• The Glasshouse (Exotic Titan helmet) – 13 Strange Coins
• Sealed Ahamkara Grasps (Exotic Hunter gauntlets) – 13SC
• Impossible Machines (Exotic Warlock gauntlets) – 13SC
• Bad Juju (Exotic pulse rifle) – 23SC
• Legacy Engram (boots engram) – 31 Strange Coins
• MIDA Multi-Tool and Special Ops (Exotic weapon and ornament combo) – 30SC and 25 Silver Dust
• Zhalo Supercell and Not a Toy (Exotic weapon and ornament combo) – 30SC and 25 Silver Dust
• Exotic Shard – 7SC
• Three of Coins – 7SC
• Glass Needle – 3SC

What’s best? Well the Titans’ Glasshouse is pretty handy, making the Blessing of Light and Weapons of Light buffs from the Ward of Dawn last longer. A decent perk for tough team-play, but not exactly a must-have. The Sealed Ahamkara Grasps? Sorry, Hunters, but they’re a bit crap. They just give you an extra melee for every charge, and a chance of auto-reloading your weapon with every stab. If using the Gunslinger subclass, they could work as a safety net for the Knife Juggler perk, giving you an extra go at scoring a precision knife-kill in order to reset cooldown – or, in fact, providing more fuel to your super by way of Circle of Life – but otherwise they’re not too exciting.

The Warlocks’ Impossible Machines are better, giving the Landfall perk for free, thus allowing you to spike the ground with Lightning upon triggering Stormcaller, while also activating chain lightning or the evasive teleport of Electric Glide. Guns though, are really where it’s at this week. 

Bad Juju is a beast of a pulse rifle, auto-reloading on every kill, adding charge to your super gauge, and stacking damage buffs so that each kill makes the next kill easier. It really likes killing things. You should let it. As for the MIDA Multi-Tool, what it lacks in stand-out perks, it makes up for in ‘Holy shit, this is good’. Carefully designed around a lot of resonating, sympathetic stats and abilities that make it one of the most ludicrously good, all-rounder Scout Rifles in the game, MIDA’s speed boost perk, hair trigger, and strong rate of fire and range make it a heck of a great, pro-active weapon. But it also has maximum reload speed. And a radar when aiming down the sights. And an additional, optional agility buff, and a secret case of the High Calibre Rounds perk, which increases enemy stagger when you hit them. It is a gun both refined and very aggressive, which frankly is a delightful combination. 

As for Zhalo? It’s an arc-powered primary. That quality alone is exciting. But that quality is not alone. With it comes an array of delicious, resonating, tertiary perks. It can trigger chain lightning on hit, and if you score a double-kill (which is highly likely when you have chain lightning) you can say hello to a bonus chunk of super energy. It’s basically great.

As ever, Xur will be around until 10am UK / 2am PT on Sunday, at which point he’ll be away for another week, no doubt to frantically check his e-mail for that confirmation of the Destiny 2 (opens in new tab) gig from Bungie. It’s been a while now, guys. He’s still waiting.

The post Destiny: Xur weapons, gear, and location, August 18 – 20. Bad Juju, MIDA Multi-tool, and Zhalo Supercell! appeared first on Game News.

Anyway, what’s Xur selling? Well this week he’s selling this lot: 

• The Glasshouse (Exotic Titan helmet) – 13 Strange Coins
• Shinobu’s Vow (Exotic Hunter gauntlets) – 13SC
• The Ram (Exotic Warlock helmet) – 13SC
• Telesto (Exotic fusion rifle) – 23SC
• Legacy Engram (Boots engram) – 31 Strange Coins
• Exotic Shard – 7SC
• Three of Coins – 7SC
• Glass Needle – 3SC

What’s good? The Warlocks’ Ram is this week’s stand-out piece of armour. It gives increased defence and, more importantly, makes all Voidwalker melee attacks trigger Life Steal, meaning that not only can you score instant health recovery every time you slap an enemy in the face, you can also equip Soul Rip at the same time, making melees reduce the cooldown of your Nova Bomb as well. Couple that with Embrace the Void (which also makes Nova Bombs and grenades trigger Energy Drain), and you have a hell of a self-perpetuating defence and damage solution.  

