A part of me was blown away from the expansive environments. The way the skyboxes just look otherworldly. How kinetic movement and combat feels. How engaging each exotic is and how they can drastically change your playstyle. The wonder of what the next game from the dudes that made Halo felt finally lived with this expansion. Bungie is at their best when they craft a semi-linear story experience. From the campaign, to watching the raid race, that led to this never before seen final event, like this was endgame or something was just cool as fuck.

Then another part of me remembers why I don't dedicate my entire life to this game like I thought I would when I was in 11th grade. The live service part of this. I always come back and play whatever the expansion is or at least check out every new season, but something about Destiny 2 doesn't slap as much as the first one. Even though abilities are way more impactful, and it truly feels like a RPG shooter that it was harped up to be back then. Especially with the new Prismatic class, which is what I've always wanted out of Destiny's power system since the start. I just can't truly dip all the way back in this game anymore.

There's a bigger story to tell that I decree on my soapbox for the eleventh time about MMOs and how that golden age of community will never exist again, but that's not what you're reading for. For the record, I genuinely tried to get back into Destiny 2 before Final Shape. I geared up, farmed some exotics, got some masterwork gear, got as much as I could from the thousands of legendary shards, stocked up bounties, did some raids, farmed dungeons for god rolls, joined LFGs and Sherpas on a nightly basis on anything anybody needed another body for.

I even did something taboo...put my headset on and talked with strangers on a regular basis. "You guys gotta mic?". Chilling I know...

But as I enjoyed my time playing the content and finally mastering the clusterfuck of a UI, I felt the looming elephant in the room. I just enjoyed playing with randoms, speculating on what the Final Shape raid is going to be, talking about what's going to happen with Destiny 3 or Marathon, reminiscing about doing Raids for the first time in Destiny 1 and the beta. Then I'd hear that one guy, "Bro what the hell is that roll on your Mousekatoole. Why are you even running that exotic bro what the hell that shit is D tier bro. Bro doesn't know the mechanics, oh my god"

I'm not one to usually have other people ruin my experience. This is coming from a guy that runs a War Rock deck in Yugioh. I'm just not a competitive player. Even when I do competitive things, I'll go off-meta or don't follow guides because I like discovering and theory crafting on my own. What's meta might not be my play style. I just do my own thing. So this is very off-putting for someone that's primary Destiny 1 group were the owns to sit down at the tower and talk about life, we would stop and smell the roses staring at Vex Architecture discussing what it all could mean. I was with the lore heads that loved to sit and talk about what's going on in the greater destiny mythos and how what we're doing correlated. I loved that because that's what I loved about Halo.

I was one of those kids that read the books. I sat with friends during sleepovers talking about what they'll adapt with the new Reach game while searching for out of bounds clips and secrets. Because I don't have a friend group that's down to jump into games like this, and the random match made player base won't be that way either, I'm just stuck in a limbo state. While I love collecting exotics and doing random missions, I don't like being rushed through it. Destiny 2 is a forever game, you're meant to be constantly doing something.

The treadmill is on like speed 7 with this game and as a filthy casual I can't keep up. I done broke my ankle falling off the ramp. Not to mention how obtuse the monetization has become, making it hard to get said friend group to even join to play with me through this experience, or else cough up like 90 bucks to start. I really did like Bungie ass Borderlands for what it did for real. I guess this is a more general review of Destiny as an entity, as this is the "finale" or whatever.

It sucks cause frfr if it really was just bungie ass borderlands, then this would be Destiny 3, and it would've hit like a bitch rn.

I cant seem to agree with a lot of people saying that this DLC was a total 10/10, maybe I'm just jaded from the amount of bullshit bungie put its player base through, but Ill state a few of the things that were bothering me.

-I don't like prismatic, like at all. Its not fun to me, and it also makes certain other classes irrelevant. Like why would I ever run arc titan in PVE again in endgame content if I can just slap thundercrash on prismatic which has much stronger survivability and 3 consecrations.
- The story was certainly better than a lot of the stuff they have put out in the past but it also felt like a marvel movie, which isn't horrible, but I don't think its a masterpiece like a lot of people are saying, There's obviously a lot more to say about the story but I wont get into it.
-Obviously the DLC was totally unplayable for the first day, which is pretty important for a live service MMO with only 3 days to raid prep.
-Overthrow is so boring.
-I loved the new pale heart weapons but I cant get over how much I hate the way they look.

There is obviously a lot of good stuff that came with the DLC, like the raid and the new weapon sandbox (which was probably my favorite thing about this whole DLC), but with all that I still just don't seem to like it as much as everyone else.

