Destiny 2 – Expansion I – Curse of Osiris

Gamers wanted longevity, so Bungie provided a grind. You get what you ask for and Bungie certainly delivered on it.

The Curse of Osiris, the first expansion in Destiny 2, adds a bit more to the gameplay than the initial release. I know, I know…duh. What you get with the first of two expansions is a new campaign, be it a short one that is comprised of around five missions, you get more weapons, a new expanded level/light cap and a new set of reasons to grind.

Without further delay, let’s get right into it.

The expansion asks you to dive into a new campaign before really getting into anything else. You’re thrown in the story of Osiris, self-proclaimed most powerful guardian in the Destiny universe, who is also the mentor to Ikora. He has built a giant forest, called the Infinite Forest, that simulates possible outcomes for situations with enemies. Regretfully, Osiris has found himself in a scenario where the Vex have taken over the forest, as well as have given him quite a bit of trouble. The Vex have also created a scenario where they dominate Mercury and cause further trouble in the world, which could potentially lead to a catastrophic outcome for the known galaxy. If the Vex aren’t stopped, then a dark future lies ahead.

You have to go through around five missions to change the Vex scenario and eventually come face-to-face with a giant Vex. It’s not a bad set of missions, but it’s short. You get a variety of different things thrown at you, including maps with mini-bosses that will eventually become new strikes in the game, as well as new vicious Vex to take on. Not too terrible for a short campaign. The length of the campaign is appropriate to the expansion. It’s meant to introduce new maps and enemies, while providing you with an intriguing storyline. In those respects, it does its job.

That said, the best parts of the campaign are the gigantic levels the Infinite Forest has to offer, which are loaded with enemies and built to run through, rather than admire. The height of the maps and the girth are impressive, as you’ll need to find ways to avoid a firefight when possible, or otherwise take on an overwhelming amount of enemies. Sometimes it’s not possible to ‘just run’, as there are giant electric gates keeping you from going from section to section in the Infinite Forest. Sometimes these gates are free to unlock, while other times you’ll have to take out certain enemies, and there is a cornucopia of enemies to play against, to unlock the gates. Ultimately, you’ll have to figure out what you have to do on the fly, but overall it’s not too complicated where you’ll get stuck on levels. I think it took around 2-3 hours to complete the campaign and that was more stopping and admiring than run-run-run. Again, it’s a short campaign, though pretty.

The lack of substance in the campaign, real substance, is where it falls short. The maps are nice, but most of the enemies you’ve seen before. The only big difference, outside of levels, is that you’ll have to open some areas through blowing up electronic cubes scattered in the map. You blow those up, some doors unlock and you progress. In the end, though, there just isn’t a lot introduced in the campaign that is mind-blowing, as I think some were expecting huge additions to the game, but again it’s nonetheless still fun.

Once you complete the campaign, then things begin to unlock for you. You get to see a man named Brother Vance up at the Light House (a previously unaccessible location, unless you’re good at 3v3 in in D1), which is the only accessible part of Mercury. You’ll be able to work with him to pick up Verses, small cubes that require you to pick up certainly elements to unlock, which produce new weapons for you to use. Each cube requires elements called Radiolarians and Paradox Amplifiers to unlock. Once you get them, and they’re the grind in the game, then you unlock Lost Prophecy Weapons, which are powerful and pretty unique pieces. You will spend the most amount of time in this expansion, when not doing PvP, acquiring material for those said cubes.

Staying with the cubes, to acquire the above material you have to run Public Events in the EDZ (as of now) and run Heroic Strikes. The Public Events will provide you with random drops of Radiolarian Cultures. Please note that I said ‘random’ in that sentence. There is no guarantee of acquiring them during public events, but I say that you’re got a 50% chance of getting one at the end of each PE. If you acquire a green version of the Cultures, then that equals out to one. If you acquire a blue one, then that equals out to 10 cultures. The latter of the two is harder to find, I think 1 out of 20 is probably a safe bet for acquiring a blue one. Regardless, it’s all a GRIND.