As for the others, The Titan’s Glasshouse makes the Blessing of Light and Weapons of Light buffs from the bubble last longer. A decent perk, but not essential enough to spend an Exotic slot on. The Hunters’ Shinobu’s Vow, however, is actually a really damn good Exotic, specifically tuned for Blade Dancers. If you’re in the habit of crafting different builds for different subclasses, this is definitely the one to go for. It gives you an extra Skip Grenade, and buffs those Skips with increased power and an extra tracker. A very powerful piece of equipment indeed, and utterly brutal in the Crucible. 

And continuing the good news, Telesto is a pretty great gun. Effectively operating somewhere between a Fusion Rifle, and sticky grenade launcher, and Halo’s Needler, it fires Void projectiles that attach to targets and explode after a slight delay, causing damnably respectable splash-damage at the same time. A Fusion that operates way above and beyond the parameters of a normal Fusion, it’s a unique, powerful, and really fun Exotic that you really should think about picking up. 

As ever, Xur will be around until Sunday at 2am PT / 10am UK, at which point he’ll be away for another week. 

The post Destiny: Xur weapons, gear, and location, March 17 – 19. Telesto! appeared first on Game News.

• Twilight Garrison (Exotic Titan Chest Armour) – 13 Strange Coins
• Celestial Nighthawk (Exotic Hunter helmet) – 13SC
• Claws of Ahamkara (Exotic Warlock gauntlets) – 13SC
• Hawkmoon (Exotic hand cannon) – 23SC
• Legacy Engram (Chest helmet engram) – 31 Strange Coins
• Exotic Shard – 7SC
• Three of Coins – 7SC
• Glass Needle – 3SC 

What’s good? None of the armour really stands out as a must-buy this week, alas. The Titans’ Twilight Garrison has a neat little gimmick, wherein a quick button-press will allow you to air-dodge while jumping, but it //is// rather a gimmick. Handy for getting across busy rooms quickly, or making the occasional fake-out in the Crucible, but it’s certainly not essential. The more PvE-focused Celestial Nighthawk, on the other hand, lets Hunters condense their Golden Gun super into a single shot of six times the usual power. On paper, a handy increase in aggregate damage, given that a standard Golden Gun charge only delivers three shots (or four with certain other armour perks, such as the Archylophage Symbiote’s Last Man Standing), but you do have to consider whether you want to concentrate all of that power on one target, or whether you’d be better spreading the pain around. It’s definitely a perk of situational usefulness. 

As for the Warlocks’ Claws of Ahamkara, we’re looking at another debatably exciting one, pretty much just adding an extra melee charge and increasing melee attack speed. Handy if your build is focused around using melee energy to boost other gauges, and a fairly meaty ability to combine with the Sunsinger’s Gift of the Sun, which does the same for grenades. Though to be fair, in the latter case you’d actually be better off just using Monte Carlo as your primary weapon and equipping Heart of the Praxic fire as your Exotic armour. 

Hawkmoon though? It’s still a good, and very fun, hand cannon, not quite up to its marauding Year One standards, but certainly improved over its nerfed, Year Two version. Combining stupid Impact, great range for its class, and two different perks built around the noble art of adding extra damage to random bullets (for a total of three), it’s a pretty uncompromising weapon indeed. Fire up the Hammer Forged perk for extra range and accuracy, and you’ve got a really imposing, delightfully versatile hand cannon. 

As ever, Xur will be around until 10am UK / 2am PT on Sunday, at which point he’ll be off for another week. The big tease. Always leaves them wanting more. 

The post Destiny: Xur weapons, gear, and location, February 24 – 26. Hawkmoon! appeared first on Game News.

• Helm of Inmost Light (Exotic Titan helmet) – 13 Strange Coins
• ATS/8 Arachnid (Exotic Hunter helmet) – 13SC
• Obsidian Mind (Exotic Warlock helmet) – 13SC
• MIDA Multi-Tool (Exotic scout rifle) – 23SC
• Legacy Engram (Heavy weapon) – 31 Strange Coins
• Three of Coins – 7SC
• Glass Needle – 3SC 

What’s good? Well Voidwalking Warlocks should head straight to the Obsidian Mind, if they don’t already have one. It is the best Voidwalker Exotic, pretty much, rather ridiculously recharging your Super every time you fire your Super. There’s some nuance to using it, in that you’ll get back more charge the more numerous and high-level the enemies you take out with your Nova Bomb, but time it right and you can near-fill your whole gauge ready for another strike. Basically, you’ll learn the absolute finest Nova Bomb conduct and get free supers in the process. There is nothing about this that is not a big win. 

