IGN Video Games

IGN Video Games

Returnal Gets a Co-op Mode in Free Update Later This Month

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 02:30 PM PST

Announced at today's State of Play, Returnal will be getting a new free update later this month that includes a new major challenge, as well as the ability to play cooperatively with a friend.

Returnal's Ascension update 3.0 drops on March 22, 2022, and will feature both online campaign co-op as well as a new survival mode called The Tower of Sisyphus.

Per the PlayStation Blog, co-op mode will be accesed through the Chronosis portal near the crash landing, as well as in other select parts of the game. You can either host a co-op game or join another public one, or host or join a private game with a friend. Players will be tethered together to prevent them from getting too far apart, and can revive one another if downed. Game progression is tied to the host.

The Tower of Sisyphus is effectively an endless survival game mode where you try to climb as high as you can, with challenges and enemies getting more difficult the higher you get. Each phase in the tower culminates in a battle with Algos that gets progressively harder as well, and scores will be tracked on a leaderboard. The Tower also includes some new narrative content.

Notably, The Tower of Sisyphus cannot be done in co-op (and a few story moments are solo only as well), but the majority of the game seems to be available to play alongside a friend -- a welcome assistance given how tough Returnal can be.

In our review, we loved Returnal's gameplay, weapon selection, and punishing difficulty, calling it "an incredible roguelike, and one of Housemarque's best games to date."

Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

Valkyrie Elysium Announced From Square Enix

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 02:26 PM PST

A new action RPG from Square Enix called Valkyrie Elysium has been announced during Sony's State of Play, a new entry in the Valkyrie series that began with Valkyrie Profile in 1999. It will launch on PS5 and PS4 sometime in 2022.

Valkyrie Elysium was revealed with a gameplay trailer that showed off some exploration and combat in a fantasy world, as well as a few teases for what its story might entail. A post on the PlayStation blog explains that "The Valkyrie series depicts the end of humanity and their encounters with the gods through a unique world inspired by Norse mythology."

It doesn't seem Valkyrie Elysium will connect too directly to the other Valkyrie games, as the same blog post also describes it as a "a brand-new standalone adventure." The last entry in the Valkyrie series was a mobile game called Valkyrie Anatomia: The Origin originally released in Japan in 2016 before heading West in 2019.

A few other details already shared were that Valkyrie Elysium will bring back the series' recruitable warriors called Einherjar, as well as composer Motoi Sakuraba to do the soundtrack. Additionally, it was confirmed that it will run at 4K and 60fps on PlayStation 5.

The name Valkyrie Elysium itself might be familiar to some fans, as people noticed Square Enix first filed a trademark for it in Japan last October before doing the same in other regions toward the end of February.

The DioField Chronicle Is a New Strategy RPG From Square Enix

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 02:24 PM PST

Square Enix announced a new game titled The DioField Chronicle during the PlayStation State of Play. It is coming in 2022.

This tactics RPG brings a fully-realized 3D take to the classic strategy genre. The new cinematic revealed turn-based strategy combat in a fantasy world, but with 3D animations.

Set in a fantastical continent, The DioField Chronicle follows a war between the Trovelt-Schoevian Empire and the Rowetale Alliance. However, the lone Kingdom of Alletain is caught between these two warring powers.

A group of heroes must then defend their land from the Empire. Expect some geopolitics on the side of your tactics RPG.

According to PlayStation, The DioField Chronicle utilizes a Real Time Tactical Battle system and the development team includes character designer Taiki (Lord of Vermillion 3), Kamikokuryo Isamu (FF12, 13), and Sound Composers Ramin Djawadi and Brandon Campbell (Game of Thrones).

The combat appears to lean heavily on the strategy element with units moving across a battlefield. But the 3D animated elements bring the gameplay to life and huge elements like giant flying dragons can be seen soaring atop the battlefield and breathing fire on players and enemies.

This new franchise sits comfortably alongside Square Enix's many tactics RPGs, but the modern take is certainly enticing. The DioField Chronicle is set to be released in 2022 for PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 4.

For more from today's State of Play check out our round-up of everything announced.

Matt T.M. Kim is IGN's News Editor. You can reach him @lawoftd.

