Let me start off by saying I am no video game expert. If you are looking for a someone very knowledgeable on games read either Jackie Beiter’s articles or Casey Bowker. I figured if I’m going to talk about video games I might as well direct you to people that actually know what they are talking about.
I love shooters. Any game where you get to shoot the bad guys is fun and a little cathartic. Trying to out-strategize the enemy so you can single handedly or with a small team take out overwhelming enemy forces is very fun for me. It’s the same reason I love fighting games but it’s on a larger scale. Recently I got Destiny 2 from my awesome wife and I couldn’t wait to write about it.
Before I go on about my loves and hates of both Destiny & Destiny 2, I want to talk about the bad guys in these types of games. Destiny, Halo, Doom, and Half-Life have one major thing in common for me, the bad guys aren’t regular people. There are a number of first person shooters (FPS) as well as third person shooters (TPS) that have human as the targets. I am not a fan of these as a rule. I played Sniper Elite, Call of Duty, Battlefield, and Wolfenstein. While I didn’t hate these games, it was a little weird to be targeting people. It wasn’t really until I thought about it that it started to weird me out. I don’t judge people for playing these games at all since it’s normal but I guess it has become odd to me. I know it’s not like killing real people or anything but I prefer my enemies to be aliens or some kind of monster, the bigger the better. I’m afraid of blurring that reality line and envisioning people I know or interact with as targets. No judgement if you do that but I really don’t want to embrace my inner sociopath.
There is a mode where you can play vs other players but I don’t play that one too much. I’m more into the cooperative raids and impromptu type missions. I’m a big fan of taking down the Servitor (big mechanical eyeball looking things) and the Ogres. Something about big baddies getting shot at by me gets my interest. After playing enough cooperative and since I was paying for it, I figured I might as well give the PVP a try.
It wasn’t until I got into playing online with others that I realized I wasn’t great at these game. I play them in single player mode on the normal difficulty and I do fine. I don’t die too much and I don’t consider it terribly difficult. When I play online there are people much better than me and a very few amount that are far worse. I love to watch people drastically better than me play so I can pick up techniques but I don’t have to get as good as them to enjoy playing. I assume that every person dramatically better than me is likely a tween kid that’s eating nothing but Lucky Charms and drinking straight Hershey’s syrup. I’m terrible at sex but I still have fun so it’s similar. Luckily, I don’t have to see the looks disappointment on the faces of my clan members if I don’t perform well.
Destiny & Destiny 2 are the exact same game. This isn’t a bad thing, why fix something that isn’t borked? Physics, gameplay, characters, and voices are all the same. The villain in 2 is a bit more fleshed out, being Batman The Dark Knight Rises’ Bane had a baby with Megatron that has Deadpool skin issues. The main difference in 2 is the use of micro transactions. Basically, there are spheres you can buy that get you in game stuff that you wouldn’t otherwise be able to have. The main issue is the shader becoming a consumable that you can’t buy individually. This is a drawback but doesn’t do anything for the play of the game. I honestly don’t care if my Titan’s gear is color coordinated but I can see it being a drawback.
Overall, I couldn’t recommend Destiny 2 enough. It’s super fun and you can get caught in there for hours. Any game that can help you lose your sense of time is A-OKAY in my book.
As always I am Tim McDonald, your movie watching stunt double. Hit me up on Twitter or Facebook to make suggestions or comments.