As for everyone else? Titans get an okay Exotic in the Helm of Inmost Light. Furnishing both the Death From Above and Headstrong perks for free, it effectively amps up your Fist of Havoc super to ‘HULK SMASH’ levels, giving you a bigger initial leap when sprinting, and then allowing you to aim and steer it through the air. Makes for a heck of a surprising, long-range whack, but is perhaps best used in the Crucible. And the Hunters’ ATS/8 Arachnid pretty much just makes the Golden Gun super last longer, and gives it a better zoom. Without any additional shot charges, you have to wonder what the real value of that is, given that it’s pretty much impossible to miss with GG unless you’re really, really trying to. 

In terms of guns, the MIDA Multi-Tool is definitely recommended. It doesn’t have any one, stand-out gimmick, but the huge array of perks it brings make it an absolute monster. It boosts your speed, fires on a hair-trigger, has a decent rate of fire and solid range, and comes packing maximum reload speed. And radar when aiming down the sights. And an extra, selectable agility buff. And an unlisted High Calibre Rounds perk. Attach it to an already speed-focused build (or combine it with another agility-buffing Exotic, like the Hunters’ Radiant Dance Machines), and you’ll be able to navigate the Crucible like a shoal of piranhas. 

As ever, Xur will be around until 2am PT / 10 am UK on Sunday, at which point he’ll spirit himself away for another week. Using spirits. Seriously, he has a ghost-chariot. Just don’t ask him about it. 

The post Destiny: Xur weapons, gear, and location, January 20 – 22. MIDA Multi-Tool! appeared first on Game News.

Check out the full trailer below, and stick around for five moments we’ve picked out that seem to hint at what will be waiting for us when Wrath of the Machine opens this Friday.

Stealth splicers are going to be a pain

No Destiny Raid is complete without jumping puzzles

That’s a LOT of bad guys – bring some crowd control

The mid-Raid boss is metal as hell (and it looks like you won’t fight it directly)

There’s lots of shenanigans going on in the server room

Seen something newsworthy? Tell us (opens in new tab)! 

The post 5 hints at Destiny: Rise of Irons new Wrath of the Machine Raid from the trailer appeared first on Game News.

Though on the flipside, it does now rather feel like Bungie might have hit a level cap of its own, maxing out what Destiny can currently do and be. Rise of Iron is a great expansion, but it feels like one slightly straining at the edges of the game’s current framework, creatively excellent, but on the verge of repeating itself systemically. With last-gen platforms finally dropped in favour of a PS4/Xbox One-only release, Rise of Iron feels rather like a last word on the original Destiny, if you’ll excuse the accidental pun, before we move on to the inevitable sequel. That said, if that is indeed an accurate appraisal, then it will be a hell of a confident and classy expansion to go out on, one that neatly side-steps its mechanical familiarities with an increased focus on narrative craft.

The difference is apparent as soon as you start Rise of Iron’s story campaign. Although only a few hours long (you’ll probably finish your first, normal difficulty run-through in an evening, though obviously that’s always just the precursor to weeks of iterative, repeat play for progressive rewards, as part of Destiny’s now huge melting pot of content), it’s easily the most precisely curated chunk of campaign Destiny has yet seen, eschewing the early game’s narrative vagaries and reliance on multi-purpose, overworld spaces in favour of pacing, storytelling and set-pieces entirely worthy of a focused, single-player FPS. And a great one at that.

Its first mission (opens in new tab) in particular is a striking departure for Destiny, built of slow-burn intrigue, a well-sculpted sense of genuine threat, a jarring feeling of isolation, and very real dramatic peaks and troughs throughout. Like all of RoI’s campaign, it’s entirely worth playing solo the first time through. This is one that you’ll want to take in properly, without the anarchy of co-op and the distraction of mic chatter getting in the way.

