Johnathon's+Entertainment+Review+(Destiny)

The game I chose to review is Destiny. Destiny is a first person shooter with RPG elements thrown in. The game takes place 700 years in the future. You are a reincarnated individual known as a Guardian. You begin the game immediately after the reincarnation and are immediately attacked by the Fallen an insectoid race of pirates that have taken over colonies on planet Earth. Initially you begin the game by selecting your ability. Then design the look of your avatar and then you are thrown into combat fighting the Fallen to get to a ship to reach the city the only city left on planet Earth after the collapse. As a Guardian you are tasked to rescue the city and other colonies on planets in our solar system. In addition, you must find more Guardians and bring back the Traveler.

[|Destiny Trailer]

This game has vast vistas and intense game play that challenges your abilities as a game player. The game has no tutorial to speak of you are thrown straight into combat from the beginning. With your helper Ghost leading you through the world helpful hints pop up that tell you how to do something in the game. For instance, you learn your aim by one of these pop ups telling you and visually showing you with text also that aim = L2. However, the basic movements are not taught. Therefore, some prior knowledge is needed to play the game. If you have never played a first-person shooter before than the first level will be difficult until you learn the controls.

I do not think that this is hard though as it is easy to pick up the correct buttons and toggles to move, look around, and fire. However, when you need to reload and switch weapons those buttons will have to be trial and error until these buttons are discovered and learned. I do not know if the game will recognize that you are new to the game or not and give you more hints on button configurations, was unable to stop myself from playing the game. You can look at the screenshot below to see an example of the hints I mentioned.



During game play some of the things that you pick up are the names of things and objectives for game play. Your first objective is to find a ship to get to the city. From the beginning of the game terminology for the game is thrown at you. You begin by learning that you are a Guardian followed by your assistant Ghost. Then you discover the name of the creature you are fighting the Fallen. After you beat the first level and succeed with your objective you are taken to the “city.” This is where you find out more about your mission and are given your next objective. Go back to where you left off and fight the Fallen for a warp drive so you are able to leave the planet for other missions.

Feedback is given at the end of each objective. You are given level ups and points to build your avatar further. These points are your rewards for the quality of your performance on the objectives. You are able to upgrade armor, weapons, and health. After succeeding on a level you are able to travel to the tower the home of the Guardians. In the tower you can find opportunities to sell artifacts that you discovered, take on sub-objectives, and upgrade your avatar. From here you can select your next objective and travel to different planets and locations within the game.

During the game play the game uses many different principles of learning starting out with repetition as it repeats many times the names of things and how to find your objectives. This helps with retention towards the terminology of the game. The game also uses practice that allows the player to learn and gain muscle memory to play the game, which allows the player to slip into flow easier. As you play the game you pick up more and more abilities. There is a satisfaction that you gain as you play through the game and earn level ups to build your avatar into a stronger fighting machine.

You can look at a screenshot below of actual game play.

This games popularity is shown through the expansive variety of sites and videos devoted to playing this game. As I researched this game I was able to find Wikis, YouTube videos, websites full of reviews and criticisms for the game. Some of the varieties of videos include walk throughs and trailers and reviews. Cheat codes are available from multiple sites. There is even a [|Wikipedia] page that is devoted to Destiny that talks about the game from the reveal, concepts, and descriptions. If there is something you want to learn more about the game you can find it on the Internet. Here is a web page that has multiple types of pages [|IGN].

Overall my game play was enjoyable once you get the design phase out of the way. I enjoyed the richness of the game play. The game has that ability to pull you in and not let you go. If I had the time I could easily devote hours and hours to the game. I enjoy the difficulty is preset so that as I grow the game grows in difficulty. The game is fun and reminds me of Kill Zone and Call of Duty rolled into one. I like the colors and design of the game and the creatures. You continuously do not fight the same character. In games like Assassins Creed the drone characters remain the same. Not so in this game. Overall my ranking for this game is 9.5 leaving a little for improvement.