Gundam Evolution Western Release Confirmed

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 02:16 PM PST

Shown in today's Sony State of Play livestream, the online shooter Gundam Evolution got a new gameplay trailer, as well as firm confirmation that it will get a simultaneous Western release later this year. A network test was also announced for the US and Japan coming sometime this spring.

Gundam Evolution is a free-to-play FPS with six players on either team competing in objective-based game modes. You are able to take control of a variety of different Mobile Suits, each with different combat capabilities, as shown in the trailer below.

Detailed in a post on the PlayStation blog, Gundam Evolution has three different game modes: Point Capture, Domination, and Destruction. The first has teams trying to either attack or defend a specific control point, the second has them simultaneously fighting over three rotating points, and the last has one team trying to destroy an objective the other is defending.

First announced in July of last year, Gundam Evolution already had a network test in Japan, but a Western release was left unconfirmed at the time. Initially announced for PC as well, today's reveal also confirms that it will be coming to PlayStation 4 and 5.

Capcom Announces Dinosaur Battling Action Game Exoprimal

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 02:08 PM PST

No, what we watched at the opening of Sony's State of Play was sadly not a new Dino Crisis game. But it was a brand new IP about fighting dinosaurs from Capcom, called Exoprimal.

The trailer gave us a look at a futuristic city where portals keep dumping massive piles of dinosaurs into the metro area, and groups of futuristic soldiers called Exofighters in high-tech armor must take them down. A disclaimer at the bottom of one section of the trailer notes that there's online multiplayer involved, so you'll be able to team up with your friends and fire a bunch of futuristic guns at hundreds of dinosaurs.

In a closer look in the PlayStation Blog explains that Exoprimal takes place in 2043, when mysterious vortexes have been opening up and ejecting armies of dinosaurs into the modern world. Exofighters must wear Exosuits in order to be able to take them on, with each suit having unique abilities and specialization. Players can change their suits at any time during a mission and change up their powers and team compositions on the fly.

Exoprimal is focused around multiplayer, cooperative play, and it's expected that teams will shift their suits often as different dinosaurs and challenges appear in front of them. In a further update on the official Twitter, it's been revealed that Exoprimal matches will consist of two teams of five players fighting against the dinosaurs, with only one winner.

Exoprimal is headed to PS5 and PS4 sometime in 2023. You can catch upon everything else that was announced at today's State of Play right here.

Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

Star Wars: How the Obi-Wan Kenobi Teaser Answers the Series' Biggest Mystery

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 01:13 PM PST

The upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series isn't the first Star Wars project to shed light on Obi-Wan's time as a desert hermit, but it's certainly the most ambitious. Past stories like Marvel's Star Wars comics and the Star Wars: Kenobi novel never gave any indication Obi-Wan left Tatooine during that 19 year period. But with the release of the first teaser trailer for the series, we now have confirmation Obi-Wan will venture back out into the wider galaxy.

Why is Obi-Wan emerging from hiding now, and how does this series tie into his ongoing mission to protect a young Luke Skywalker? The answer seems to lay with one crucial scene featured in the teaser.

Obi-Wan vs. the Sith Inquisitorius

The trailer focuses a great deal on the Inquisitorius, positioning these elite hunters as the main villains of the series. Originally introduced in the animated series Star Wars Rebels, the Inquisitors are Dark Side adepts who answer directly to Darth Vader. They've been trained to help their master hunt down and eliminate any Jedi who survived the Clone Wars. The series features both new and old Inquisitor characters, including the Grand Inquisitor (played by Rupert Friend), Fifth Brother (played by Sung Kang) and most importantly, Moses Ingram's character, Third Sister/Reva (more on her in a bit).

Based on this footage, we can infer the Inquisitors have caught wind of a Jedi hiding out on Tatooine. We even see Reva interrogating a group of Mos Eisley residents that includes Joel Edgerton's Owen Lars. It doesn't appear that she's zeroed in on Owen as a person harboring a future Jedi Knight, but she's clearly way too close to uncovering the existence of Anakin Skywalker's son. That's where Obi-Wan comes in.

Up till now, the biggest question surrounding this series has been what exactly compels Obi-Wan to leave Tatooine. Why take such a huge risk? Is there someone or something that calls him into action How do you even remove him from his hiding place and pit him against Darth Vader again without upending the continuity of the movies?