From this impeccably paced, enigmatic beginning, the campaign takes in a sort of greatest hits of Destiny level design, albeit one which often retunes the model with a greater sense of urgency and purpose than before. Missions that weave cross-country, indoor and out, the former providing tense, claustrophobic tests of skill and spatial control – in truth always some of Destiny’s finest joys, as desperation forces creativity – the latter providing some splendid, airy, free-flowing vertical combat. Intensive crescendos which combine multi-part objectives with ever-increasing assault and scale, blending free-flowing strategy and gleeful, explosive abandon in equal measure. And of course, a slightly arcane, explanation-free climactic battle that turns what you know on its head – or at least quietly shifts the goalposts – forcing an engaging bit of puzzle-solving just as you wreak havoc in deeply gratifying fashion.

If The Taken King showed what Bungie could do with story and mission design by bringing character to the fore and its lore into the realm of the explicit – while letting the intrigue of its Raid design lightly pepper the rest of the game-world – then Rise of Iron is the logical continuation of that reorientation. You’ll wish for more by the slightly premature end, but that’s as much the product of quality as it is brevity.

That said, Rise of Iron does a great job of encouraging sustained play. Like The Taken King, it spins and recontextualises its content post-‘completion’ through multitudinous spiralling questlines. Not with the same, months-worth volume, certainly, but within just a few hours I’d already unlocked a bonus story mission, with the promise of at least one more to come. As is always the way with Destiny, the concrete ‘amount’ of content is only an indication of how far it can be reworked and re-experienced through different lenses for different purposes, and although it’s early days, the promise of an eventual experiential scale somewhere between House of Wolves and TTK feels plausible, if gauged slightly closer to the former.

Beyond quests – one of which, yes, will earn you the Iron Gjallarhorn – the new Record Book will be key to extended play as well. Picking up where the previous Moments of Triumph record left off, this addition formalises abstract progress through a great many activities, offering tangible rewards for all kinds of in-game tasks, from hard-level replays to more ambient achievements. Perhaps its biggest incentive for completion is the promise of the new, beautiful-looking, medieval-style Iron Lord armour set. It’s a neat addition, providing a new, tertiary means of further spinning out play-time – Destiny’s true metric of content has always been in reworking more than adding – and also bringing alternative means of progress, beyond simply throwing yourself repeatedly at the same elite event.

That said, Rise of Iron also has three new Strikes to throw into the mix once the expansion hits the daily and weekly playlists. Two are remixes of famous (or infamous) early Strikes, bringing back Sepiks Prime and Phogoth, while the brand new one, The Wretched Eye, is a killer slice of classic Destiny. One of the most assured and complete Strike designs in quite a while, it’s a great example of the pacing, variety, co-op strategy, and compelling boss design that the game can do so well. I’ve already detailed a full playthrough from Gamescom (opens in new tab), but if you don’t have time to read that, do know that the tricksy, shifting strategy of the final confrontation alone makes it entirely worth playing.

On the PvP side, Rise of Iron brings three new Crucible maps and one new game mode, Supremacy (opens in new tab), which mixes up the standard team deathmatch set-up by delivering extra points for snagging the Crest dropped by each downed opponent. It seems a simple twist at first, but the frantic race to double the points for every kill, coupled with the chaos of choke-points and the ability to deny a Crest grab by taking it back for your team before the opposition does, make for some delightfully hectic play when things heat up. As does the scope for more involved strategy using wingman overseers and sneaky class abilities. Sunsinging Warlocks with self-revive abilities, prepare to be hated.

As for co-operative staples, the new Patrol area, the Plaguelands, brings the Archon’s Forge. Effectively a blend of the Prison of Elders and The Taken King’s Court of Oryx, this in-world arena location can be activated by offering certain special currency items at its entrance, summoning an array of large-scale wave battles – and increasing rewards – for the price. Given its scale, and the multi-leveled verticality of its setting, it’s a distinctly chaotic experience – particularly given that late-coming players can buy into the sealed arena after a battle starts – and although the full scope of its reward tiers obviously aren’t currently known, it’s a hell of a hoot to play through in its own right. That’s the other great thing that Destiny has always got right. However long you might repeat and grind for particular gear, the actual experience of playing is always a joy.

The final kicker – and a wisely judged one at that – is the new Iron Lord artifacts system. By taking on certain tasks at the picturesque new Felwinter’s Peak social hub, you can earn a ‘Legacy’ item pertaining to one of the eight original Iron Lords. Cash this in, and you can equip a new, additional perk – one available every week – each of which offers fundamental game-changing abilities.

