To start I have to say that Destiny is a really, really pretty game. It looks for all intents and purposes fantastic. However the environment/world so far has been boring, extremely boring.
Environment
The maps and environments the players play in are seriously sterile and lifeless, the player can’t interact with it on any level whatsoever and nothing changes no matter how much time has passed or what happens. The best example of this is where you can see the Fallen and the Hive duking it out in the areas of the Cosmodrone. Sure they are fighting each other, in the same places however they do nothing else but give us something to shoot. You don’t see which side wins, there aren’t corpses littered around, you don’t see them disposing (or absorbing) their dead and because no one ever wins there are no effects on the environment.
Imagine the Fallen cleansing the area of the hive presence when they win while observing the toxic effect the hive previously had on the environment retreat as the Fallen become more present in the tunnels and set up a serious base of operations. Only to have the hive emerge from right underneath them in a surprise assault which defeats/displaces the fallen and watch the environment undergo another shift where the barnacles and green miasma of the Hive spread into buildings and the general area. Instead we have a few units that run out and shoot each other over and over again where we could have a wonderful, interesting and intricate cycle.
Also there is legitimately nothing to find in the environment except a chest or ghost here or there (and spinmetal) players should be able to scavenge things from dead guardians (not PCs), old supply caches, supplies guarded by enemies etc. There is none of that to be found here which makes adventuring/ killing never ending re-spawned AI’s unrewarding. Scavenging in this setting makes sense and for gameplay it fits in for exchange and glimmer purposes.
[spoiler]The use of only one unchanging map “for everything” should not occur. Ever. I really do hope we come back to earth and unlock even more areas to enjoy so we have some variety but for now we have been in the same map for many separate missions (and raid of sorts) going in slightly different directions each time. All of these missions should have really been clumped together namely finding the ship and the warp drive and finding the hive then activating the array. This would help improve player interest in going back to these areas.[/spoiler]
Lifeless
The NPC’s in this game are glorified vending machines or seemingly do nothing at all. They have exceedingly little substance with only a fragment of personality given in their dialogue, I have no reason to care about the various groups that have vendors in the game or their views as their missions consist of two sentences in free mode that involve collecting or killing things that have no impact on their dialogue, actions or environment. What you do is folded out of existence never to be heard again until you repeat that same mission [spoiler]and considering we just came back from the dead this is the perfect opportunity to allow the player to ask questions or inform us of these things while interacting with characters we will be seeing often.[/spoiler]
Your enemies have no purpose whatsoever. They stand around, looking around places for no reason and then defend them to the death like they are somehow important (none of them actually run away or escape). Killing on sight is ok for some but the Fallen are a hit and run race that are supposed to utilise agility to fight yet they stand out in the open most of the time and are not agile in any sense of the word (they can also scale walls really well but I have yet to see that actually implemented in their AI).
All in all these reasons kill any intention of going back to explore because you already know exactly what it will be like and know that it hasn't changed since you last saw it.
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I agree with this
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I'm sure everyone is enjoying their time playing the Destiny Beta which I sure am! it will all come to an end July 27th where we then have to wait until 9-9-14 to pick up the official game. Now I am saddened by this because I enjoy playing the beta very much and I am very impatient to wait for this great game to come out! So why don't we the voice try and get the beta to stick around a little longer! Use the hashtag #PlayALittleMore to keep the beta around a bit longer. Spread the movement. Join the group "Lets Play" to start the group of the voice
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I agree. For those who say "it's still in beta" name me 5 games you've seen in beta from that have totally revamped the development side of things. I'm not talking slight tweaks or glitter added, I'm saying mechanically. Unfortunately, I think our gripes are here to stay. This is how they've chosen to use their focus time and get the lore and game running. If anything, I could see these additions being slightly added into the DLC, or Destiny 2.
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Изменено (John Crucible): 7/22/2014 1:21:33 AMI'm with you on this. The AI could really use some tuning, as well as some Level Scaling; the areas on Earth will have almost no replay value to a higher-level Player since every enemy has become a push over to them. Without Enemy Scaling the game has also become that much more Anti-social because it's either nobody needs help, or nobody wants to help because they don't want to show-off. And then if Scaling was a thing in Destiny, Players would then be joining together when they are all being challenged by the opposition. (Too much faith in People?) Playing with lower level friends when you're more experienced then them is as awkward as it gets in Destiny since the options are to demolish everything in sight while ruining their experience or to sit back and be a cheerleader for them. " Don't worry, You'll kill that Wizard eventually."
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Vote choices are all wrong. The game is great an I DO want to see changes made because it's only beta...