However, now we know what spurs him into action. Obi-Wan will apparently do something early in the series that draws unwanted attention from the Empire. With the Inquisitors on his scent, Obi-Wan will have no choice but to leave Tatooine and create a trail for the enemy to follow. Better he sacrifice himself than risk Luke falling into the Empire's hands before he's even old enough to wield his father's lightsaber.

Somehow, Obi-Wan will have to pull off the ultimate trick: He needs to lure the Inquisitors away from Tatooine, give them a proper hunt and ensure they don't return to the desert planet later. That may well mean faking his death at some point along the way. Clearly, Master Kenobi has his work cut out for him.

Who Is the Inquisitor Reva?

While the series will feature several members of the Sith Inquisitorius, it appears Ingram's character Reva will be the central antagonist of the series (at least until Hayden Christensen's Darth Vader arrives on the scene).

According to StarWars.com, Reva has been given the rank of Third Sister. However, based on the way the Grand Inquisitor seems to be lecturing her about the nature of Jedi Knights, we get the impression Reva is a more recent recruit. Based on the series' place in the Star Wars timeline, it's even possible Reva was recruited to fill the void left by Second Sister, following the climax of Jedi: Fallen Order. Obi-Wan Kenobi takes place roughly ten years after the events of Episode III and five years after Fallen Order.

Then there's the fact that this character is even being given a civilian name in the first place. The Inquisitors may have had other lives before becoming Darth Vader's pawns, but those lives are meant to be as dead and buried as Vader's Anakin Skywalker identity. So why is Third Sister being given a name? Is this a clue she hasn't yet been fully corrupted by the Inquisitorius?

Hunting Obi-Wan may be Reva's first real test as an Inquisitor, which would certainly explain why she seems so fanatical in the trailer. Is she like Kylo Ren, a fallen Jedi overcompensating for the fact that they aren't 100% committed to the Dark Side? Perhaps Obi-Wan will see a chance to pull her out of darkness, a small act of atonement for all the Jedi he failed during the Clone Wars. If so, Reva had best hope she doesn't meet the same fate as Second Sister.

For more on Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi, learn how the series can answer a decades-old Star Wars mystery and brush up on all the Star Wars movies and shows in development.

Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.

Sony PlayStation Suspends Software and Hardware Sales in Russia

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 12:41 PM PST

Editor's Note: The war in Ukraine is an ongoing, painful and emotive topic. IGN urges community members to be respectful when engaging in conversation around this subject and does not endorse harassment of any kind.

Sony has shared a statement with IGN saying that it will be suspending all software and hardware sales in Russia due to its recent and ongoing invasion of Ukraine.

"Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) joins the global community in calling for peace in Ukraine," the statement reads. "We have suspended all software and hardware shipments, the launch of Gran Turismo 7, and operations of the PlayStation Store in Russia. To support humanitarian aid, Sony Group Corporation announced a US$2 million donation to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the international NGO, Save the Children, to support the victims of this tragedy."

Sony joins numerous other gaming companies denouncing the invasion and pulling sales from Russia and, in some cases, neighboring Russian ally Belarus. Epic Games, CD Projekt Red, EA, Microsoft, Take-Two, Ubisoft, and plenty more have announced similar suspensions in the last week. Nintendo has also delayed Advanced Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp due to the war.

Similarly, many companies have announced donations and other forms of support and aid, including a massive itch.io bundle offering almost 1,000 games for a minimum donation of $10, which has already raised nearly $3 million. You can see all the companies issuing statements, sharing resources, and making donations here.

Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

Triangle Strategy Review

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 12:29 PM PST

Triangle Strategy starts slowly. Pressing "New Game" leads to a series of unappealing events. You're introduced to your character, Serenoa Wolffort, and his extremely boring retainers and fiancee. You're given a bunch of narration about the recent history of a fantasy land whose most interesting characteristic is that there isn't much naturally occurring salt. There's cutscene after cutscene, introducing character after character with almost no context. You barely have to actually do anything, with the exception of a simple intro battle – and that battle system lacks an obvious hook. It's awkward and frustrating with very little other than the marvelous pixel art to keep it motivating. But despite an unappealing start, over the course of its 40-plus hours that slowness becomes a virtue, growing into one of the most effective and entertaining examples of the tactical RPG form.