Unlimited sprint, overall stat changes, double-grenades… These are the kind of major shake-ups that will fundamentally recontextualise current character builds, and therefore the entire experience of the game. And given their time-rationed nature, it seems that they’re intended to be experimented with, offering scope for long-term tweaks and rebuilds for quite some time to come. The system is a very economical piece of design, but one which should deliver a great deal of experiential content as it reshapes and multiplies the possibilities available.

And that’s Rise of Iron all over, really. It might not offer the huge, nuts-and-bolts content-dump that The Taken King did, but this is an expansion built in layers rather than breadth. It delivers enough new places to see and things to do, of such a high quality – and do not forget, this is me speaking before the Raid – to give Destiny’s overall ecosystem a worthy shake-up, but the various resonant means it offers to change the experience have even greater potential. If you’re a long-standing Destiny player, it’s almost certain to refresh and revitalise your daily visits. And if you’re a curious newbie, there has (once again) never been a better time to jump in. 

This gameplay for this review was undertaken at a review event at Bungie’s studios. 

Get the latest Destiny: Rise of Iron news, tips, guides and information in our Destiny Rise of Iron hub which we will be constantly updating. 

The Verdict

4

4 out of 5

Destiny: Rise of Iron

Assured creativity and a smart eye for systemic refreshment make for a confident and classy expansion.

The post Destiny: Rise of Iron review: “A great expansion but straining within the game’s current framework” appeared first on Game News.

Though on the flipside, it does now rather feel like Bungie might have hit a level cap of its own, maxing out what Destiny can currently do and be. Rise of Iron is a great expansion, but it feels like one slightly straining at the edges of the game’s current framework, creatively excellent, but on the verge of repeating itself systemically. With last-gen platforms finally dropped in favour of a PS4/Xbox One-only release, Rise of Iron feels rather like a last word on the original Destiny, if you’ll excuse the accidental pun, before we move on to the inevitable sequel. That said, if that is indeed an accurate appraisal, then it will be a hell of a confident and classy expansion to go out on, one that neatly side-steps its mechanical familiarities with an increased focus on narrative craft.

The difference is apparent as soon as you start Rise of Iron’s story campaign. Although only a few hours long (you’ll probably finish your first, normal difficulty run-through in an evening, though obviously that’s always just the precursor to weeks of iterative, repeat play for progressive rewards, as part of Destiny’s now huge melting pot of content), it’s easily the most precisely curated chunk of campaign Destiny has yet seen, eschewing the early game’s narrative vagaries and reliance on multi-purpose, overworld spaces in favour of pacing, storytelling and set-pieces entirely worthy of a focused, single-player FPS. And a great one at that.

Its first mission (opens in new tab) in particular is a striking departure for Destiny, built of slow-burn intrigue, a well-sculpted sense of genuine threat, a jarring feeling of isolation, and very real dramatic peaks and troughs throughout. Like all of RoI’s campaign, it’s entirely worth playing solo the first time through. This is one that you’ll want to take in properly, without the anarchy of co-op and the distraction of mic chatter getting in the way.

From this impeccably paced, enigmatic beginning, the campaign takes in a sort of greatest hits of Destiny level design, albeit one which often retunes the model with a greater sense of urgency and purpose than before. Missions that weave cross-country, indoor and out, the former providing tense, claustrophobic tests of skill and spatial control – in truth always some of Destiny’s finest joys, as desperation forces creativity – the latter providing some splendid, airy, free-flowing vertical combat. Intensive crescendos which combine multi-part objectives with ever-increasing assault and scale, blending free-flowing strategy and gleeful, explosive abandon in equal measure. And of course, a slightly arcane, explanation-free climactic battle that turns what you know on its head – or at least quietly shifts the goalposts – forcing an engaging bit of puzzle-solving just as you wreak havoc in deeply gratifying fashion.

If The Taken King showed what Bungie could do with story and mission design by bringing character to the fore and its lore into the realm of the explicit – while letting the intrigue of its Raid design lightly pepper the rest of the game-world – then Rise of Iron is the logical continuation of that reorientation. You’ll wish for more by the slightly premature end, but that’s as much the product of quality as it is brevity.

