Video Games & FOMO

A couple of weeks ago I blogged about the end of Destiny 2, but oddly once I had re-completed the quests of Season 2 of Marathon I booted up Destiny 2 again. A game that I hadn't touched since "The Final Shape" DLC released back in June of 2024.

It seemed from afar that Destiny 2 was over the mantra of holding content, because boy the patch notes for the 9.7.0 release was insanely large. I'm guessing it makes sense because why hold back anything at the studio if the game is over - release whatever you have slated for now or the future.

So as I booted the game up I had 2 campaigns to play and catch up on - Renegades & Edge of Fate.

Neither looked like they had good reviews, but that was to be expected. Destiny 2 probably wouldn't be over if the previous DLCs had been a smash hit. Personally I think they were doomed to make anything after "The Final Shape" as that DLC put an end to a story line that had been developing for a decade. Basically same reason why I think any movie in the Marvel universe after Endgame isn't my cup of tea.

I accidentally played the campaigns in the wrong order (Renegades than Edge of Fate), but I'd agree that neither of them were that fun.

Renegades:

• Trying to be Star Wars so much inside an existing Destiny 2 world.
• Introduced some new mechanic that conflicts directly with abilities - somehow I went entire campaign only using it when directed.
• Enemies and areas felt very close to the original Red War campaign

Edge of Fate:

• Crazy boring puzzles revolving around some ball/teleport/mutate mechanic
• So much backtracking in missions back to an area after solving something elsewhere
• Sparrow travel disabled leading to prolonged slower mission progression

However, ignoring all of that. The only reason I came back to Destiny 2 is that because it was over. This meant to me no matter what I played or did was the final time I had to do that. I only had to grind to the highest light one more time and that was tempting enough.

Back when I was in school and had all the time in the world - Destiny releasing upgrades that nullified old gear and forced a progression to new max light was kinda fun. However, as I got older watching an update come out and either remove a ton of existing content (cough Beyond Light) or force me to re-grind to get back to activities (Raids) I enjoyed doing was not. I didn't have infinite time anymore to get a new perfect build every DLC so I stopped playing.

I roughly followed along, because like any game you'd been playing for decades you are invested in the success and path of it. I wanted to play here and there, but once you fall behind there is not much point of going back to play unless you invest some serious time.

When I look at the stats of PC usage I wonder if the chunk of people who returned did so for the same reason I did. I think it was an inverse effect of FOMO, because with each season Bungie presumably tried to leech onto the human behavior of FOMO. Hopefully encouraging folks to return and play before that content/season is out of the focus for another.

As I mentioned - it just became too much for me and I couldn't keep up with the constant grind of each update. So oddly the game ending was the thing that brought me back. I just feel bad the end of the game led to a majority of the staff being laid off, since boy Destiny at times was one of the best games I ever played.

At this point with a full time job, a wedding on the way and tons of things outside of work. Gaming isn't what it used to be, but I'll slowly grind myself to the max light on Destiny 2 because I have no fear of missing out this time.