The Gist - Does Destiny’s Lack of Compelling Plot Matter?

How can you even call that a story ?

Ghosts can rezurrect people. Why not rezurrect everyone...

The last city has a wall around it. Aliens have spaceships which I guess they weren't aware actually can fly over walls.

Some exo hunter chick shows up infrequently then bails to orbit anytime I'm about to get into a fight. But wait I decide to listen to everything she randomly tells me to do. Wait a sec who the **** is she ? Never find out.

We need the forsaken to find the "black garden." Ok... we we basically take out an army of Vex, kill a Gate Lord yet we need to ask some fairy guy with a stoned queen for help.

Whats with the queens brother ... as we're leaving he sounds like he's from queer eye for the straight guy warning us to watch out for the exclusion zone. Was that the place I drove through on my scooter ? Wow that was rough.

Oh we beat whatever the big blob was in the black garden.. .never find out. So the exo hunter chick gives us her level 16 gun. WTF ? Gee thanks for nothing.

Destiny's lack of compelling story is only made worse by the completely obvious removed content, which among other things, included the actual intended story. Shame on bungie... that isn't right.

she is just too pretty, I couldn't pay attention to what she was saying at all ;D

If I was a teenager living with my parents, or a college student in a dorm, and was bored out of my mind with a group of friends who all had consoles and this game, i would probably live in this game, or some other random repetitive MMO. However if you have other things to do (anything else to do) Destiny is a hard sell.

After finishing the story I felt embarrassed for Bungie's sake. I think one of the reasons that this game has had so much success is that many of the players are migrating from first-person shooters and don't have such high expectations for what a loot system should look like, what features an MMO needs, and the progression that an RPG can offer. For those new players, all of these terribly executed aspects are just icing on the cake of their FPS gameplay machine.

Was hoping Destiny would finally give me a reason to buy a next/current gen system (PS4). Right now I'm closer to buying a Wii U or just playing Steam games that have been sitting there for months, or even years. Everyone says the shooting is great but a lack of noticeable plot and repetitious gameplay is a definite deal-breaker. Funny how all the examples of games weak on gameplay and strong on story are games I own and enjoyed. Maybe its just my type?

Might sound a bit trite, but story matters for the audience for whom story matters.

Big studio games will keep hammering on gameplay, and they'll keep getting it right (mostly), and they'll keep pushing story down the priority list. And they'll keep getting surprised and scratching their heads when other games with wafer-thin gameplay and deeply engaging storylines keep drawing attention, awards and customers.

I pity the middle managers who get given the job of trying to create a 'story scoring system' that a big studio employer can use to apply marketing metrics to game proposals :)

Destiny got old fast. How many times did I find myself at the cosmodrome, shooting the same dudes, in the same spot, over and over again, hoping to score a new pair of ugly yellow boots. Even a compelling story couldn't save the game for me.

Thing is Destiny doesn't have a story or game play. How is doing the same thing over and over and over and over game play? I'm so disappointed in my fellow gamers, but I think the big reason it's successful now is because of the Summer lull and there simply is nothing else to play on the next gen console. When the Holiday games hit, Destiny is going to be in some big doo doo.

It really does matter. There is so much potential for an awesome story. The game play is great, but I think with a story worth pursuing it can be "legend". I will continue to play, hoping for more story, so long as new content keeps coming, and we will see how far Bungie can take us with just game play. Even though we keep coming back anyway, the story matters. Please fix it.

Yes, Destiny needed a good story. It is completely flawed without one.
The Evil Within, on the other hand, does just fine with it's boring story, but because it's a survival-horror and you instinctively just don't want to die. Destiny needed a good story to propel it that step further because you don't feel like you need or really want to kill anything. I guess what I'm saying is people think that horror games like TEW need a better story when really games like Destiny are the ones that need it.

I would have liked to see a stronger effort in the story. I think that is 1 of the 2 biggest downfalls of the game. Though you can go to the Destiny site and look through the grimores to get a little more depth....who's really going to do that? There where times during the story when I thought I blacked out during parts. Then thinking "Why am I doing this again?". But, The masses want action and could care less about why. Bungie gave the masses what the want. while the 1% just wants more.

As someone who has played the game for 200+ hours and has a level 30 Hunter and level 28 Titan, the gameplay machanics are spot on. I love story driven games like Mass Effect and The Last of Us and thus far I am very, very disappointed by the "way" the story has been told, more so than the story elements themselves. I love the game, but I can't ignore that the story has been a huge missed opportunity to lure another couple million into the Destiny fold.