Don't worry - this is not one of those "it gets amazing after the first two dozen terrible hours" kinds of JRPGs. Almost every part of that frustrating start fades away, some problems almost immediately, revealing a game whose slow confidence is a virtue. The mundanity of the setting turns into a tense, extremely human political drama. The overwhelming number of characters provides fertile ground for intrigue, as seemingly major characters can be dispatched once the story gets violent, while minor characters step up. It slowly reveals a system where expressing beliefs, gathering information, and understanding character relationships all become important. Combat never becomes overly complex, yet somehow always feels perfectly tuned. And the main character….well, the main character just always makes Jon Snow look exciting by comparison. Sorry about that.

The initial impressive standout for Triangle Strategy is its two-dimensional character pixel art that exists in a flexible three-dimensional world. It's the hallmark of Tomoya Asano, who also worked as a producer on the similarly impressive Octopath Traveler. Being able to zoom in and out and swirl the camera around or tilt from an isometric to a top-down view, all while looking consistent and clear, is a tremendous achievement. It looks good on both TV mode and handheld on the Switch, although I ended up preferring the latter slightly because the characters really popped on the small screen. Likewise, (and also extremely importantly for a word- and number-heavy RPG) I was able to easily read all the text fairly easily both on the Switch itself and on a relatively small television.

Game of Triangles

It's important to start with the plot and setting, because this is a story-heavy game. Magic exists on the continent of Norzelia, but here it's a tool and weapon more than a world-defining power. Instead, the characters do battle over resources and political authority. The three competing states have vied for control of salt and iron, but a new joint mining project serves as a symbol of peace. Needless to say, things go badly, and everyone starts fighting once again.

It's refreshing to play a game focused on human political machinations.

The grounded human story of resources and ambition may not sound exciting, but in a genre that's usually filled with mad mages or ancient gods threatening to destroy their respective worlds, it's refreshing to play a game focused on human political machinations. One of my favorite characters was introduced as powerful but sympathetic, then was ordered to war in which they killed off some major good guys, but then they slowly started their path down a redemption arc as they realized just how far they'd gone into the brutality. It would be easy, but not unfair, to compare Triangle Strategy to Game of Thrones in many ways.

One the other hand, the four main characters of Triangle Strategy suffer because they are too similarly boring. The young Lord Serenoa, his betrothed Frederica, his advisor Benedict, and his best friend Prince Roland and most other party members are kind, responsible, and excruciatingly, painfully, polite at all times. They don't seem to have any baser instincts and they never swear, lose their temper, express desire, or anything that might seem fun. There are even flashbacks for some of the older characters showing their rowdy youth, and the extent of them is that they sometimes raced in order to see who could follow orders the most efficiently. How rebellious! In a genre filled with flamboyant and memorable characters in games like Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy, or Persona, it's almost shocking to have a set of main characters be so aggressively dull.

It's almost shocking to have a set of main characters be so aggressively dull.

Yet even this character weakness is mitigated by some of Triangle Strategy's other strengths. First, the plot they participate in ends up stressing them out enough that a personality starts to show through, even if it is still universally positive and responsible – like Frederica's intense need for justice or Roland's love for his family. Bigger than that is the Scales of Conviction system, where whenever House Wolffort faces a major choice, instead of asking us to simply make it through Serenoa, the seven main party members all discuss and vote on it. The votes are binding and can go against your wishes, and as time goes on, they take on more and more importance to both the future of the characters and Norzelia. The higher stakes make the differences in character motivations stand out more, even if they remain – again – excruciatingly polite and rational throughout.

There are a few ways to affect the votes. Some small exploration phases allow you to gather information that might prove useful; the knowledge that the Wolffort village is riddled with traps could make inviting an invasion seem more palatable, for instance. Second, dialogue options that match a character's impulses can help: knowing that Benedict is pragmatic means those options are most likely to sway him, while Roland is more focused on loyalty. Finally, based on other choices in dialogue, Sereoa has "Convictions" in Utility, Morality, and Liberty stats that can help strengthen his arguments. In one campaign I had generally focused on being kind and honest, which led to difficulties when I wanted to make a choice of whether to play along with a corrupt offer while my retainers all voted to be honest and expose the corruption immediately.

