This, this is just essential...
Love it or hate it, if you are someone like me, you've played a sh*t ton of Destiny. I, myself, am a veteran, I've been there (here?) since September 9th and by the looks of it I am not going anywhere anytime soon. Vanilla Destiny had problems, a lot of them, but the gameplay was insanely good and addictive. Then came The Dark Below, which fixed some problems while creating new ones. After that we got The House of Wolves which well again, fixed some problems while creating some new ones.
Now well, three weeks ago The Taken King released and it changed Destiny, this time only for the better. Destiny feels different, Destiny is different now. The changes The Taken King brought are to many ranging from massive UI improvements, improved faction leveling, material exchange to quests, mission types, bounties, new loot etc.
One of the biggest complains regarding Destiny was the storytelling. That kinda sucked cause the universe building and the lore Bungie delivers through the Grimoire cards is just bonkers. However in The Taken King they have fixed that, in a very big way. The Vanguard leaders are fully fledged characters now with Cayde 6 taking the crown as one of the coolest characters in recent memory. Everything from the dialogue in the fantastic cut-scenes to the dialogue in mission is perfectly crafted and delivered. No more jump everything, get to the last room and kill everything that breathes just, cause. The things you do just make sense now.
There is a sense of urgency, the whole solar system is in danger and as a Guardian it is your duty to prevent that and in the process smack Oryx to another dimension. You'll go exploring new areas in the Cosmodrome to pick us tech which will help you infiltrate the Dreadnaught, Oryx's massive massive spaceship. Once in, you have to disable its defence systems so you can clear a landing pad for the other guardians. Then you'll travel to the Moon and back, stealing something that will ascend you into something else so that you can finally hunt down and "kill" the big baddie. In this journey however, you'll learn more about the Vanguard, Eris and her fireteam, the Cabal, the Taken, Hive gods etc. It is filled with details that expand the universe in a great way making you care more about what happened, what is happening and what will happen in the upcoming future. I wish there were more details about what in the actual f*ck is the Traveler, but next DLC, maybe?
New subclasses are also introduced and while the new supers are well, super, the way you get these new subclasses steals the spotlight. Harnessing the power of the storm, picking up the legendary flaming hammer and absorbing the power of the void are some of the most badass moments you can find in Destiny. The backstory of who, why and how are fantastic and again, it all makes sense. And believe me when I say that you will need these powers to save the solar system.
So you will band together to fight Oryx and his Taken armies on each planet, but the biggest fight will happen inside the Dreadnaught, a completely new massive location filled with secrets, lore and a ton of stuff to do. A new "mechanic" that is introduced is the Court of Oryx which basically functions as the public events in the planets, but in this case you can initiate whenever you want and how many times you want provided you have the runes. It has 3 tiers and while the first two tiers put you against two or more bosses at random, the final one, the hardest changes every with each weekly reset. Completing these will earn you engrams, exotics if you are lucky enough or if you use the new item Three of Coins which increases the chance of that happening, materials, experience etc. The Court basically is another motive to be excited on a Tuesday.
What else is new? Well, four new strikes and some old ones reimagined with Taken enemies thrown in. However these four new are not like the old ones, jump/run to the end, kill the boss and dance. Nope, these actually feel like mini3x Raids meaning that you will encounter some mini puzzles or different enemy types each time you play through. Strike specific loot has been added for more replay value along with a reworked Vanguard Strike Heroic/Nightfall system.
Now we come to the new endgame activity, the King's Fall Raid. Surprise, surprise Oryx is not dead so you have to go back to the Dreadnaught mow down everything that breathes or looks you the wrong way, snipe the hell out of the Warpriest, jump to and from spaceships, destroy Golgoroth's chest with a barrage of flame infused bullets, find your way in the decrepit labyrinth and ascend to the final arena where through a series of ingenious mechanics and puzzles you will expunge from reality Oryx's daughters (sisters?) to then fight the big big big baddie. The final fight is fantastic and since explaining would take a long time, just watch the video down below.