The same goes for Paradox Amplifiers, though they’re almost always guaranteed at the end of a Heroic Strike, which are brutal. The same color schemes apply, as do the numerical values to those color schemes. I think the strikes are far more interesting to take part in, as they pull from the new material found in the campaign, as well as the older material that started out in the initial launch back in September. Much like the PE, it’s a GRIND.

Grinding for weapons (as nasty as that sounds) aside, you’ll also find new exotics have appeared, as well as new maps for crucible. The new exotics range from weapons to armor to ships and even dances. You’ll find a lot more Osiris related material waiting for you and the drops of exotic engrams are far more abundant than the original release of the game provided. That doesn’t mean that the expansion won’t do repeats, especially of old armor, but the variety has expanded.

Now, moving on to PvP, the crucible maps added to the mix are nice. Here is the list of maps added:

Pacifica: I especially enjoyed this new map on Titan. It’s a multi-tiered map of the rig you played on in the original release of the game, though you have a bevy of different places to hide and good amount of cover during firefights. Lots of metal, lots of places to throw grenades and good places to run/hide/die in. It’s one of the better maps of the bunch.

Wormhaven: A mixture of tech littered building mixed with overgrown plants taking it over. This is a neat place, though there is a choke point right at the get-go of the map in the middle, where players can gather and fight each other really close (and surrounded by glass). This map doesn’t take much to get used to it, and technically, as far as I can see, it’s basically two perfectly even and designed halves, so no one really has advantage.

Radiant Cliffs: This is an open area, where hiding isn’t much of an option. It’s flatter than the other two and it’s basically a giant map with giant walls everywhere. There are certain small choke points in the map, but essentially you’re on your own in a largely walled environment. This map really does separate the players from the campers and asks the most out of its participants. I enjoyed this map, but felt like it had less creative offerings, in terms of visuals, in comparison to the other two.

Overall, the additional maps I played (above) where solid. I think they added some good depth to an already competitive crucible. They have a little something for everyone in the game, which wasn’t the case in the initial launch of D2.

That said, let me talk to Bungie directly for a second about crucible.

*AHEM*

You have to bring back melee the way it was in Destiny 1. You have to return melee to its glory. It’s truly unfair for a guardian to be charged up and run into another player only to lose sight of them and not kill them outright, thus leading to the melee guardian’s death. I’m not entirely sure why the decision was made to change melee from the first game to the abomination that it is now, but it makes crucible a bit irritating, especially when you have to punch someone three times to kill them. At least make the charge melee something that temporarily stuns the opponent, enough so that they can’t jump like a gamer jumping around in Halo to avoid being killed. In short, please fix this. Melee was fun in the first game and now it is downright irritating in the second.

Okay, moving on!

Beyond all the above, you also get some new strikes added to the game. They are long and hard, as they should be, and are challenging, as well as welcomed. I found the additional strikes, some straight from the campaign, really do help to make the experience of the expansion bigger. They work and they’re fun, as well as beautiful and creative. For example, there is a strike where you take on a giant eye at the end. While the final fight isn’t anything majestic, the real magic lies within the level design with the journey to get to the eye, which is nothing short of art. I was playing it tonight and was just in awe of how pretty the level was designed. Most of the experience lied with multi-tier levels that included jumping pads to shoot guardians up-Up-UP! Again, it’s art. Anyway, you get a few new strikes to add to the mix that bring their own challenges and rewards. They’re fun to play and will be nice to see in the rotation of the Nightfall eventually.

As for the new Raid, well, it’s been tough going getting through it. In fact, it’s ongoing. I like that it’s based in the same area as the previous Raid, which is cool and makes the original Raid map much bigger than expected. Anyway, I haven’t gone through it enough to give a judgement of the Raid, so I’ll just say right now that there will be an update sometime in the future.