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I agree with this, the lack of communication / awkward fireteams and the back to orbit nonsense.... aaannnnnd here is my wall of text. To the people who are kissing ass for no reason saying the game is perfect and the like... grow a pair (not if you are a woman though... you stay.. you) - have an opinion on something, communicate, grow as a society. This is directed at Bungie and fellow forum... so sometimes the target changes unexpectedly. I know they refuse to hear MMO or really want to completely distance themselves from it. **However, as one map in a demo/beta** they are creating a world where story /explore is dull and too quickly extinguished. Sure you can go back and eliminate the same baddies, redo those dreadful beacon missions, find some dead ghosts (meh), find poorly placed loot chests (only a couple require ingenuity) or look to help people.. but the investment in your character and it's impact on the world suffers. I mentioned it before - I hope they can avoid that trap of becoming the completed story /now it's only pvp game. Many people love pvp, but there is a population just as large, if not larger, that wants to be immersed in something more. Give me better reasons for powering up my console with YOUR game in it. What will make us go back time and time again to improve our Guardians? Why do I care about my Guardian? Maybe certain enemies that only come around in certain weather or other conditions (dense fog, make it so!).. and they drop different gear or a rare material you can only get from them to use in your crafting or to put on the market. Some people live to grind. Bless their little hearts. More story, more depth, more concern for my character's development aside from an occasional new weapon. Seriously, as you are aware, you must create the need for someone to come back ALL the time and those big RPG do just that. I understand you want to separate yourself and stand alone, but pluck the successful elements and don't be afraid to incorporate more of them. No one will call you a clone - you are already different. Hopefully you aren't just looking for spectacular initial sales numbers (which you will no doubt get). Keep your player in the world: crafting, marketplace?, better social structure etc. Yes it is a beta and we all may be saying things that Bungie is well aware of and already incorporated in the full release... but even a company that large can't think of everything and it always helps to have a multitude of fresh (or stale) inputs - even if some are a little off base.
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I agree along with many others this game is far what I personally expected. I assumed I would just walked out from the tower and start my adventure like Skyrim or an elder scrolls game and make my own story. To my surprise I find it to be what I call in the MMO crowd a Dungeon crawler where you have a mission and you go to the end of the level to complete said mission. Then when its finished you go back to the mission select screen. Granted I put up with it, maybe get a feel to the story and maybe this game has more to offer. But sadly I have no idea what I am fighting for or why I am here. I feel like just a face in the crowd known as this "Guardian" to fight against the darkness. I get assumed when I see the voice of the traveler and he tells me that I must have many questions to ask "well yea I do and you never told me what the heck happened I mean I died so fill me in GIVE ME SOMETHING GIVE ME PURPOSE TO EXIST!!!" All I have to go on is that "I go kill darkness make human race free" ( I say that with broken english cause that's alI i got from that), I also picked up dead ghosts and I assumed that I would learn some story for finding these and I still get no info even when it tells me to go to the website to learn more. The map indeed is empty I tried to go into caves maybe to find something interesting like a fallen hide out or a hive cave or FREAKING SOMETHING!!!!! But no I just find an empty cave with maybe a few enemies that I just kill with no effort. Maybe I might find a loot crate but thats probably the highlight of my efforts to explore this "expansive free roam world". When I did the missions in explore mode I would just end up back tracking and I would moan and groan having to fight the same enemies in the same locations with no variety. I thought it was interesting that certain races would fight each other, but if thats all you have to blow me away with, I might as well cancel my pre order because bungie is already on thin ice. Sometimes when I sneak up behind and enemies I would just stand there directly behind them and they would not notice me until I shot them or moved in front of their line of sight which just made me face palm. Probably the only thing I could get out of the beta was how large the environment was and how beautiful it looked. Other than that I see no reason to buy this game either bungie delays this game for another year or wait until the unbiased reviews come out and see if its worth anything. I am an MMO player and the excuse for "oh its a beta give them some slack they are just testing it out" that is a poor excuse to look past these flaws. The game comes out in september and its july, if you expect changes to suddenly come out of nowhere then you are a slave to the industry. I have probably ranted enough for now but I am very disappointed in what I was promised. Maybe I will buy it or may I will save my money for "No Man Sky" because that is the type of exploration I am personally looking for that destiny is poorly lacking in. ( do not bash on my grammar I do not personally care I know it sucks)
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This is a BETA not a full game release
