Destiny. You're like the friend nobody else seems to like, but I like you. If someone else attacks you, I defend you even though I'm aware of your faults. They're ok to me because I know you meant well, and I enjoy the good parts of you. But that doesn't mean you aren't without those faults, or that I'm not aware of them. So I'm going to try and reach out to you now. When I heard about you, long before I met you, from my other friends... I thought you were the coolest and I couldn't WAIT to meet you. Man I talked about you like I already knew you, how great you were gonna be. I watched videos that your parents made about you, I read the articles written about you, the updates, talked to other people who had heard about you just as bad. You were going to be the video game Jesus. Halo intertwined with World of Warcraft. I was going to get to explore Earth as I'd never seen it before, and the planets and moons around us. I couldn't wait to hear the stories you had to tell, I had hung out with your brother Halo and his stories were incredible. They always felt real to life and every time he told a new one, I'd get so much out of it, more insight into the old ones. And from everything I was hearing, you were even better: your brother taken to another level. A unique person like nobody I've ever met. I remember the first time I met you, a brief visit over a few days. I got to hang out with you in Old Russia on Earth, and even got to hang out at the Ocean of Storms on the Moon. It was a fantastic first meeting! You seemed to be everything I had expected you to be. I couldn't wait to see the rest of Earth, the Moon, and the solar system!!! The only thing that sucked about that first meeting was having it end, but I knew I would be getting to spend serious time with you very soon! Then the day came when I got to bring you over to my place to chill. Dude, I was so excited when we got into my living room and turned on the tv, no homo. I don't mind telling you this now because we've been through a lot since then. I found myself back on Earth, back on Old Russia. Perfect, I knew exactly what to do here, and floated through those initial missions. It was just as beautiful as the first time, my environment was breathtaking, the vistas and terrain to explore expansive for only the first level on Earth. Once I was reaching the end of Old Russia, I got even more excited at seeing the next place on Earth you would take me to. Then the Moon opened up, and I knew I'd get to see much more of it than the first time we went there. Figuring I'd go back to Earth, I hopped in my jumpship and explored the Ocean of Storms again. Half way through, you called me back to Earth to kill that certain giant purple eyeball, and it was back to the Moon. Getting close to the end of the Moon missions, I saw Venus open up! I was expecting more of Earth but I didn't even care, I had you take me to Venus the moment I could swing that very first level. The Ishtar Sink... my god. I thought Earth was beautiful, I thought seeing the ISS in shambles above the moon was impressive... Venus was another level (pardon the pun). To this day and I'm sure for a very long time to come, I will never be impressed with a digital environment the way I was with your Venus. I still, many gaming hours and months later, look around me in awe. It was truly a privilege to get to experience that with you. Then we were off to Meridian Bay, Mars and I knew I was approaching level 20. I believe I finished the game at level 19 after that intense sequence with the Divisive Mind in the Black Garden (which I loved). The cutscene that followed provided wonderful closure for the initial stages of the game, and left me hungering to find more of your story. I had heard that your endgame began at level 20, so I travelled around doing random patrols until I reached that milestone. I figured maybe we'd go to Earth again now, or a different order of the previous planets, or see something entirely new now! You didn't offer anything to me in the Director, so I figured I needed to score some more Light points. I let you take me on a journey to revisit all of our awesome adventures. We were able to relive them all, over and over again over the next month. During that time, you told me about this cool new joint called Vault of Glass, and that I should gather meself a crew and sail there. So I did, and I spent so much time in there discovering new things. You also showed me new ways to experience our old adventures with Nightfall and Weekly modifiers, and I was more than willing to do them with you. I had no problem, because you'd been such a blast to hang out with! I admit I cheated a little along the way, you gave me some things to do in that Vault of Glass and somewhere along the line I started taking shortcuts that let me finally finish the tasks you gave me. Once you figured out those loopholes, my other buddies and I had already gathered enough gear to make the legit versions much easier. Did you know there's a place online and a bunch of people gather every day and do nothing but talk about you? It's cray. But as always during this time I would come to the Bungie.net forums. That's the place I was just talking about. Man you have some people that are super down for you, and you have some straaaaaaaaaaight haters on there. I always stuck up for you though. They'd talk about how you only had the same stories over and over again, and you really had nothing fresh. They'd talk about those little mistakes you made during VoG, and had some hella crazy conspiracy theories about how you even came to be born. I was ALWAYS quick to have your back though, like I said. Cuz you're my boy, blue! I did wonder though, how's come when I talked about your stories... you couldn't ever help me tell them? Why didn't you tell them? I always had to point them to books where you had written everything down, and much of it was there in pieces for me to put together. Hey man, I love a puzzle and a mystery so I didn't mind too much, I just wished more of it came directly from you because so many people missed out on it. Your little dude Peter D for some reason always sounded out of it when he tried helping you out by telling your stories, so it was kind of hard to follow sometimes. Your other story teller pals usually sounded legit though, but they just didn't say a whole lot. Anyways, somewhere along the line I realized you weren't going to take me to a new place on Earth, or the Moon... at least not yet. But that was okay, because like I kept telling people... I know this dude's parents, I know his brother. Believe me, they have more up their sleeves than this. Remember, this is Halo meets World of Warcraft, and I knew that in WoW there were free bits of content released every so often between paid expansions (even whole raids Zul Gurub, Ahn'Quiraj, Caverns of Time, etc). Surely you were gonna hook us up before the first expansion came out, right? Regardless I enjoyed playing and when you told me you were expecting, I was so excited for you, and for me, and the rest of your friends! You were gonna name it The Dark Below, and it sounded compleeeeeeeeeetely badass! (Continued, see post #2 for conclusion)