Destiny 2: The Final Shape
Play it on: PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Windows (Steam Deck: Nope)
Current goal: Get through the story and try not to get emotional about the past ten years of my life
It’s finally here. By the time you’re all reading this, The Final Shape will be out and folks will likely be tackling the raid. They might even be done already. I’ll be away from home, but I’m thinking of bringing my console with me expressly so I can play Destiny 2 and finish this fight. The road here has been difficult, both for fans of the series and its developers, so it’s a big moment for one of gaming’s biggest communities. I’m glad to be here and be a part of it.
I’ve been playing Destiny since the first game’s alpha test dropped us into the remnants of Old Russia and I fought my first Fallen Shank. I remember taking on Destiny’s first strike, the Devil’s Lair, and thinking it was the pinnacle of gaming. I came back for the beta, and was there on September 9, 2014 when Destiny launched. I still remember the week that Vault of Glass was introduced to the game. Me and my high school friends took on the challenge of our first raid and slammed our heads against the game’s byzantine leveling system as we squeezed our builds for any extra damage we could in order to overcome Atheon’s DPS check. We’d talk strategies in the back of our geometry class and run home to test them out. Some of those fireteam members are still some of my closest friends to this day, and that clunky, unpolished game remains a core memory of a defining era of my life.
Destiny’s come a long way since then, and dammit, so have I. I’ve fought back the Fallen time and time again and eventually turned them into allies. I’ve gained the respect of a celebrated Cabal leader. I killed the fucking Taken King, his stupid-ass son Crota, and the rest of his godforsaken lineage. I lost the Light, got it back, and embraced the Darkness. I spent the later part of my teenage years and all of my adult life playing Destiny. This game has endured the most crushing defeats of my life, and it’s also been there to complement some of my greatest victories. For fuck’s sake, I cover this game for Kotaku now. This was the dream when I started playing it ten years ago. I’ve shared it with countless of my favorite people, and I can’t wait to share it with even more folks down the line. I don’t know what’s in store for either of our futures beyond this point, but I’m sure we’ll figure it out. — Moises Taveras