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I really agree with all of your points. The environment as it is right now is nothing but a pretty background for killing enemies over and over again. But beyond being pretty the levels should tell a story that immerses the player. In ODST we had audio logs that told a nice little story that had almost nothing to do with the main plot, but immersed the players by giving a little bit of background about the world. In Old Russia we should get something similar like letters, datapads or anything that gives us some information about how the cosmodrome worked before the darkness, or even an eyewitness account of the attack. Give us a little puzzle where you can open a hidden room with a bunch of skeletons and a letter that explains how a family tried to hide there during the attack and got trapped inside. Fallout 3 did stuff like that extremely well. Almost every Vault, cave, house, factory or raider outpost had at least a little bit of backstory, making exploration very rewarding. And show us why we should hate the Fallen (beside the fact that they wanna shoot us). Right now they feel kind of generic. In ODST you can see the Brutes mistreating an innocent little Engineer. That makes me feel good about myself when I finally kill them. Give the villains some character so we can kill them with more satisfaction. The same goes with NPC's in the Tower. Make them more than just faces. When I first saw Lord Shaxx I thought he looked super imposing and I wanted to know more about the guy. But right now we get nothing. I would also like to see some NPC's in the combat zone. Maybe a tiny little outpost manned by a small fireteam of guardians who are searching for some old world artifact. That would make the world more alive, give us a little backstory and even provide the opportunity for a public event where you have to defend the outpost against an onslaught of enemies. Granted we have only seen a small sliver of the story (I hope!), but as it is Old Russia is not a very interesting place. I remain somewhat hopeful however, that some of these points will be adressed in the final game.
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Изменено (saline solution): 7/21/2014 2:35:42 AMHere's what I like about Destiny: Imagining I'm mankind's last hope. Except for that guy, and that other guy there, and this other guy, and every other Tom, Dick & Harry I pass on the street. How ferociously the enemies guard their treasure-stuffed strongholds. Like abandoned shacks and bear caves. How determined the enemy is to keep fighting. Just a minute or so after you've killed them, they're back up and at it, in the same place. It makes you truly feel the futility of mankind's plight, when slaughtering the enemy has about as much effect as twisting their nipples. It's a good thing they just stand around and do nothing all day or such resilient foes surely would have overrun the city long ago. The massive scale of the tower, almost as large as my Uncle Mike's back yard. The NPCs' dedication to the cause. They stand in the same place all day and all night and do nothing but give you quests and services. The vastness of the terrain. I stand on the cliffs in the Divide and stare across the distant and forlorn landscape, wondering how I get down there. (Still trying) The depth of the planning and strategy needed to beat bosses. Choosing which variation of "shoot them 2500 times" is best suited for each boss. The sense of danger inherent in battles. If the battle goes badly for me I'll have to run away real fast. If by some miracle the enemy actually kills me I respawn a whole 20 yards away and have to walk back.
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Изменено (D Rock): 7/21/2014 4:51:07 PMThe game is currently on last gen consoles. I hope in the future when the game is only on our current gen consoles that we see some improvements: destructible backgrounds (like battlefield) or more interactions that we can perform with our ghost to "improve" or build things back up. I would also like to some some NPC's out there: something other than the warring factions.
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Изменено (MRayn): 7/21/2014 2:51:41 PMImpressive post, I must say. I never really though about that, but, because of you, now I feel sad for the lack of these things your just pointed. I hate you now! Hahahahaha You are completely right. Some animals here, some environment souds there... If each of these species have a backgroud story, let us know! Let them fight among themselves! Let them celebrate on victory or escape on defeat. They should be trying to survive and that means: creating camps, gathering things, building, I don't know, all of this. They should have created an environment that can survive for itself, without necessary external influence. Something that let me sit down and watch as many other things happen. This is a MMO and THAT'S WHY it should happen like this. If you are not at spot A, you will not see something big happening, but, at the same time, you are at point B seeing something completely different! Turning off the console and coming back one day later should bring the feeling of "jesus, what did I lose????" because the place you thought you knew so well now has a wall created by The Hive. And this will ask you and your friends to get together to take this thing down to make it back to normal. I loved your post!
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I just wanted some more intriguing wildlife and thing that you can track through sounds and vision... I think that all of these other ideas would be good but some animals would be just fine. :)
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Need I remind some people, that in regards to the fictional canon, an few alien races are here and they're not too fond of our home planet, so I'm pretty sure a good chunk of species got wiped out during the invasions over the years. Sorry there's no puppy dogs and buffalo roaming the wilderness. Secondly, NPCs aren't going to be flashy and important, otherwise we would be able to play as them. Your story is about your Guardian, not Steve the flight & hangar manager. That sorry bloke is nothing compared to the godliness of your guardian standing and dancing in the hallways... At least appreciate the fact that for some of the NPCs, they used real voice actors, like the gunsmith is Marcus from Gears of War, and Jake from Adventure Time, and that one female faction-mission lady was an admiral for the Quarian Fleet, and she was also in Exorcism of Emily Rose.
