels and are settling into routine. And I’m SURE once this publishes all my Destiny-playing friends will blow up my feeds and my phone telling me they’ll be happy to help ease me into the experience. But I didn’t even play Destiny 1, so there’s a lot of ground to cover. Right? (This primer might be a good place to start.)
There’s a joke here about Destiny being part of my destiny, but I’m not going to make it, because I probably have no idea what I’m talking about. And also it’s lame.
For more on Destiny, check out FANDOM’s guides:
