This week’s launch of Future 2: Lightfall noticed an enormous inflow of gamers on Steam and console to take a look at Bungie’s subsequent enlargement for its on-line shooter. Because the penultimate story for its Gentle and Darkness saga, paving the way in which for The Remaining Form in 2024, Lightfall shifts the bigger plot in the direction of the concluding chapters of its 10 yr story whereas revising its gameplay techniques. Nonetheless, the general reception from the neighborhood appears to inform a special sort of story.
Following the February 28 launch, gamers on social media, the Future 2 reddit, and on YouTube have been actively voicing issues with the present state of the enlargement. Whereas the Future neighborhood has not been shy about sharing opinions, there have been a wave of criticism in regards to the core narrative of Lightfall, the brand new setting of Neomuna, the advanced strategies to unlock Strand, and the way troublesome it’s for brand new and returning gamers to return to a modified expertise.
At present, Steam critiques on Lightfall are at a “principally detrimental” ranking, with gamers disapproving of the sport’s narrative and its general method to a yearly reset. For now, we’ll break down some key takeaways from the neighborhood and what Bungie has addressed in its latest This Week At Bungie weblog put up.
The Important Narrative
A lot has occurred within the universe of Future since its debut in 2014. Following massive conflicts with the Fallen, Hive, Vex, Cabal, and Taken factions, the Guardians have now cast alliances with splinter teams from their opposing armies, and have even embraced some restricted powers from the darkness. All of the whereas, a brand new risk within the type of The Witness, an emissary of The Darkness and the present huge dangerous of Future 2, who seeks the Traveler for their very own nefarious functions.
On the finish of the Season of the Seraph – a now-retired occasion that happened all through December and to late February – we noticed The Witness lead their Black Fleet to Earth to seize the Traveler. With The Traveler having left to stay simply exterior of orbit, the Guardians and their allies made a stand towards the Black Fleet, resulting in the occasions of Lightfall. On this present enlargement, the Guardians and allied forces journey to Neomuna, a hidden metropolis on Neptune that The Shadow Legion has invaded. Led by Emperor Calus, a returning D2 Yr 1 villain who’s now a servant to The Witness, he seeks to achieve a hidden energy supply within the hidden metropolis.
I’m sufficiently old to recollect when The Veil was a brand new enemy race that was gonna come out of the pyramid ships https://t.co/SFtzOBe8Jg
— Paul Tassi (@PaulTassi) March 2, 2023
To start with, Neomuna and its new characters, The Cloud Striders, confirmed promise. Nonetheless, the final reception chilled considerably as soon as the dimensions of the marketing campaign and its story was revealed to be smaller than anticipated. Moreso, the sense of urgency proven within the opening act of the marketing campaign was muted as soon as gamers acquired settled in Neomuna and commenced interacting with characters like Nimbus, the comedian reduction of the story. This has led some gamers to view the marketing campaign as much less severe than it was set as much as be, coming off extra according to earlier expansions.
Furthermore, this enlargement’s plot particulars and lore have left followers confused – a lot in order that in style Future 2 content material creators reminiscent of Paul Tassi and D2 lore knowledgeable My Title is Byf have launched movies explaining why the marketing campaign’s light-hearted tone undermines the bigger story and the way lots of the important plot particulars and occasions are launched with out a lot clarification. One level of competition was the inclusion of Strand within the plot, and the way the sport doesn’t supply a lot clarification on its origins.
“Strand’s complete insertion into the narrative simply doesn’t assist, it feels as if obstacles have solely been put in place to make use of this new subclass, and that may be a big detriment to the bigger [invasion] plot as a result of [Strand] is what Lightfall finally ends up being all about,” stated in style D2 lore content material creator My Title Is Byf. “As a seasonal storyline, this might have been superb, however as an enlargement story when there’s a literal assault on the Traveler taking place – I imply, come on? [Strand] seems out of nowhere and it’s not defined in any respect within the story.”
One of many extra frequent complaints among the many neighborhood focuses on particulars concerning “The Veil,” a mysterious energy that the sport presents as a long-established element however has solely been just lately mentioned. This shift within the plot has additionally led to memes and on-line jokes, which have turn out to be a daily sight on Future 2’s Reddit.
I’m the quote-on-quote “lore daddy” of Future 2, and I can’t inform you what the Veil is as a result of I do not know
Whereas Bungie is, in fact, tight-lipped on particulars concerning The Veil and different narratives, builders have expressed that Lightfall’s story will progress within the weeks forward and that the present Season of Defiance occasion launched alongside Lightfall can even add extra necessary particulars to the story.