In one campaign I had focused on being kind and honest, which led to difficulties.

The voting and Conviction systems end up being very clever ways to manifest your choices. All the little dialogue decisions you make (and even some actions taken in combat) end up combining to both subtly lead Serenoa down particular paths, and unlock side characters and flashbacks for them. That scrupulous honesty, for example, helped me acquire the honest anti-corruption support character Julio, who proved invaluable in the late game as someone who could keep my mages casting spells with no breaks. On the downside, the Conviction system is masked for the entire first playthrough, which did lead me to some confusion over whether I was supposed to know what was happening or not. (Relaxing and letting the campaign happen as it happens proved to be one of the better ways to play.)

The choice system is also deployed well in some crucial ways. For example, one of the seemingly minor setting traits of Triangle Strategy is that it includes an oppressed people called the Roselle, whose historical and religious oppression seemed directly inspired by the history of the Jewish people in a way that was so direct as to feel awkward (real history of real oppressed people being given a slight fantastical mask can lead down some strange and unpleasant paths). But Triangle Strategy consistently gave me the opportunity to take action to make life better for the Roselle when they became relevant. That oppression wasn't mere window dressing to make the world seem darker and more realistic, but instead some created a storytelling opportunity. I still think the Roselle are a little weird, especially the physical trait of pink hair, but they were definitely handled a lot better than I'd feared.

The quiet confidence of Triangle Strategy is even more apparent in the combat system, which initially felt like a perfectly generic tactical RPG. But as the campaign went on it increasingly impressed me with some of the best level design and difficulty tuning I've ever seen in a tactics game.

It increasingly impressed me with some of the best level design and difficulty tuning I've ever seen in a tactics game.

The combat form is similar to Final Fantasy Tactics or Fire Emblem: you have a party of eight to 12 characters that you move around a tile-based map in turn. Each character has different skills and stats: Benedict is a supporting class who can use skills that make your characters stronger, tougher, or faster, but does little damage on his own; Roland is a fast-moving cavalryman who can do a lot of damage but doesn't last long if he gets isolated. It's a very traditional form, and one that's stood the test of time because it's an effective way to provide strategic challenges for players while combined with character distinctions and personality shown through actions.

There are small tactical considerations built into the Triangle Strategy system: some enemies take more damage against certain spell types, while taking advantage of the terrain and attacking from higher ground or hitting enemies from behind can do more damage. But these are small features and don't add up to, for example, a combo system like that in Disgaea, where the goal is to create the biggest exploits you possibly can. In Triangle Strategy, the progression system doesn't allow for creating superpowered characters like those in Final Fantasy Tactics. Nor is there anything like Fire Emblem's friendship system to encourage combat choices beyond simply "do the most damage."

Instead, Triangle Strategy has simpler, quieter progression. Characters get slightly but noticeably stronger in ways that allow some temporary advantages, but then tougher enemies also pick up their own strengths. And while you can't completely reshape your characters, there are enough items and progression choices via weapon upgrades that can tweak them in important ways. As I noticed that Erador, the main heavy infantry character, was starting to take massive magic damage, I upgraded his magic defense and so that he was able to stand my ground more. Meanwhile, every time I thought I found a major advantage – like picking up the powerful archer Archibald – I watched as the enemy forces got strong enough that what I had previously thought was being overpowered became simply another useful strategy.

The tactics genre is one where balancing difficulty is essential, and that's proven demonstrably tough to do. As much as I love both XCOM 2 and Fire Emblem: Three Houses, figuring out what difficulty level I actually want for a consistent challenge was a major frustration for me in both cases. So it's extremely high praise when I say that Triangle Strategy, on the default Normal setting, provided me with exactly the level of difficulty I wanted at almost every turn. When I got stuck on those harder fights, there were interesting and worthwhile optional battles I could engage in to level up a bit, or else I could just experiment with changing my characters' formation and roster. "Ah, so if I used the ice mage here, and set my party up on the left instead of meeting the enemy head on, I can survive longer" are the exact sorts of tactical decisions that I hope to make in games like this.