I continue to support the game because I hope that they can right the ship by including more content and making huge improvements in the way they tell the story, otherwise Destiny may only be a 1 year game and not a 10 year franchise. The gameplay, although repetitive, is fun and challenging; I am really hoping that Bungie listens to their community and make it the game it has the potential to be.

I suspect it will be different for everyone, but I think I can agree that poor gameplay hurts a game more than poor story. Because if the game plays bad and the player begins to have a constant feeling of fighting against the game, it will make the player abandon the game much easier than a game that feels good to play but doesn't have a good story.

Personally, for me, story is the most important, I absolutely loved The Walking Dead, The Last of Us, Mass Effect, and hated Diablo 3, for instance. Diablo 3 just felt like an infinite grind fest to absolutely no end, it felt actually a chore to get to the end of that game.

The fact that it was sold at least partially on its story made me pretty disappointed to discover how poor it was. Games can be great without story at all, but for me a good story adds a lot. Moreover, since story and gameplay aren't mutually exclusive and bungee have delivered both in the past, I think we all had a right to expect better.

I enjoyed lots of Destiny but I'm not a massive fan of the grind, and without the context of good story and characters the world feels pretty cold, so I doubt I'll go back with so many other great games coming out soon.

3.2million+ people have buyers remorse. When I got my White PS4 from Game the person said are you going to be playing it heavily and then tried selling me the guide. I was like I have not bought the PS4 for Destiny. He went Oh. I said I could have bought it for my xbox One but wanted the white Ps4 for for the Ps4 it self and the white version. Every one in shop also was like :O at me lol.

@PETERAKO @jasswolf Very strong variety of mechanics involved though compared to most opening MMO offers. Wildstar would be the exception, while SWTOR was just awful.

people for some weird reason don't see beyond the solid shooting mechanics. They are drawn by it like a moth to a light bulb. And to be frank that standard is sooooo low it practically reached the earth's core.

let me quote something that bungie said at their advent "develop kicka$$ games that combine State-of-the-art technology with uncompromising art, captivating storytelling, and deep gameplay"

Destiny's tech is not state of the art. It would if it was adjusted for taking full advantage of Latest PC hardware(no, thats non of that PC master race nonsense). On storytelling, well, it is as bad as it could get. Its really bad, I can almost say with certainty that it was made like that to sell the rest as DLC, but the main plot of the game doesn't even make you the least bit interested to buy it and see what's next. Also the gameplay, while it has solid shooting, everything else seems like it was made by amateurs. Only the art is fine.

I didn't bought into the hype and I still found the game to be average at best.

I think the meat and the bones of the levelling process is great, and that makes it a solid shooter. End game, like it so often is now in perpetual online/MMO games that have a PvE experience, sucks because what's there is good and then the well runs dry after a fortnight.

You can't cater the experience to the hardcore, but every MMO I've seen come out recently has suffered post-launch because it only had one or two piece of top tier content ready to go at launch. IMO you need about 20-30 raid-esque encounters ready to go. If you want to sequentially launch them across the first 8-10 weeks that's fine, just have them ready.

The hardcore players will love you for holding their interest for more than 6 weeks, and the more casual end-game crowd will have up to 6 months of material to work with. It takes a little more effort, but provides you with a much larger buffer as you smooth out launch issues.

WoW learnt this over a decade, other MMOs should incorporate into the initial budget.

Well I enjoy good storytelling as much as anyone, but in the end the crappy story has had very little impact on my experience playing Destiny. Once I realized the story was a dud the game started to take on even more of an MMO feel, which wasn't necessarily bad. Sure it would have been cool if there was a better plot, but in the end it's the gameplay and the grind that are keeping most people playing.

Why Destiny was a success.

1. Three elements was promised. Gameplay, Storyline and multiplayer. One was lied about, another was there in spades but repetitive as hell and the last was half done 2000-ish style of grouping.

2. Because we were lied to and we bought the game thinking otherwise.

3. Might as well play it if we already own it until we are bored.

4. Wasn't that log in stats less than one month into the game? How about being up to date Miss Jess?

5. On that note Jess you seriously disappoint me and have to take anything you say with a grain of salt if you are going to just guess and not notch it up with it being educated at all.

I think the most reasonable argument against Destiny is not that it's a bad game, but that it failed to innovate. The original trailers depicted and described an experience unlike anything we had ever played before, but the delivered final product is derivative almost to a fault. Nearly all of Destiny's elements have been used to greater effect by other games in the past.

Yes, the gunplay is on par with the best examples the FPS genre has to offer, but it offers nothing new. Everything just drips with generic from the weapons to the enemies, and the uncompelling story is, in my opinion, a large cause of that.