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Yes I agree. I'm not too fond of the fact that the enemies just kinda stand around. They should be up to something. They should be doing things that makes it look like you should stop them. But this is just the beta so far. Maybe we will see a change ?
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You don't understand. This is a beta (demo). They aren't showing you a lot of content because of that. The story will expound on some of the various NPCs, I'm sure. And what in the blazes are you talking about? The world is amazing, and filled with an incredible sense of detail. You must not have a background in game development, or you'd know that having the war end in a deciding factor pretty much requires them revamping the entire system for that area. The fact that a FPS has a random war like that occur in itself is an awesome feat. The fact you have an open world to explore is an awesome feat. If you want more interaction, go play Skyrim. But see, then you miss out on the dynamic world that Bungie has worked their asses off to create, that you dare call lifeless.
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I thought "The Wild" sounded like it should have fauna (other than immortal birds), there's [b]nothing[/b] alive in any area. [spoiler]yes, we know. [b]IT'S A BETA...[/b] [/spoiler] Wild dogs, tigers (it's Russia), killer bunnies, [i]anything[/i], I'd even settle for molerats, just something other than standard enemy types.
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I'm just really bemused at how there were people who suffered from withdrawal after the Alpha, which had less content. Such exaggeration, imo.
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A few things that would help: Enemy patrols that don't just stand in one place. Animals or other neutral NPCs. Different things to find. Effects on the world, such as the fallen and hive battles actually having a winner that takes over for a while. Weather would be cool.
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Изменено (ANever-EndingWar): 7/21/2014 7:13:36 AMSome of the most awkward moments of the story missions were when I would walk into the rooms or corridors where the Hive are suppose to be fighting the Fallen, and when you first walk up, the Hive enemies are just chillin, sittin there. When you get close enough they finally sprint over to fight the Fallen, and it's like you kill the entire group of Hive enemies before they even had a shot at attacking the Fallen. Or on the open map when the Hive enemies respawn and they walk over towards an area closeby where the Fallen respawn, they seem to just run around eachother and hide behind stuff. Kinda wish there were like armies of these things going head to head with bodies dropping everywhere. And I'd like to see the dead bodies remain on the map for a while. But anyways, the Beta has a few moments like this lol. The enemies are literally just sitting there waiting for the player at all times. Literally the only interaction in the game not involving other players is the Ghost. NPCs and all are just sitting there, say and do nothing really. I wonder if you run into NPC Guardians actually fighting during the story at all. And Idk if its just me, but do the Fallen and Hive enemies not have any form of interaction with eachother? It seems like they each just grunt and make a couple noises. Shouldn't the Captains be ordering the low rank enemies and doing crazy battlecrys and stuff?
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No idea why you think this. Are you playing alone or with friends? I think the game is extremely engaging. Yeah they can do things like make more public events and have them more often but hell man... It's not "LIFELESS" [spoiler]unless of course you have been playing with the sous bug that is associated with lag.[/spoiler]
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I think some different and un predictable weather would be awesome! There's snow lying around - would be cool if the occasional snow storm blew in which would change the way you play the game.
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To be fully fair. Destiny is fairly accurate in terms of living breathing worlds the exception being the planet Earth. If you look at real life footage of Venus, Mars, & The Moon they are wastelands. Barren tundras of sand, rock, and in Venus' case...acid, lava, and lightning. That said...unless The Darkness killed every animal on Earth...we should have some Wildlife walking around. Perhaps we have to protect it from The Fallen & Hive? I do agree on the topic of NPCs they are just sorta "there".
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I mean even if the enemies were more populated and chased after you relentlessly (I can just run over a hill to let my shields recharge) it would make it more challenging. I think the Explore variant should have a 1-10 difficulty setting.
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I like the fact it's not crawling with enemies. But things like wildlife and more interactive areas objects would be great.
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Destiny's "explore" worlds are beautiful but feel barren. I understand if Mars and the moon are not that populated with living things, but Earth needs some animals or some thing in it that create the feel of a living Eco system (ala far cry). And honestly I am hoping that new planets yet to be seen will include various forms habitats and ecosystems ( jungle, snow, dessert, Forrest, ect) with each having their own sets of life and population on the planet.