This is the biggest raid out of the three in the game and in my opinion it is also the best with VoG coming a close second. It is an experience, one that will make you and your fireteam sweat. But in the end, it is so satisfying. And yet another thing to be excited on a Tuesday.
If have been careful till now and if you love Destiny well, you will love Tuesday. But what about the other days? Friday is also known as Xur's Day, but we will also get a new and improved Trials of Osiris that will go on all weekend till Tuesday. Iron Banner, also improved, begins and goes on for the entire week. Both were great, but I have to try them out before I can give a "review" about them. And what about Wednesday, you might ask? Well, now it's officially known as Armsday. On this day everyone rushes to the Gunsmith at the Tower to collect their legendary weapons from the packs they bought the previous week and pick up the guns available for research. Using these guns and completing their requirements gives you Gunsmith reputation which builds up your level, higher levels, bigger better loot drops, but that is not the end of it.
The Taken King expansion introduced the Quests system which streamlines Destiny in a big way. What you have to do, where you have to go, who do you need to talk to, you can find all of these and more in the Quests page in detail. This makes tracking the progress way easier than it was before. And among the Story and Crucible Quests, there are also Exotic Quests which pay out with an exotic gun in the end and everyone, till now, has been amazing to tackle and complete. But the best thing about this Quests system is that Bungie has been adding or unlocking, call it whatever you want, new quests every so often, but again, that is not the end of it.
Check the complete album with screenshots captured directly for PS4 by clicking right here.
What has surprised me and every fellow Guardian out there are the secret stuff that Bungie has packed inside the Daily Missions. The Black Spindle secret part mission broke r/DestinyTheGame records and so did the Praedyth's VoG one. Or the crazy search for the Sleeper Simulant, where people were data mining the heck out of the code to find details on how to get the elusive exotic super weapon. Or when Reddit banded together to solve the mystery of the "basket room" inside the King's Fall. And if Luke Smith's tweets are an indication, there are a ton of other secrets to be discovered. This is the best thing to ever happen to Destiny, much like the search for the elusive jetpack in GTAV, the search for "stuff" in Destiny is keeping everyone on the edge of their seats lurking the official forums and Reddit for something new, anything, every day once that daily reset hits and I have to say kudos to Bungie for doing that.
God close to 1400 words and still so much to talk... Nah I am going to end it here well, maybe the next paragraph. The TKK loot is awesome. The new legendaries are awesome and the exotics, just special. Accompanying them are a series of new perks which change the gameplay quite drastically, so expect to do some experimenting. Also since they changed the light system where every piece of equipment builds toward your light level, the grind for better loot is very real. Swords, yup SWORDS make an appearance for the first time as an equip-able weapon and are f*cking awesome. The exotic one are well, in my opinion, just illegal, you just wreck everything like you should, both PVE and PVP. In the PVP side, there are a couple of new maps to play on and a new assortment of daily and weekly Crucible bounties, so if you are into that, good for you.
Now this was supposed to be the end of the review and it will, but what you just read above has been written on and off in a two week long period cause Destiny just keeps changing day after day. For example two days ago, the Iron Banner started and well, it's like the old one apart from new gold bounties which give big reputation, but are quite hard and long to complete. Anyway, another thing that Bungie introduced on Tuesday was the Eververse Company, basically Tess Everis came back to the Tower with a new shop. What does it sell? Emotes which is really good as the Carlton dance is f*cking awesome, but you have to use real money to buy them. Microtransactions, one simple word everyone hates. However before we all jump the gun and hate Bungie and everyone working there, we have to chill for a moment. These emotes are just cosmetic, no affect on gameplay whatsoever and no one is forcing us to buy them. So don't expect Tess selling a Year 2.0 400 damage Gjallarhorn as that is never going to happen if Luke Smith's tweets are an indication. Taking all in consideration, The Taken King is a true expansion. As I said at the start, it fixes a lot of major and minor problems while no new one appear to rise. In the end The Taken King is essential if you love Destiny and a great starting point for bambis (new players). Thanks for reading!