EDIT after doing post raid content:
-I don't like the sandbox anymore they just made everything overpowered and now titans are in a really bad spot.
-The raid was good it was like a 7/10 for me I think I liked VOW better but encounter 4 of SE was the best non boss encounter I've ever played. Super cool.
-The post raid mission was whatever.
-Dude why are we adding random rolled exotics this is going to be awful to grind

EDIT again way later: The game balance is actually awful the more I play it the more I realize that this game is in a really shitty spot rn. Why does arbalest do more damage than cataclysmic???
some quests are way too tedious like the prismatic fragment quests and khvostov quest

In the same time that a end of a cycle brings a feeling of insecurity for the future, it also gives a sense of pride, because everything ended after our many ups and downs, and the Final Shape ending is the exactly representation of that.

I'm impressed that even with the many flaws and problem Destiny has and had, they could bring a excellent closing for the Darkness and Light saga, something that many things couldn't get to do.

Now i'm here, feeling anxious of what will become of Destiny, but being curious of what the future reserves for this game.

It's been hard to think about a game like Destiny 1/2 through critical lenses in comparison to other games that I've played and have touched me in some meaningful way. With how live-service works, a franchise like this is going to have constant fluctuations in quality and whatnot, changing one's view on it at the drop of a dime. Never really thought I could give a content drop in this series a 10 outta 10, 5 outta 5, whatever- even if it is the best the series has presented up to that point, and I always appreciate the good qualities put in with each release by the clearly passionate devs, cause it just hasn't had the consistency and that big meaningful aspect to it that so many of my other ranked 10s have. But I think that changes with The Final Shape.

I've never really had Destiny be considered one of my favorite games, in regard to what clearly influences me and feels like a solid 9 or 10. But it is clearly the game franchise I have spent the most time with, more than any other. And sure, that probably has to do with the nature of these kinda games, which is why I kinda barred it off from standing amongst my greats. That is unfair. This game has influenced me in so many ways, given me a consistent outlet to play with friends, overcome some anxieties and join a community and make new ones, create big moments and discussions for us all to remember and share. I know this is the case for many others. And The Final Shape, despite the inconsistencies this franchise has had throughout its whole existence, even as recently as one of its biggest missteps being the expansion immediately before this one, manages to land on its feet in just about every aspect (music, art and visuals- as always, the characters and writing, gameplay) and deliver some of the biggest moments, especially with its final mission- where it delivered an emotional satisfaction that I never expected to feel for myself even after nearly a full decade of playing through every piece of content Bungie has put out with this title come September.

Despite everything, Bungie managed to make it all feel so much more worth it than I could have imagined. I don't quite know what the further future holds for me and this series, but whatever it may be I am thankful for all the memories that have spanned over the past decade that I will always remember.

It's OK...but as the finale of a 10-year saga, I find it lacking.

Look, if you're a Destiny fan that just wants more Destiny, go for it, the Final Shape is definitely that, more Destiny. Familiarity, it's a funny criticism to have, I guess, but there are flashes of something more interesting under the surface of this franchise, so this being the conclusion leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Not to get all snooty, but I feel as if there's massive overlap between those that find Endgame to be peak cinema and those that find this expansion to be peak gaming, which is fine, it's just not all that interesting to me. So much creative potential, all for it to conclude in the most bog-standard, predictable manner. No drama. No intrigue. No innovation. A creatively unmoving product, which is okay if all you want is that that you already have.

Nailed it. Really good encounter design throughout the story, utilising raid-light mechanics to create the most engaging boss fights in a story mode for a long time, maybe ever. The story explores its characters well and ends on an incredibly high note and hits some emotional beats surprisingly confidently. I think this is helped by the campaign's structure, which is traditionally linear until the final fight preparations which opened up the exploration gameplay, with an impressive 12 player co op mission that unlocked after the raid was beaten. Very epic, and very fun. Prismatic is cool and is fun to tinker with, leading you to maybe be more confident with ability building with other subclasses too.

I'm not going to do the raid until contest mode is over, but even without that I'm having a great time with this expansion so far. The pale heart is probably my favorite destination now, there are so many fantastic looking areas, and it's fun to explore. Prismatic has been a lot of fun to buildcraft with, even if it could cause extreme balance problems. Some of the objectives after the campaign feel like a lot of busywork, and I'll always be upset how few exotics we have been getting per expansion lately, but that final mission and the ending were so well done. I'm very excited for the future, but if we are actually getting Destiny 3 then Bungie please don't take away my godslayer title I had to go through so many LFG groups.