'Destiny's Shortcomings Are a Good Thing for 'Destiny 2'

When Destiny launched it was heavily criticized and smacked around by fans for its lack of story, complex leveling system with both its character levels, but also the games painfully farmed Light Level that required players to farm for gear. Doing so required fans to not just grind out missions, strikes, and even reputation to purchase the gear required to see the endgame content. Let alone did it suffer from these issues at launch and even does up-to-now, Destiny has come a long way with Destiny's most recent DLC - The Taken King.

Even with multiple amends to some of these alleviated issues, Destiny still is filled with painful shortcomings, some that have even caused players to walk away until year three's content "Rise of Iron" launches on Xbox One and PlayStation 4 this September. While some may harp on Bungie for delaying Destiny 2 - this is not a sign of cancellation or trouble for the second title - it's a chance for them to fix what they messed up on the first time around.

Some of Destiny's shortcomings have been unforgivable by some, such as the removal of vehicle crucible maps such as First Light (Moon Map), and the Cabal themed Bastion, which took place on Mars. Over the past few months it's been rare to see the crucible rotation that carries these two maps, which is odd, and frankly surprisingly as vehicle combat made Destiny's PvP fast, furious, and quite enjoyable.

One of the most painfully obvious shortcomings comes down to the three classes, which contain three sub-classes that were meant to feel unique. Issue here? None of them, in a traditional sense of the classed based shooter genre, feel as if they push the game in a unique way that the class is desired. These are things that could fuel Destiny 2's development in a rather surprising way. Let alone does it give Bungie a chance to fix the bugs we've been seeing quite often with Iron Banner and Trials of Osiris.

Destiny has been a title I've had a love hate relationship with. It has been one I've quite honestly installed for months before coming back and now play on both PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. On both I own all the content you can imagine for it and I've played it till my fingers have metaphorically bled, but if these shortcomings venture into Destiny 2? Destiny 2 could quite possibly hang the hat up for the franchise if these problems remain.

With Bungie having announced prior to E3 2016 that Destiny 2 has been delayed till 2017, the developer didn't hesitate showing that their title's upcoming expansion "Rise of Iron" has a few new changes, a new story to add onto the one we know already, and the new threat's that Guardian's will be put up against. But this DLC neglects a few loopholes that have already been put into place with the title. What happened to the Awoken queen? What is her brother doing after he fled from fighting against Oryx? What's going on with the Cabal's Empire now that a distress signal was sent out to them? With the Taken threat gone, will we see Noctis take her rightful place as Queen of the Hive? What about humanity once the walls are broken protecting the last thriving city of humanity?

Many of these questions in ways have been given subtle answers within the games Grimoire, which can only be accessed via Bungie.net if you've discovered a grimoire trigger, but what will these shortcomings be able to teach Bungie with their future release?

When playing Destiny, I've always wondered what it'd been like had Bungie followed the route of games like Diablo where the Journal (our case Grimoire) would be hidden within the game. Doing this would allow for players to find their lore as a story that could be read by Ghost or simply read by the players via an on-screen entry. While going to the Grimoire via the website is enjoyable, I don't find it worthwhile if I'm wanting to move on the go, and get back to the task at hand. Something I'm sure Destiny fans will agree with quite adamantly.

While the Grimoire does uncover quite a bit of story that is hidden throughout the worlds and is only unlockable if found. Let alone does this bit of story explain things such as the Exo's, the Awoken, enemies, locales, and more - players would quite possibly enjoy popping up an in-game screen that explains these events. Even with these minor things, Bungie has a lot to fix and not a lot of time with Destiny 2's release window. Let alone do they need to resolve the issues at hand there can always be more to arise. For now? We'll have to wait and see what direction they take with "Rise of Iron" and Destiny 2 in 2017.

While all these shortcomings have been trouble for Destiny, Bungie has definitely been taking notes as they've been vocal on what they are doing, what's going on through their pipeline, and what they are looking into thanks to the fans. Now we just have to wait and see if they will take the mistakes players were angered with and fix them in their future releases. We can only hope that Crucible will also once more see the return of vehicle based maps.

Destiny's third expansion "Rise of Iron" is set to launch September 20th, 2016. Pre-orders of the content will contain a limited edition black and silver Iron Gjallarhorn rocket launcher.