What's more, the combat system manages to apply that consistent difficulty across multiple level types due to varied and clever level design. In one late-game battle, I was faced with a powerful enemy force headed directly at me – an all-against-all scrum of the sort that tactics games rarely actually try to pull off. I succeeded by loading up on archers and getting them in flanking positions in order to burn down as many enemies as possible, keeping the numbers my melee characters had to deal with manageable. This came right after a battle in a mine, where several mine carts allowed fast movement around the map. That was the complete opposite structure: a series of small group battles where I worked to quickly shuffle support characters around in order to get small advantages that added up to a win.

Pixelated Greatness

Triangle Strategy also rises to the occasion whenever a major plot battle occurs, both in combat design and also aesthetically. The music – which is so important in this genre – is generally perfectly fine, but in some of the big battle themes it goes above and beyond, particularly with one tune that gives off a spaghetti western vibe. There's also some unique character dialogue that happens during these fights, which is especially useful because the villains tend to carry the campaign in terms of personality.

Destiny 2: The Witch Queen Review

Posted: 09 Mar 2022 11:30 AM PST

The reason I've stuck with Destiny for more than seven years, through both its highest highs and lowest lows, has everything to do with its incredibly strong foundation. Even at times when a poorly told story or a lack of content have held it back, firing magical space weapons and throwing flaming hammers at aliens just feels good! And while the past few expansions were adequate but flawed iterations that kept my appetite fed, The Witch Queen feels like a breakthrough that finally realizes the long-running looter shooter's greatest potential. This latest update provides not only Destiny's first truly phenomenal story alongside a campaign that's both challenging and memorable, but also a weapon crafting system that's a godsend for hardcore devotees like myself, new light-wielding enemies that completely evolve the flow of combat, and new takes on some old abilities to refreshingly shake up the meta. While PvP has still been left in a disappointing lurch, there's no doubt in my mind that The Witch Queen is otherwise the best Destiny's ever been.

Destiny has always struggled to balance its rich lore between action-packed campaigns and cutscenes, which at times border on the nonsensical, and the item descriptions and "grimoire" lore entries where many of its world's most important details are squirreled away. Even if you've been following the story for a long while, it would be understandable if you have almost no idea what's actually going on most of the time. But Bungie has spent the last several years changing that, introducing meaningful story developments and characters that feel more three-dimensional than they have in the past. Nowhere is that more apparent than in The Witch Queen which, for the very first time, doesn't just tell a passable story but an actively compelling one.

The star of the show is The Witch Queen herself – Savathûn, the Hive God of Deception – who has succeeded in claiming the almighty power of The Light for herself and her Hive brood. But her story is much more than the usual monster of the week fanfare where we drive a tank through her face and emote on her corpse in glorious fashion. Instead, we get to know her life and motivations, understanding her to be more than a purely evil entity out to destroy us – and as the events unfold, we're treated to multiple, jaw-dropping twists and turns that make the rollercoaster ride much more enjoyable. There are still a ton of references to characters and lore that make the plot harder to follow if you haven't been meticulously keeping up with Destiny's wild escapades (especially the past year in particular), but that's almost unavoidable at this point and doesn't stop this story from being entertaining even if you're playing catchup.

The campaign isn't very long (I was able to get through it in a 24-hour period on the hardest difficulty), but it's unique, difficult, and more inventive than any Destiny campaign before it – to the point where it's not even close. The biggest addition is the Become Legend mode, which increases combat difficulty and adds challenging mechanics like limited revives for teammates. For those who would rather not just blow through the campaign immediately, Become Legend serves as a daunting, rewarding adventure that makes Savathûn and her ilk feel like a force to be reckoned with and makes victory in the end that much sweeter, especially since the loot you get out of it is absolutely worth the trouble.

Completing this campaign is no longer a matter of mindlessly running and gunning.

My only real complaint as I looted and shooted my way through all The Witch Queen had to offer is that a lot of it is unusually buggy by Destiny's standards. Whether I was getting kicked to orbit repeatedly during the excellent new raid, staring down sluggish menus on PC, or even experiencing the occasional hard crash on console, I found myself frustrated by bugs and performance issues more often than I'm used to in an MMO that's usually known for its extreme polish. These problems weren't just minor quirks either and they especially stood out while attempting the raid, where the challenge is exceptionally high and losing progress because everyone randomly gets disconnected can be downright maddening.

