Positive Signs Of Bungie's Independence Already Spotted In Destiny 2

Talha Amjad writes: "Bungie has separated from Activision and has got the rights to Destiny. This news was taken very positively by the fans and we are already seeing signs of Bungie’s independence in Destiny 2 as the developer has already begun its efforts to make the game better."

[rdgneoz3]

"The gist of the matter is that players will now be matched up against enemies that are ranked closer to them. This will make the game much more interesting."

If it took Bungie separating from Activision to do this, that is quite sad. Its something simple that many games do easily...

[amazingmax7]

Lol, yep.

[NarutoFox]

That is sad. Activision should be a shame of themselves.

[RacerX]

Yes, Activision forced a system where you are matched against higher ranking people with better weapons, to manipulate you into spending more time and money to compete.

[UltraNova]

Corporate 101.

[Ninver]

Damn you exposed some heavy truth. It went over alot of people's heads.

[Atanasrikard]

I am going to assume this is sarcasm.

[CorndogBurglar]

I'm assuming this is sarcasm. But in case it's not, there is nothing in Destiny that makes you better or stronger by spending money.

Also, aside from Iron Banner, which only comes around once a month, PvE puts everyone on the same playing field as far as power level. So this really doesn't make any sense.

[Palitera]

Can you buy non cosmetic items through microtransactions or is this just an ignorant comment?

[OnlyThoseOnTheFence]

He's right you know. Activision patented this type of machmaking for that specific reason: https://www.pcgamer.com/act...

[ziggurcat]

@corndog:

"... there is nothing in Destiny that makes you better or stronger by spending money."

if the matchmaking was designed in such a way to get people to feel as though they had to purchase things (like booster packs or time savers) in order to compete with the people they're matched with, then yes... there is something in the game that does that.

[CorndogBurglar]

@ Ziggurcat

"if the matchmaking was designed in such a way to get people to feel as though they had to purchase things (like booster packs or time savers) in order to compete with the people they're matched with, then yes... there is something in the game that does that."

Destiny 2 doesn't have any "booster packs" or "time savers" that you spend real money on.

The closest thing D2 has is something called a Fireteam Medallion. All it does is raises the chances of having a Legendary weapon drop after beating a Strike. Once activated these last for 4 hours and there is never any reason to spend money on them because they give you so much Bright Dust to buy them that you should never run out.

The Eververse is the only place you can buy things with real money and they are all cosmetic. They have something called an Eververse Medallion which does the same thing as the Fireteam Medallion except instead of dropping weapons it drops random cosmetic items.

And again, for PvE every player's power level and stats are placed at the same level when you join a match. So no one has any real advantage over anyone else aside from what weapons they decide to use. So there are no boosters or time savers since everything is based on random drops anyway.

[neutralgamer1992]

Also did Activision stop then from matcch making feature in destiny? What aboit micro transactions which bungie themselves suggested

I know people want to blame Activision but let's not act so naive to think everything that was wrong with destiny was because of Activision. Bungie knowingly signed the 10 year deal with promise of delivering more content than they could actually develop. They owned the IP so it was always their call to make

I am excited for the future of destiny I really am but I am also skeptical because now bungie can't blame Activision do they better be real careful

Activision always took the blunt of all the hate so let's see now

[UltraNova]

This ^^ guy gets it.

Bungie is of equal blame for Destiny's state, if not more since they were the ones who willingly signed a deal with Activision. Open your eyes people.

Like I said before, we will see Bungie's true nature when they are left on their own devices.

[LightofDarkness]

*Brunt, not blunt.

I did snicker at the idea of Activision rocking a giant blunt made of hate, though.

[Obscure_Observer]

@neutralgamer1992

Perfect! That´s exaclty how i feel regarding EA.

[rainslacker]

I do wonder why people think Bungie would be against making money. They know people will pay it, because they have for the first two games, and while I'm sure Activision had some influence, Bungie will still need to make money to produce the game.

Maybe good things will come, but Bungie spent years under MS, and then Activision, so they know what can make money. Even before being brought by MS, they knew how to make money. They were not in danger of going out of business.

[amazinglover]

Activision https://www.rockpapershotgu... did patent a system where you are matched against higher level players with premium weapons and armor in attempt to entice people to spend more money to catch up to them but from I understand they never implemented this. Bungie may have done something similar in making matchmaking preferring higher ranked opponents for the same reasons to try and make more money. Not excusing them as they have some blame as well just trying to understand the decision they made to change there system.

[OffRoadKing]

Game balancing and connection for both crucible and the sandbox have been changed many times throughout the years Destiny has existed, some times for better some times for worse, this is nothing new and it has little to do with Activision. That being said hopefully the changes they claim to have made will be an improvement but I do expect longer wait time for matches as a result of this which they have themselves already alluded to.

[Atanasrikard]

It didn't so you don't need to be sad.

[TheOtherMoon]

Yes, Activision makes decisions based on the dollars, not the user experience. Not a Destiny fan, and happy to see Bungie gain its independence.

