Astonishing, really, that the grouping tools and interface can be so poor. I just tried to complete my first Nightfall via Forums, LFG sites, and even the PSN Destiny "communities", and it was a resounding failure. 45m of messaging and invites back and forth, then finally joining a fireteam (who weren't terrible, but the same 2 people kept dying at the Mind), and that's it. Back to orbit. Removed each other from friends--and did the same with all the other randos that I couldn't quite connect with. Now I'm done. I won't be touching any further-tiered content since that seems like it will be an even greater waste of time simply to even access it with a complete group. My experience is not an uncommon one, and when it takes a person 30-40m simply to "prepare" for content, you've done something wrong in your game. Luke, Cosmo and the rest, are you guys actually aware of what other games offer? [b]FFXIV[/b]: A full matchmaking suite for everything [i]except [/i]the top tier raid with numerous options. The top tier raid can be organized, efficiently, through the LFG panel. Furthermore, the LFG panel has every option imaginable, from setting ilvls (think Light Level), to posting short descriptions and setting specific classes for each slot. EVERYTHING FFXIV DOES IN LFG COULD BE RECREATED IN DESTINY. The game is far more complex and it runs on older platforms, too. [b]DCUO[/b]: Same thing as XIV with additional options set to the instances themselves. [b]Warframe[/b]: Near instant and flawless MM, with numerous options. [b]ESO[/b]: Their social systems are horrible, and somehow still more functional and built into the game than anything of Destiny's framework. If you're chasing ESO for 2nd place in social functionality, there's a problem, Bungie. [b]WoW[/b]: Maybe just pop upstairs with some cupcakes and ask them to code your game for an afternoon. They've perfected loot-treadmills and carrot-on-a-stick instance progression, and their social tools are top of the class. If you can't figure it out yourself, seek external advice. Instead you're wasting resources on a gear manager, rather that fixing the near-worthless social tools that have existed in your game for over a year. The biggest shame about this game, to me, is how brilliant and tight the mechanics are, and how intriguing the world can be at times. Again, though, bizarre decisions such as setting up numerous, PS2 era friending and communication systems, and leaving that glorious world's tale undiscovered or removed from the immersive-environment of the game, continue to undermine any other decisions that are made. ("Let's put all the cool lore in cards that you read on your phone"--said nobody, ever, except at Bungie HQ). I can certainly say that you've done a very good job at convincing people to stay ignorant of any of the above options prevalent in multiplayer games today. I don't care whether it's LFG, optional matchmaking, or whatever, but a phone-app that browses forums and managing friends lists is ass-backwards compared to how EVERYONE ELSE ON THE MARKET DOES IT. You're not being different, Bungie, or cool, or trendy, since the trends have all moved FORWARD. For the love of God, please join the rest of us in 2015. Take care, Guardians. Edit (Formatting and Critical Reviews for TTK Added): [i]As most players agree the six player co-op is the best thing in the game but with just one new, hard to access, raid The Taken King does nothing to expand it. [b]Especially as there’s still no matchmaking for anything other than the three-player strike[/b][/i]—Metro [i]Where World of Warcraft has spent the best part of a decade iterating and improving MMO mechanics, Destiny seemed intent on reinventing them from scratch. The game launched with almost no matchmaking functionality for any serious play, requiring players to put themselves into teams of three to six friends manually. Bungie insisted on treating co-operative and competitive play the same for balancing purposes, ensuring that weapons were frequently bizarrely overpowered or completely useless. Earning high-level loot, explicitly required to participate in the game’s high-point, the Vault of Glass raid, was an exercise in frustration and destructive psychological loops to the extent that players chose to stand outside a cave shooting low-level enemies for hours on end to earn rewards, rather than play the game “as intended”. [b]Those are problems World of Warcraft experienced at launch, too – over a decade ago[/b][/i]—The Guardian. [i]The Taken King's best content is often the stuff that highlights one of the game's worst remaining flaws: [b]For an online game, it can be really hard to find people to play with[/b]. The Taken King's three best repeatable sources for loot — the weekly Nightfall, the new raid and the Court of Oryx — don't feature matchmaking at all, requiring you to use third-party websites to fill a fireteam if you don't have any friends online. What's more frustrating is that The Taken King's new hyper-challenging public events, which are intended to bring strangers in the same area together, have actually formed altogether new social disconnects[/i].—Polygon