The campaign also includes the notable addition of puzzle mechanics to levels and boss fights that have been almost exclusively gated behind raids and Destiny's endgame content up until this point. Now, instead of just standing on a plate or scanning an artifact before shooting a boss to death, you might have to remember a set of symbols and fight your way through the halls of a palace searching for the door with a matching set before the boss can be damaged. These interactions never approach anything as complex as proper raid mechanics, but instead feel like a perfect entry level for more casual players or those looking for a less sweat-inducing experience. They make all the difference too, because completing the campaign is no longer a matter of mindlessly running and gunning for a handful of hours before credits roll. Now you have to contend with platforming and weird occult magic while dodging fire from some extremely rude baddies.

Speaking of baddies, one of the new challenges you'll face is the fearsome, badass Light-bearing Hive: immortal monsters with many of the same abilities your own character possesses. In fact, they can even be endlessly revived by their Ghost to fight you again and again, which is honestly terrifying. In combat, these Hive Guardians can wield the Light to slam you with devastating supers, many of which can kill you in a single hit. Victory against these formidable foes requires smart gunplay, patience, and most importantly, that you remember to quickly run and crush the enemy Ghost before it can revive them. A challenging new enemy type that forces you to think about how you approach an encounter like this is exactly what Destiny has needed to spruce up combat. Knocking them out then smashing their Ghosts in my hand has been the highlight of my time with The Witch Queen.

With so much new content to tackle in The Witch Queen, one thing that's missing is any sort of improved introduction for new players, which is especially painful considering that this expansion makes an already convoluted world even more complex with systems like weapon crafting. If you don't already know how to play Destiny 2, the odds of you figuring it out without a very kind and very patient friend as a guide are infinitesimally small. I'd like everyone to enjoy the truly awesome stuff The Witch Queen has to offer, but while it's sure to excite existing Destiny fans, it's also harder to recommend it to the uninitiated in its current state.

Fynch has one of the best voice performances in Destiny ever.

Once you're done with the campaign, there's a whole new area to explore in Savathûn's Throne World, a pocket dimension that's a magical, otherworldly representation of her mind. The Patrol Zone is fairly similar to things we've already seen before in Destiny, but it does have my new favorite character: Fynch, a Hive Ghost who betrays his own to help you save the day. This sassy little conscientious objector serves as your guide through much of The Witch Queen's action and is absolutely brimming with memorable one-liners in one of the best voice performances Destiny has enjoyed. It makes exploring the Hive God's mind a lot more enjoyable, even when you're running the usual chores like Patrols and Lost Sectors.

We're in the Endgame Now

The Witch Queen also has plenty of challenging post-campaign endgame quests and multiplayer activities, some which have their own cutscenes or flesh out the story in one way or another. Exotic quests, for example, are difficult, miniature adventures that end in you acquiring some crazy new toy like a grenade launcher that shoots exploding worm Gods. There's plenty to do for those hungry for more once credits roll on the campaign and lots of new weapons and armor to grind endlessly for if you're into that sort of thing.

But when it comes to endgame content, as usual, the raid is king, once again pitting six players against some of the toughest challenges to be found in any game. This year's raid is called Vow of the Disciple and it takes place in a bizarre alien museum filled with grotesque statues and pieces of preserved living tissue, apparently put on display there by the galaxy's most disturbed hoarder. The trials within are enigmatic puzzles that require powerful gear, incredible teamwork, and fast reaction times to overcome, and it's some of the most fun The Witch Queen offers for those brave enough to tackle it. More importantly though, Vow of the Disciple also does some serious heavy-lifting in terms of storytelling and setting up future events still to come in Destiny – something few other raids have done so far. Without going into spoilers, I'll just say it's absolutely worth climbing the mountain for those interested in seeing what lies beyond the horizon – even if the challenge of getting there may make you like your friends less as a result.