Buying Strand
One of many stand-out additions of Lightfall is the Strand subclass, the primary new playstyle for the reason that Past Gentle enlargement in 2020. The brand new subclass permits gamers to control a inexperienced weave of vitality to grapple throughout areas, bind enemies, summon inexperienced vitality beings to deal additional harm. To date, the category has been well-received, and there is been a bunch of stunt movies showcasing how far gamers can take the grappling.
Grapples feeling good!#MOTW #Destiny2 @DestinyTheGame @Bungie pic.twitter.com/Qfla8VK3x7
— Senseileon (@Senseileon_) March 1, 2023
Nonetheless, the neighborhood’s subject with Strand is that it feels minimal at launch. Very like Stasis from Past Gentle, Strand’s development and energy progress was supposed to be tied to weekly challenges, and future story beats added in updates. Basically, because of this development was tied to a set schedule dictated by Bungie’s launch of recent content material. This led to issues that the brand new class will likely be restricted for an prolonged interval – issues that have been sharpened by gamers unlocking Strand for everlasting use after the marketing campaign and discovering that the signature grapple skill had a prolonged cooldown, and that different unlocks needed to be bought with massive quantities of assets that may take time to earn. That was on high of being reasonably weak, dampening the sensation of wielding a chaotic and unknown factor.
In an try to repair this subject, Bungie introduced a brand new replace rolling out on March 2 that may enable gamers who’ve the subclass to unlock all out there fragments. This new replace will unlock Strand correct, giving gamers nonetheless making their manner by the facility grind new choices and alternatives to experiment with the sport.
“We’ve determined to launch a reside replace that can unlock the flexibility to earn the complete suite of Strand Fragments for all gamers,” Bungie wrote. “Whereas these further Fragments will likely be class-specific to unlock and also you’ll want Strand meditations to accumulate them, this ought to be a good way for everybody to expertise extra of what Strand has to supply earlier than we head into subsequent week’s raid.”
A Refocused Gear System
Together with the brand new story content material and site, Future 2 additionally added a revised gear system and useful resource administration. Beforehand, mods for armor items have been tuned to particular components and have been additionally tied to unlocks from Seasonal Actions – with new ones resetting progress. If gamers wished to take part in sure occasions, some artifact mods – reminiscent of anti-barrier, overpowered, and different fight buffs – have been important for achievement and required gamers to maintain them attuned to their gear. With the brand new enlargement, construct crafting has been revised, and plenty of seasonal artifact mods at the moment are added perks to a personality that don’t must be set in place.
Whereas the scope of construct crafting has expanded, the Future 2 neighborhood has expressed issues about the very best choices for outfitting characters in mild of lots of the revised mods. Moreover, this has additionally made some favourite neighborhood builds unusable, requiring added effort to tune character loadouts. Added to that is the brand new armor cost system, a revised tackle the phased-out elemental wells mods now designed to spice up your character’s protection. A brand new system brings again an underlying subject of making certain that you’ve got particular game-specific buffs added in your character or else take care of overly troublesome encounters.
In one other video, populer Future 2 content material creator Datto chimed in along with his ideas on modding. Although he acknowledged he nonetheless wants extra time with it, he remained optimistic on the system than most different followers Nonetheless, he does specific issues it might fall into slender constructing traits amongst the neighborhood.
“There’s basis to construct on [mods] now, and I hope that Bungie plans on introducing extra because the yr goes on. However people who did perceive the system previously at the moment are left with a much less attention-grabbing mod and buildcrafting world. The equal of these staple mods at the moment are left within the seasonal unlocks, and my fear is that buildcrafting is simply going to utterly include what’s within the artifact mod and never that rather more.”
At present, Bungie has not addressed issues with the mod techniques but, however the studio did add an replace to tune recurring points with particular buffs from the sport. To date, it’s nonetheless early, and the neighborhood remains to be experimenting with the capabilities of the brand new class updates and mods. Within the weeks forward, we may have a clearer image of how the brand new armor mod system has dealt with itself.
The Highway Forward
Whereas Lightfall’s launch has been comparatively clean on a technical degree, the enlargement content material has turn out to be the topic of scrutiny from the Future 2 neighborhood. Exterior of those bigger points, the response from the neighborhood concerning the yearly refresh has been constructive. Nonetheless, given the character of Future 2 as a live-service sport that can evolve over the subsequent yr forward of The Remaining Form’s launch, there’s nonetheless loads of room for enchancment.
It’s nonetheless early to say how Lightfall will fare amongst Future 2 expansions after just a few days. Nonetheless, with the upcoming launch of The Root of Nightmares raid on March 10, we’ll start to see the place Lightfall’s story and its implications on the bigger plot of Future 2 will go from right here.
Sustain with IGN for extra particulars on the present state of Future 2: Lightfall, together with our upcoming assessment of the sport.
Alessandro Fillari is a contract author at IGN.
