Destiny 2 players have spent a long time waiting for answers to some of the loot shooter’s biggest questions. Bungie claims they’re coming in 2024’s The Final Shape expansion, and they won’t be dragged out across four seasonal story updates like some of the most important parts of Lightfall were.
The studio has set up Destiny for a giant confrontation between players and The Witness, an ancient alien entity intent on destroying The Traveler, the giant sentient magic orb that set all of the game’s events in motion. Lightfall brought that conflict to the cyberpunk city of Neomuna on Neptune, where fans hoped to uncover some of the mysteries around a powerful artifact called The Veil and its connection to The Witness and what its ultimate goal is. Instead, some of the most substantial reveals were drip-fed to the community in subsequent seasons. The result made Lightfall one of the most poorly received Destiny 2 expansions ever.
“We know there are some who would have preferred to experience these stories during Lightfall’s campaign,” game director Joe Blackburn wrote in Bungie’s latest state of the game blog post in an attempt to reassure players that next year’s big update will deliver what this year’s didn’t. “With those players in mind, we believe the totality of this year’s narratives will set the stage for The Final Shape in ways that a single story beat never could. And to put concerns to rest right now: The Final Shape and its raid will provide a climactic conclusion to the Light and Darkness Saga before we look ahead to what comes next in Destiny 2.”
It’s a bold reassurance for a game whose long-standing relationship with its vocal and passionate community constantly rubber-bands between complete adulation and melodramatic exhaustion. Destiny 2 has always been subject to the competing demands of players wanting to get every rare piece of loot and high stakes lore revealed now and wanting to have a reason to keep playing their favorite game endlessly for years.
Especially as it entered its modern seasonal model with weekly micro-story updates, it’s often felt like a Shōnen anime where months of filler are punctuated by short but dramatic plot progressions that inch the space opera forward. Why let Gohan go Super Saiyan 2 right away when you could milk the Cell Saga with a dozen preliminary fights and extraneous side plots first? Fortunately, it sounds like players won’t have to wait months after The Final Shape launches to experience the final showdown of Destiny 2’s current, 10-year story arc.