Max's+Entertainment+Game+Review

Destiny is a first-person shooter game that was released in September of 2014. The game was developed by Bungie the famed creators of Halo and published by Activision. This game out on the Playstation and Xbox platforms, I purchased the game to run on my first run Xbox 360. The game did it’s very best to kill my Xbox, and as of the writing of this piece my Xbox is currently clinging to life. Gameplay is pretty similar to many other first-person shooters; you start off with a general intro to the game after character selection and are slowly taught how to use your various powers.

__The three classes of characters available at the beginning of gameplay.__

You’re given an assistant, Ghost, which is a tiny floating robot that’s similar to the yellow one that follows Robin Williams around in the movie Flubber. With the help of Ghost you set out to try and save humanity in a post “Collapse” earth. You’re opposition is a species of creepy insectoids that are aggressively trying to continue occupying the Solar System. The first mission or task I accomplished was finding a ship, to do so I used Ghost (voiced by Peter Dinklage) and my machine gun/ melee fighting moves to work towards a ship inside what looked like an abandoned shopping mall in Russia. The game controls are pretty standard and can be picked up quickly with the help of a controller layout

After finding the ship I was taken out into Orbit, from there you’re presented with a pretty amazing view of the world around you. From there you’re given a choice of where to go next. I chose to go find a hyper-drive on Earth so that I could explore the Solar System. Once on Earth I encountered quite a few of the easier to kill Fallen and then Ghost discovered where the hyper-drive actually was actually hidden inside a structure that, once entered, prevented you from being quick-spawned back into action. After entering the building I received about 10 beat-downs I decided to go see what was outside where I encountered more hostile aliens that also took offense to my existence. So anyway, the whole goal is to go out and find the Traveler, which is a giant orb that is a sentient being that is responsible for the rise of mankind and technological advancements.

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Learning in the game was strongly based on repetition at first, especially once you come in contact with a hostile force. I learned that I had to be very accurate in my movements and target acquisition, a skill that I’d worked on years ago when I played a lot of Call of Duty. They repeat the strategy of repetition over and over and over again. To be successful you have to be persistent and have a little bit of trigger endurance.

Destiny teaches by way of Ghost, who leads you into different scenarios. I found that the main focus of the game’s teaching was by creating meaning through pattering, active practice, meaningfulness based on presentation (scenery and music), and finally with feedback and reinforcement for good choices (level ups). This game has a huge following online, both negative and positive. After playing for while and starting this review I decided to check out some reviews on YouTube. I noticed that the reviewers I found just whined a lot about how much the game sucked and what it could have done better while continually saying it “wasn’t groundbreaking like Doom 3”. I really wish I had those 20 minutes back… One common thread online was that it’s pretty fun to play with friends, I’ll have to get some buddies together and play to find-out for myself as my wife refuses to pick up the sticks.