Destiny 2: Shadowkeep is almost here. BUNGIE is shutting down all of it's
Destiny gaming servers this morning at 10:00 for a 24-hour upgrade, after
which time, players will get their first look at Shadowkeep.
I'm told much is changing about Destiny 2 for the new version, and I spent
yesterday online with my clan taking care of some unfinished business (I
FINALLY HAVE THE RAT KING!) and doing some housekeeping. Serious Destiny 2
players will have done the same much earlier than did I.
Housekeeping
The most notable housekeeping item was that exotic weapons and armor
in a player's posession (read: either equipped or in the player's vault)
would get its power upgraded to 750 — the maximum power in the current
season. Now, when a player is awarded an exotic item, that item joins
the player's collection, serving as a record for having received it. This
is important because most items can be retrieved from your collection
should you dismantle it. So the big task was to compare the exotics I
had in my character's possession with those in my collection, and retrieve
the ones I was missing, so that by Tuesday morning ALL of those exotics
would have been upgraded. This is a tremendous bonus, because an exotic
weapon like Sturm, which originally had a power of 260, becomes thrice
as powerful without you having to dismantle other items and spend
legendary shards to do it.
Another part of the housekeeping was to go through and dismantle
a number of duplicate and/or non-exotic items in my vault — including
objects awarded through Eververse purchases — because of a change in
the Destiny 2 economy: all players should know by now that bright dust,
which is a currency used exclusively in Eververse purchases, is going
away and being converted into some combination of glimmer and legendary
shards. When an item purchased with bright dust gets dismantled, the
player receives bright dust. The thinking was that, in preparation for
the conversion, one should maximize their ROI on those objects by breaking
them down into bright dust prior to the conversion. Given how long I've
been grinding away at this game, I should be a virtual buzillionaire
come Tuesday morning, with more shards and glimmer than I have sense.
The great part about this scheme is that I should be able to get all
of those shaders back in Shadowkeep for pennies on the virtual dollar --
though I'm told I may not want to, because a new shader system (2.0)
is being rolled out which is supposed to be spactacular.
I spent hours doing this yesterday, much to my daughter's chagrin.
And I have to say, I'm not anyone's idea of a hardcore gamer. I don't
care about stats or PVP all that much. I don't want to dominate; I
just want to have fun while I'm doing laundry. But my clan sort of
made me care about getting ready for the upgrade.
The Clan
Actually, lately, they've made me care about a few things. It's a
small group with some dedication to all the stuff I tend to shy away
from, so I'm getting exposed to "new" aspects of the game that I'm
learning to enjoy. Through this, though, I realize I'm building a
dependency on them — there are so many activities that require group
participation, so wanting to do them, more than having
to do them, requires me to engage more.
Plus, I'm learning more about gaming culture — a term I use to
describe the habits of the hardcore set. I learned a new term yesterday:
"rage quit." The term refers to when gamers get so angry they quit
out of a scenario, challenge, or game. It's a feeling I know well—
I'm comforted knowing that others feel the same frustrations I do at
times. Is it comeraderie? Meh... maybe. But it's certainly social,
with a lot of laughter; and I think I maybe need more of that.
ROI
So I don't know what Shadowkeep has in store for me. I'm looking
forward to the story — Eris Morn, aka "my creepy girlfriend" (I
described the character that way to my wife once) is central to the
story, as I understand it involves the Hive and earth's moon — all of
this was written out of Destiny 2 until now. But more than the story
elements, I don't know what it has in store in terms of my playing
experience. I've become closer to the clan over recent weeks, and
that makes me wonder if I'll get more out of Shadowkeep than I would
have otherwise.