Bungie, the gaming studio spun off from Microsoft and responsible for the
HALO and DESTINY franchises, seems to have answered a call from more dedicated
players for a more challenging gameplay experience, leaving the less committed
(read: people with jobs and responsibilities) behind.
In a recent season of Destiny 2, Bungie introduced The Black Forge — a new
dimension of the game involving an entirely new class of weapons, but requiring
the attainment of 600 power level for character participation. I spent that entire
season trying to advance my character to 600 so that I can even have a shot
at scoring one of these new weapons (forgive the pun), and opening new caches
that appear from time to time.
Part of getting to 600 is fighting in the Crucible. Every time I did, I was
up against people who were at 650 power — I was at 550. I got crushed every
time I played.
Adding insult to injury, I had acccepted a challenge from the Drifter that
requires a number of Crucible opponent kills. The rub is that if you are on a
team that loses its challenge, your completion percentage drops. The highest
I ever got was 4%; I'm flat-lined.
Yes, I'm mad.
"Grinding" is a term used in the gaming community to represent the work you
have to invest in a particular goal, like getting through a level or unlocking
a legendary item. Players get frustrated when that relative level seems unusually
high, or when, in the case of Star Wars: Battlefront II, they feel
coerced into paying to unlock items or characters that they would otherwise have
to spend many hours grinding at the game to earn. In the context of Destiny 2:
Forsaken, players (besides me) have been complaining about the amount of
grinding to reach 600 and to complete the Volundr mission.
According to the new storyline, you must help bring the Black Forges back
online by starting forges hidden throughout the galaxy. The first forge is
Volundr in the EDZ. Starting it is a 3-person challenge that really requires
significant experience, skill, and some CBD oil — it's pure infuriation (again,
getting crushed every time I play — even at 600!!!). And it's complete bullshit:
You really need a power level of over 610 and a lot of experience in this
challenge, and enough luck to join a group of others with the same experience
and skill, to complete the challenge.
I nearly threw my controller in anger a few times last night. And that's
a warning sign for me.
BUNGIE, I fear I'm not long for your worlds. I'm not a college kid who
spends all day playing and skipping classes. I work over 40 hours a week
and have a family to support and a house to clean. I play in the evenings
to unwind and have a good time. THIS — this is not unwinding. And I'm
definitely not having a good time. I understand you have a community
that needs new challenges to keep the experience fresh; but you need to
make sure those new challenges don't alienate those of us who maybe only
get to put in an hour or so at night when the kids are asleep, or a few
hours on the weekend. We need you to understand that we're relatively
underpowered — so maybe don't put us into Crucible matches where everyone
on the opposing team outpowers us by over 100. We're still with you because
we love this game. But we'll eventually reach a point where it's not fun
anymore, and we'll go play other games that ARE.
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