That said, Rise of Iron does a great job of encouraging sustained play. Like The Taken King, it spins and recontextualises its content post-‘completion’ through multitudinous spiralling questlines. Not with the same, months-worth volume, certainly, but within just a few hours I’d already unlocked a bonus story mission, with the promise of at least one more to come. As is always the way with Destiny, the concrete ‘amount’ of content is only an indication of how far it can be reworked and re-experienced through different lenses for different purposes, and although it’s early days, the promise of an eventual experiential scale somewhere between House of Wolves and TTK feels plausible, if gauged slightly closer to the former.

Beyond quests – one of which, yes, will earn you the Iron Gjallarhorn – the new Record Book will be key to extended play as well. Picking up where the previous Moments of Triumph record left off, this addition formalises abstract progress through a great many activities, offering tangible rewards for all kinds of in-game tasks, from hard-level replays to more ambient achievements. Perhaps its biggest incentive for completion is the promise of the new, beautiful-looking, medieval-style Iron Lord armour set. It’s a neat addition, providing a new, tertiary means of further spinning out play-time – Destiny’s true metric of content has always been in reworking more than adding – and also bringing alternative means of progress, beyond simply throwing yourself repeatedly at the same elite event.

That said, Rise of Iron also has three new Strikes to throw into the mix once the expansion hits the daily and weekly playlists. Two are remixes of famous (or infamous) early Strikes, bringing back Sepiks Prime and Phogoth, while the brand new one, The Wretched Eye, is a killer slice of classic Destiny. One of the most assured and complete Strike designs in quite a while, it’s a great example of the pacing, variety, co-op strategy, and compelling boss design that the game can do so well. I’ve already detailed a full playthrough from Gamescom (opens in new tab), but if you don’t have time to read that, do know that the tricksy, shifting strategy of the final confrontation alone makes it entirely worth playing.

On the PvP side, Rise of Iron brings three new Crucible maps and one new game mode, Supremacy (opens in new tab), which mixes up the standard team deathmatch set-up by delivering extra points for snagging the Crest dropped by each downed opponent. It seems a simple twist at first, but the frantic race to double the points for every kill, coupled with the chaos of choke-points and the ability to deny a Crest grab by taking it back for your team before the opposition does, make for some delightfully hectic play when things heat up. As does the scope for more involved strategy using wingman overseers and sneaky class abilities. Sunsinging Warlocks with self-revive abilities, prepare to be hated.

As for co-operative staples, the new Patrol area, the Plaguelands, brings the Archon’s Forge. Effectively a blend of the Prison of Elders and The Taken King’s Court of Oryx, this in-world arena location can be activated by offering certain special currency items at its entrance, summoning an array of large-scale wave battles – and increasing rewards – for the price. Given its scale, and the multi-leveled verticality of its setting, it’s a distinctly chaotic experience – particularly given that late-coming players can buy into the sealed arena after a battle starts – and although the full scope of its reward tiers obviously aren’t currently known, it’s a hell of a hoot to play through in its own right. That’s the other great thing that Destiny has always got right. However long you might repeat and grind for particular gear, the actual experience of playing is always a joy.

The final kicker – and a wisely judged one at that – is the new Iron Lord artifacts system. By taking on certain tasks at the picturesque new Felwinter’s Peak social hub, you can earn a ‘Legacy’ item pertaining to one of the eight original Iron Lords. Cash this in, and you can equip a new, additional perk – one available every week – each of which offers fundamental game-changing abilities.

Unlimited sprint, overall stat changes, double-grenades… These are the kind of major shake-ups that will fundamentally recontextualise current character builds, and therefore the entire experience of the game. And given their time-rationed nature, it seems that they’re intended to be experimented with, offering scope for long-term tweaks and rebuilds for quite some time to come. The system is a very economical piece of design, but one which should deliver a great deal of experiential content as it reshapes and multiplies the possibilities available.

And that’s Rise of Iron all over, really. It might not offer the huge, nuts-and-bolts content-dump that The Taken King did, but this is an expansion built in layers rather than breadth. It delivers enough new places to see and things to do, of such a high quality – and do not forget, this is me speaking before the Raid – to give Destiny’s overall ecosystem a worthy shake-up, but the various resonant means it offers to change the experience have even greater potential. If you’re a long-standing Destiny player, it’s almost certain to refresh and revitalise your daily visits. And if you’re a curious newbie, there has (once again) never been a better time to jump in. 

This gameplay for this review was undertaken at a review event at Bungie’s studios. 

Get the latest Destiny: Rise of Iron news, tips, guides and information in our Destiny Rise of Iron hub which we will be constantly updating. 