Even if you prioritize gameplay over story, I feel like the rub with Destiny isn't because it's a BAD game, but rather because it's a DISAPPOINTING game.

TL;DR - People are dissapointed because they were pitched an innovative idea by Bungie that was not delivered upon.

It matters to me, which is why I didn't buy it. That and the fact that you have to always be online.

Spec Ops The Line was pretty good. I beat the campaign three times.

Off-line gameplay is very popular, but there isn't much of a story usually.

'Leave me your thoughts'

I love Jess.

People have bought Destiny because of the hype. People play Destiny, because it plays solid. Do people like the game? Maybe, but for all we know, they play it because of the buyers remorse or because it's their only game. I wish there was a graph of sales, so we could see once and for all, just how sustained Destiny sales are, because so far it looks like it sold well based on hype only and when it turned out to be a broken game, the sales probably slumped.

The best games I have played did tell stories well.Of course game play matters. I like to play Ffifa 15, there's not much of a story there. But story can make a game truly great. Destiny is of no interest to me. I'm grateful to have played Last of Us. I really liked Heavy Rain and Beyond Two Souls.

Depending on my mood, I do like to shoot things. The teens mean these games will always be popular - also, story may require language and in Asia people may not enjoy subtitles. They tend to prefer heavy click games like League of Legends.

But as gamers get older they will mellow and appreciate story more. That was my case at least. Thing is, I think story is actually harder than gameplay. There's not a lot of Gustave Flauberts or Orson Welles working in the game industry.

At least I appreciate interesting characters, humor, and smart dialogue, even if the story arc is lacking.

1. destiny gamers are hopeful that the dlc are going to give us the answers to many of the questions we have about destiny's story and also hopeful that bungie listened to fan feedback and make more interesting missions in both story and gameplay aspects.

2. the pvp is the best small arena based pvp iv ever seen on an fps game. it reminds me a lot of quake 3 arena except instead of launch pads you have jet jumps. also the gunplay is fantastic. even gamespot's review couldn't fault the gunplay.

3. destiny had a very smooth launch with minor flaws in game mechanics. in fact, the only mechanic that was bad at launch was the loot system and they are working on fixing the loot system and have already done a good job fixing it so far. there are only minor mechanical flaws now, if they managed to fix those and make the dlc have better story and more unique objectives and events in missions then destiny will become a much better game.

i am giving bungie a chance with the first expansion pass and if they suck then im jus gonna stick to pvp and not invest any more on poor pve content. i think pvp is the only thing keeping destiny going right now.

Destiny sold well? I mean 6 million copies is a lot, but considering the amount of hype, considering the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on advertisement for the game, the 500 million investment, 6 million copies sold is nowhere near enough.

They would need to sell 8 million copies to break even with the investment and 9 million copies to make a small profit. This is not to mention that all those big server fees and stuff.

I thought the 3.2m were the sales and not the daily users? I am one of the sales but I haven't played it since a few days after launch. It is repetitive and, at least when I played it, the loot system was totally broken.

Also yes, the point of Spec Ops is to make fun of FPS and their players

I enjoyed Destiny.

The only problem is that the game ended I thought I sill had another planet/area to explore (The Reef) and that disappointed me. I still sometime feel like playing but it will only be to collect light items to progress my level. I wish the level cap was 100 so I could at least level up. In saying that, the game was fun and I hope in the expansions for the game they will increase the level cap. Then I'll go back and play.

I have too many complaints about this game but I'm still playing it somehow. Few reasons.

Levelling up my exotics/legendaries, superb gunplay, and PvP.

That's whats kind of nice about gaming. It's the first art form that can easily and frequently get by without telling a solid story devised by the artist (or team or artists). All games still have story, but that story can be player-made and player-driven, unlike in any other medium, where the author/director/playwright/illustrator/etc. is the judge/jury/executioner when it comes to determining exactly what the story is going to be.

Any one that's playing Destiny doesn't give a rat's *** about story. They're there for co-op and MP play. Conversely, I will never touch that game since there's no story and it's as anti-SP as any MMO.

Oh, and I'd play Spec Ops: The Line any day over Destiny. Same with Walking Dead and Heavy Rain.

Yes, it does matter. Why is this even a question?

We need to get away of the idea of sales determining a quality of the game. Just because a game with a horrible story sells well, doesn't mean story isn't needed anymore.

People playing Destiny till The Division comes :D well destiny got social gameplay and raid is fun still.

Much better loot table, customization, variety, and grinding...

I agree:)