Of all the new frontiers The Witch Queen offers though, none are so enticing as the long-awaited weapon crafting feature, which is a joyous windfall for RPG nerds like myself. Now, instead of relentlessly grinding the same activities over and over in hopes of getting that perfect weapon with all the right perks you were looking for, you can simply craft it to your exact specifications. There are a few caveats, though. First, doing so is every bit as needlessly complex as you might expect from Destiny, forcing you to juggle a bunch of new, confusingly named currencies in a process so hilariously dense you'll get whiplash coming at it straight from the fast-paced battlefield. And second, building your perfect weapon requires (wait for it) a whole lot of grinding! That's right – the new system that lets you avoid the grind for the perfect weapon is replaced by a different grind to level up a mediocre weapon until it's powerful enough to be crafted into its final form. The good news is now you at least always know there will be a definitive and predictable end to the grind instead of playing endlessly hoping RNG will be kind to you, but killing thousands of enemies and completing dozens of activities just to level up a single weapon is still quite a climb.

Glaives shake things up in a big way as the first melee/ranged hybrid option.

The weapon crafting system also impacts just about every aspect of how you'll play Destiny going forward, in that now you'll likely be using less-than-ideal weapons in order to level up ones you'd like to fine tune via crafting. And since one of the ways you gain the resources necessary for crafting is by using randomly dropped (and usually bad) weapons until you fill up a progress bar, my loadout was usually a bizarre mish-mash of weapons in their awkward puberty stage before they become useful for the endgame. That injects a bit of amusing variety into the day-to-day grind, but also means you're rarely using weapons you fully enjoy for most of the time you're working your way through the expansion.

One entirely welcome addition in The Witch Queen is a new weapon archetype called the glaive, which is a polearm that can be used to block incoming fire, attack enemies in melee range, and fire projectiles to hit others from a distance. It's been a few years since Destiny got a proper new weapon type and this one shakes things up in a big way as the first melee/ranged hybrid option, but this experiment is a glowing success. Glaives are a lot of fun to use, play a major role in the Destiny weapons ecosystem, and don't feel overpowered at the moment (until someone inevitably devises a completely broken build to exploit them, as is tradition at this point).

The other major sandbox change is Void 3.0, an overhaul of one of the four power types guardians can choose from. After Stasis abilities were introduced with Beyond Light in 2020, the legacy abilities of Void, Arc, and Solar have all felt out of balance by comparison – and at times even completely unviable. Void 3.0 is an attempt to fix that in part by bringing one of the other ability groups into parity with Stasis. The new customization options completely changed the way I thought about my Void abilities and have the much-needed benefit of making it so my guardian doesn't play identically to every other guardian at my side. Now two characters using the same subclass might be equipped with two entirely different super abilities, grenades, and perks that fundamentally change how they operate, which mixes things up for the better in PvE and PvP alike.

The downside is that it's only a partial fix, as the two other subclasses (Arc and Solar) remain very much in the dust. Seeing them in the wild has been a rarity in the days following The Witch Queen's release. Bungie has said it plans to bring the other subclasses into parity over the next year or so, but in the meantime the meta remains very much imbalanced in a way that discourages you from using half of the abilities on offer.

The Witch Queen does so much right, its shortcomings are defined by what isn't there.

And that's a trend that arises quite frequently when playing The Witch Queen. While just about every inch of the content added does everything right, its shortcomings are instead defined by what isn't there. That's embodied perfectly by the complete lack of additions both to Destiny's PvP modes and the PvE/PvP hybrid mode Gambit. Once you step out of the excellent campaign and new content around it, which you'll almost certainly need to do during the grind to the endgame, you'll find that absolutely nothing has been added to Crucible – no new game modes and not a single map. This isn't a new trend either as Bungie has largely left their PvP options rotting on the vine, even removing a whopping eleven maps from their playlists without replacing them and going on almost two years without adding a new one. Similarly, Gambit has had its maps reduced to just four, and only minor changes have been made to it over the years despite it being easily the least enjoyable mode Destiny has.

We used to expect Crucible maps and the occasional game mode to be added with each major content release, but The Witch Queen is yet another expansion that largely ignores the issues. It's getting harder to overlook that when Crucible and Gambit are stood up as such large cornerstones of what players are expected to do.
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