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Destiny

Discuss all things Destiny.
Edited by aceebro: 4/1/2015 7:20:39 AM
107

On Destiny vs. The E3 2013 Demo

[b]Preface:[/b] I would like to start off by saying that this is likely going to be a big wall of text. There will be a conclusion at the bottom summing up my main points, however. We have all (likely) seen people on here whine and complain about the E3 2013 Demo, and how what it seemed to be then has differentiated itself from what the game is now. These are often met with things such as "It's the same game only with less polish", and "The only difference I could see was a mixed subclass"; however, I believe that the people making these remarks are merely viewing things from the mechanics side of gameplay, while those talking about the video are looking at the small differences, causing a shift in the feel of the game. My goal today is to go through the video, and find those small changes, and to help articulate the disappointment that various people feel, without simply stating "Oh look at how different everything is!". Let us begin. [b]0:07[/b]- This opening shot holds an absolutely beautiful landscape. To be honest, I haven't seen one that beautiful in game yet. They all seem to be less detailed, or cut off earlier. In fact, in the full game, the area where this is has been clogged up with fog, and the landscape as seen here is nonexistent. [b]1:04[/b]- This is our hero of the video. He is not teleporting in from his personal ship, but he is jumping down from what appears to be a carrier ship. This does two things: him jumping down simply looks more heroic than teleporting in, and we [b]only[/b] teleport down in the full game; the ship appears to be a military carrier of some kind. The ship being a carrier makes implications that rather than being some lone wolf, he is actually [b]part[/b] of something. We don't get that in the full game, we're simply on our own the whole time. [b]1:25[/b]- At least they cut the annoying narrators in the full release. [b]3:42[/b]- Here we meet the ghost. Rather than his boring, flat lines (and delivery of lines), we meet a sassy, more animated ghost. [b]4:35[/b]- This part is so cool! The lights come on, it reveals this massive area, the ghost says a line indicating that enemies are probably inbound. This kind of stuff rocks. Shame it was [i]nowhere to be found[/i] within the final release. [b]4:45[/b]- This is where we start to see our first gunplay. Throughout the demo we will see more, and it will look nearly identical to final release. The only real differences are minor changes in what pulse rifles look like, how subclasses, originally called focuses (they should have stuck with focuses), are set up, and the secondary handcannon. [b]4:45[/b]- See those shanks that came out of nowhere shooting dinklebot? See the enemies on the far side rushing out of hiding? The shank that retreats when its friends are all dead? A few seconds after that, an enemy jumps down from the ceiling! There is almost none of that in the full game. Yeah, it happens a couple times. The fallen at the beginning that you have to (or at least are recommended to) melee, and the cabal all jumping out of their dropships during the exclusion zone, along with a few other, even more forgettable, occasions I'm sure. But rather than making this [enemies doing interesting stuff] a common theme in the game, Bungie decided to make enemies come in endless streams from magic doors. [b]6:25-6:53[/b]- So, either bosses used to be an absolute joke, or that handcannon was shooting Gjallarhorn shots. Either way, I'm glad they upped the difficulty. [b]6:53[/b]- Rixis dropped Thunderlord. He dropped Thunderlord. He did not drop an engram, that was later decrypted into Thunderlord. He was not part of a nightfall or something where at the end screen Thunderlord popped into the player's inventory. Rixis actually dropped the gun onto the ground, then it was picked up. I'm aware that this seems like a small detail, but it really isn't. Getting loot in the game is one of the most important things. And it is so unsatisfying. It is really important, for most people, that people see what they got. They get a visual cue that they should be excited for. In game that just isn't there. It also implies that by killing certain enemies you will, if you're lucky, get certain exotics. The only places where that's true is Atheon and Crota. Besides that, it's any exotic from anywhere. The loot drop/lootsplosion mechanics are important to the feel of the game, and even compared to their pre-alpha, Bungie dropped the ball. [b]9:06[/b]- OH MY GOD. DID YOU SEE THAT? THAT WAS INCREDIBLE!!!! The sky got dark, then the ship warped in, then there was a big shock wave and the tower fell over, then there were more ships, and IT WAS AWESOME!! Now here's my question: [b]Where did things like that go[/b]? Those things make the world feel [i]alive[/i]. It makes it feel like when you're doing a public event you are actually doing something, not just completing a diversion for some marks or a bounty. It was this moment that truly started to sell me on the game almost two years ago. What we got instead was beyond disappointing. [b]11:18[/b]- You see that? That's the carrier! Really heavily implying that we are part of something, once again. [b]11:24[/b]- Oh look! Epic speaker speech! "War is coming. We barely survived the last. We must regain the offensive." These kinds of things are important. These kinds of things are [u]really[/u] important. They explain what's going on. They explain why we have to fight how we do. They give the narrative a driving force. [b]The closest thing we got to that was some sort of sad speaker speech about how he could tell us X, Y or Z[/b]. Moreover, notice how the speaker was on a balcony with the player. That implies that the player is important. Some sort of serious military force that's talking directly with somebody who is very clearly a leader of humanity. We got nothing like that in the full game. [b]11:30[/b]- The Vex, Hive, and Cabal appear to be way more aggressive on here than the full game. I'll simply chalk that up to advertising though. [b]11:36[/b]- Okay, first off let me say that I'm a very auditory person. When I say very auditory person, I mean I almost broke into tears when I heard the tune that started playing here for the first time. Anyways, what happened to this whole section? This had such heavy implications for the story. "Why is the city breathing down my neck?" Oh, so what you're saying is that the city is some sort of authority, and is trying to impose justice on some rogue or something. Not only that, but they have the structure and government to actually breathe down somebody's neck. Cool. "Out here in the wild, this is how we talk." Implies that this whole thing is a big jungle to be explored. It's not. [b]11:46[/b]- Beautiful scenery shots implying that the worlds are larger than they are. [b]11:51[/b]- Saturn. There is no Saturn. [b]11:55[/b]- Oh look! There's the speaker telling us how important we are! How vital everything is! How we will [b]become legend[/b] (the game's catchphrase, that isn't even said in game) and that if we fail we're all screwed. This was such an awesome moment in the trailer. I can almost assure you that with this final moment, 99% of everybody on the fence of whether or not they wanted the game fell to the want side. Shame that in the full game there are already "guardians fighting on Mars and Venus", and we're just another member of the horde. [b]Conclusion:[/b] In many ways, the game is the same. The gunplay and, more basic, enemy mechanics remain essentially unchanged. That is a definite plus, as Destiny has some of the tightest gunplay and best normal enemy encounters that I've ever seen in a game. Unfortunately, the game doesn't feel like the trailer. It doesn't feel big, epic, alive. It feels like a flat soda. It's still sweet, sure, but it's missing that feel to make it into something that's really great.
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