The Verdict

4

4 out of 5

Destiny: Rise of Iron

Assured creativity and a smart eye for systemic refreshment make for a confident and classy expansion.

The post Destiny: Rise of Iron review: “A great expansion but straining within the game’s current framework” appeared first on Game News.

After some server issues with Rise of Iron (opens in new tab) I managed to get in and play the first few missions (which you can watch below). Crucially, though I was able to decrypt about 50 odd Rare engrams I’d been hoarding. Everything is coming out at minimums of 320 Light and up, with most hitting 325s and more. 

Best of all I got three Legendaries and two Exotics from the stock pile, and some 330 chest armour. It’ll be a short lived thrill to be sure, but it means everything my Warlock owns was 325+ in about three minutes. Hmmm, power. 

Seen something newsworthy? Tell us! (opens in new tab)

Get the latest Destiny: Rise of Iron news, tips, guides and information in our Destiny Rise of Iron hub which we will be constantly updating. 

The post Save your blues! Rise of Iron is decrypting Rare Engrams at 325+ light appeared first on Game News.

Though on the flipside, it does now rather feel like Bungie might have hit a level cap of its own, maxing out what Destiny can currently do and be. Rise of Iron is a great expansion, but it feels like one slightly straining at the edges of the game’s current framework, creatively excellent, but on the verge of repeating itself systemically. With last-gen platforms finally dropped in favour of a PS4/Xbox One-only release, Rise of Iron feels rather like a last word on the original Destiny, if you’ll excuse the accidental pun, before we move on to the inevitable sequel. That said, if that is indeed an accurate appraisal, then it will be a hell of a confident and classy expansion to go out on, one that neatly side-steps its mechanical familiarities with an increased focus on narrative craft.

The difference is apparent as soon as you start Rise of Iron’s story campaign. Although only a few hours long (you’ll probably finish your first, normal difficulty run-through in an evening, though obviously that’s always just the precursor to weeks of iterative, repeat play for progressive rewards, as part of Destiny’s now huge melting pot of content), it’s easily the most precisely curated chunk of campaign Destiny has yet seen, eschewing the early game’s narrative vagaries and reliance on multi-purpose, overworld spaces in favour of pacing, storytelling and set-pieces entirely worthy of a focused, single-player FPS. And a great one at that.

Its first mission (opens in new tab) in particular is a striking departure for Destiny, built of slow-burn intrigue, a well-sculpted sense of genuine threat, a jarring feeling of isolation, and very real dramatic peaks and troughs throughout. Like all of RoI’s campaign, it’s entirely worth playing solo the first time through. This is one that you’ll want to take in properly, without the anarchy of co-op and the distraction of mic chatter getting in the way.

From this impeccably paced, enigmatic beginning, the campaign takes in a sort of greatest hits of Destiny level design, albeit one which often retunes the model with a greater sense of urgency and purpose than before. Missions that weave cross-country, indoor and out, the former providing tense, claustrophobic tests of skill and spatial control – in truth always some of Destiny’s finest joys, as desperation forces creativity – the latter providing some splendid, airy, free-flowing vertical combat. Intensive crescendos which combine multi-part objectives with ever-increasing assault and scale, blending free-flowing strategy and gleeful, explosive abandon in equal measure. And of course, a slightly arcane, explanation-free climactic battle that turns what you know on its head – or at least quietly shifts the goalposts – forcing an engaging bit of puzzle-solving just as you wreak havoc in deeply gratifying fashion.

If The Taken King showed what Bungie could do with story and mission design by bringing character to the fore and its lore into the realm of the explicit – while letting the intrigue of its Raid design lightly pepper the rest of the game-world – then Rise of Iron is the logical continuation of that reorientation. You’ll wish for more by the slightly premature end, but that’s as much the product of quality as it is brevity.

That said, Rise of Iron does a great job of encouraging sustained play. Like The Taken King, it spins and recontextualises its content post-‘completion’ through multitudinous spiralling questlines. Not with the same, months-worth volume, certainly, but within just a few hours I’d already unlocked a bonus story mission, with the promise of at least one more to come. As is always the way with Destiny, the concrete ‘amount’ of content is only an indication of how far it can be reworked and re-experienced through different lenses for different purposes, and although it’s early days, the promise of an eventual experiential scale somewhere between House of Wolves and TTK feels plausible, if gauged slightly closer to the former.