[Gameseeker_Frampt]

It is sad how people people think Activision had anything to do with this. Destiny 2 had skill based matchmaking at launch. Then Bungie broke it. Some players liked it broken. Some hated it. 6 months later, Bungie finally did something with the system they broke.

https://www.pcgamer.com/bun...
https://gamerant.com/destin...
https://www.gamepur.com/new...

[TK-55]

Yeah I also doubt Bungie would be able to implement an unplanned fix for it in under a week. This was likely already in the works before the Activision split. I think some are just desperately looking to find reasons to blame the publisher right now and act as though the developers were mindless zombies following orders.

[Michiel1989]

agreed. Same thing with wow, its not activision who made Blizz create a unintuitive, boring and broken progresion system (and mot of the other aspects of the expansion). People just say: it was all activision to stay in the illusion that bungie only made great games. Its like the family of a criminal in court, they will deny he did anything untill he confesses. Then they will say: he had no choise, poor thing!

[chris235]

sounds like fanboy‘s interpretation and fantasy runs wild in the open :/ blowing things out of proportion. funny, but also annoying.

[kayoss]

Almost 5 years just to do this? This is what Bungie always do, tell players to send their comments and feedback. But they never really do anything about it. Near the end of destiny 1, fans said they dont want microtranaction. What did Bungie do, they implemented Microtransaction in Destiny 2.
Fans didnt want to grind to level up, what did Bungie do, they throttle the leveling system.

[Michiel1989]

Yes they have fallen from grace, lets just hope they can recreate their golden days again.

[kayoss]

Im not sure if they ever had a golden day. If rumors are true, Bungie did shady things in the first Destiny 1. Like cutting content. I think the only thing that is compelling about Destiny was the game play which kept me playing for a while.

[Michiel1989]

I meant Halo era with the golden days

[2pacalypsenow]

Activision has nothing to do with the failures of this game.

Y’all think just because Activision is out of the picture this game will automatically get better?

Nah, Bungie made this game, not Activision.

[Sam Fisher]

But under certain strict rules from activision.

[2pacalypsenow]

Right, but the core gameplay is still part of bungie.

[rainslacker]

I'm more curious about why Bungie split. Nothing has really been said about it. This will be the 2nd company that Bungie split with for its game, and it makes me wonder if what they want to do, is just something that publishers aren't OK with. MS, I can understand they wanted to do their own thing. But if they aren't making major changes to Destiny, why pay the money to break the contract with Activision. They can get producers and investment for their games, they are proven devs many times over. They used to be a publisher, so they know how to do that.

Something is going on here that no one even seems willing to ask. Dunno what these journalist do in their time, but you have a story and stuff. Maybe go after it or something?

[Einhander1971]

Activision,EA, are like tumours that need cutting out. Before they start spreading even further, unfortunately there are others as well.

[Koguza]

Come on. I wanna blame Activision for Destiny's problems as much as the next guy, but there is absolutely no way Acti had this kind of control.

[shaun mcwayne]

If you want to make it better, go back to where Destiny 1 finished then continue from there.

[darren_poolies]

Not really sure how this is Activisions fault but ok.

[LordBeef]

While it is not definite proof, it is a close coincidence that Activision was found to have a patent filed to influence matchmaking making it geared to the following

""A system and method is provided that drives microtransactions in multiplayer video games. The system may include a microtransaction arrange matches to influence game-related purchases. For instance, the system may match a more expert/marquee player with a junior player to encourage the junior player to make game-related purchases of items possessed/used by the marquee player. A junior player may wish to emulate the marquee player by obtaining weapons or other items used by the marquee player."

The fact that bungie has decided to "fix" the matchmaking after all this time just after the pull out of Activision is more evidence of the implicit. Though it is noted that there is not confirmation and we may never get confirmation.

I cannot post sources while being new, but there was an article on PCgamer that also included a link to the patent.

[CorndogBurglar]

This article doesn't even make sense and I'm pretty sure the writer has no idea what is going on with the game.

1. There's no proof whatsoever this wouldn't have been done if Bungie didn't split from Activision. PvE has no bearing on it because PvE puts all players on a level playing field as far as power levels. Also, there are no MT's in the game that effect your stats, level, or performance. They are all cosmetic. So then excuse can't even be made that they have poor matchmaking to get people to spend more on MT's. So I believe this was just something the game needed and they handled it, with or without Activision.

2. Yeah. Imagine that. Bungie is saying more content is coming soon. No kidding. The Annual Pass is in full swing. Everyone knows more content is coming soon. It's set to keep coming out periodically all year. That has nothing to do with Bungie splitting from Activision either as they announced this months and months ago.

[Parasyte]

"While we do not know anything for sure, Bungie has announced that there will be new content coming soon. This content could be part of Destiny 2 or we could get a new game entirely. That is something that we will have to wait and see."

The new content coming soon is the stuff that has already been announced for the Annual Pass.

[XiNatsuDragnel]

Good first steps

[krauley]

I dont believe anything is gonna change because of the act/bungie split. I think bungie makes the game they want and as a matter of fact, i enjoy this game lots.