Beyond quests – one of which, yes, will earn you the Iron Gjallarhorn – the new Record Book will be key to extended play as well. Picking up where the previous Moments of Triumph record left off, this addition formalises abstract progress through a great many activities, offering tangible rewards for all kinds of in-game tasks, from hard-level replays to more ambient achievements. Perhaps its biggest incentive for completion is the promise of the new, beautiful-looking, medieval-style Iron Lord armour set. It’s a neat addition, providing a new, tertiary means of further spinning out play-time – Destiny’s true metric of content has always been in reworking more than adding – and also bringing alternative means of progress, beyond simply throwing yourself repeatedly at the same elite event.

That said, Rise of Iron also has three new Strikes to throw into the mix once the expansion hits the daily and weekly playlists. Two are remixes of famous (or infamous) early Strikes, bringing back Sepiks Prime and Phogoth, while the brand new one, The Wretched Eye, is a killer slice of classic Destiny. One of the most assured and complete Strike designs in quite a while, it’s a great example of the pacing, variety, co-op strategy, and compelling boss design that the game can do so well. I’ve already detailed a full playthrough from Gamescom (opens in new tab), but if you don’t have time to read that, do know that the tricksy, shifting strategy of the final confrontation alone makes it entirely worth playing.

On the PvP side, Rise of Iron brings three new Crucible maps and one new game mode, Supremacy (opens in new tab), which mixes up the standard team deathmatch set-up by delivering extra points for snagging the Crest dropped by each downed opponent. It seems a simple twist at first, but the frantic race to double the points for every kill, coupled with the chaos of choke-points and the ability to deny a Crest grab by taking it back for your team before the opposition does, make for some delightfully hectic play when things heat up. As does the scope for more involved strategy using wingman overseers and sneaky class abilities. Sunsinging Warlocks with self-revive abilities, prepare to be hated.

As for co-operative staples, the new Patrol area, the Plaguelands, brings the Archon’s Forge. Effectively a blend of the Prison of Elders and The Taken King’s Court of Oryx, this in-world arena location can be activated by offering certain special currency items at its entrance, summoning an array of large-scale wave battles – and increasing rewards – for the price. Given its scale, and the multi-leveled verticality of its setting, it’s a distinctly chaotic experience – particularly given that late-coming players can buy into the sealed arena after a battle starts – and although the full scope of its reward tiers obviously aren’t currently known, it’s a hell of a hoot to play through in its own right. That’s the other great thing that Destiny has always got right. However long you might repeat and grind for particular gear, the actual experience of playing is always a joy.

The final kicker – and a wisely judged one at that – is the new Iron Lord artifacts system. By taking on certain tasks at the picturesque new Felwinter’s Peak social hub, you can earn a ‘Legacy’ item pertaining to one of the eight original Iron Lords. Cash this in, and you can equip a new, additional perk – one available every week – each of which offers fundamental game-changing abilities.

Unlimited sprint, overall stat changes, double-grenades… These are the kind of major shake-ups that will fundamentally recontextualise current character builds, and therefore the entire experience of the game. And given their time-rationed nature, it seems that they’re intended to be experimented with, offering scope for long-term tweaks and rebuilds for quite some time to come. The system is a very economical piece of design, but one which should deliver a great deal of experiential content as it reshapes and multiplies the possibilities available.

And that’s Rise of Iron all over, really. It might not offer the huge, nuts-and-bolts content-dump that The Taken King did, but this is an expansion built in layers rather than breadth. It delivers enough new places to see and things to do, of such a high quality – and do not forget, this is me speaking before the Raid – to give Destiny’s overall ecosystem a worthy shake-up, but the various resonant means it offers to change the experience have even greater potential. If you’re a long-standing Destiny player, it’s almost certain to refresh and revitalise your daily visits. And if you’re a curious newbie, there has (once again) never been a better time to jump in. 

This gameplay for this review was undertaken at a review event at Bungie’s studios. 

Get the latest Destiny: Rise of Iron news, tips, guides and information in our Destiny Rise of Iron hub which we will be constantly updating. 

The Verdict

4

4 out of 5

Destiny: Rise of Iron

Assured creativity and a smart eye for systemic refreshment make for a confident and classy expansion.

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