It should come as no shock to any player “worth their salt” in Destiny that the game has a number of issues.  It’s not to say that it is unplayable, or that it glitches and/or disconnects players to a point where the game becomes intolerable.  No, rather, it’s simply not what Bungie had envisioned for their large world, social shooter.

I recently came out of a surgery, one that I had the week after Destiny was released, and with a long recovery ahead of me, I knew exactly where I’d be investing my time.  Granted I didn’t expect the time spent in the world to go well over the 430 hours I’ve reached between my three characters (One of which is pictured below).  Unlike a number of internet goers you obviously won’t find me in a comments section or forum complaining about what the game is not.  Clearly from the amount of time I’ve put in, as well as having shared much of that time with others, the game is not as bad, or as much of a shell as some would have you believe with their rhetoric.  This however does not mean the title isn’t without it’s problems.

Since the game has launched Bungie has been working hard to fix issues with PvP and issues in their beloved raid, the Vault of Glass.  Clearly these two items have been their priority being the first two pieces of content patched within the game, yet neither are entirely necessary at this juncture.

The team at Bungie has expressed that they want the Vault of Glass to be very challenging, they even quoted the first team to beat the raid, with the players saying “Easily the most emotionally rewarding experience I’ve had in a game. There’s nothing akin to pounding your head against a wall for almost 12 hours to have the wall finally cave. It definitely isn’t for everyone, but I love the hell out of it.”   Then came the cheese, players who would attempt to find a work around for the raid’s final boss, Atheon, and other difficult sections of the game’s current ultimate challenge.  They proved that players didn’t have to toil away for hours at a time to obtain the games supposed most lucrative rewards.

After being taught by a fellow writer on the site how to push Atheon off a cliff, me and my teammates decided to push hard to see what kind of rewards could be reaped from the raid.  We completed something around three dozen attempts of pushing Atheon off his perch, whether it was through helping ourselves or others, who could help us down the road.

Through all of those efforts, all of those workarounds — cheese as it’s often referred to — never once did I feel the rewards were entirely worth a real play through of the raid, especially when, on average, half of our teammates wouldn’t receive anything!  And every attempt was on hard mode!  The Vault of Glass is often frustrating unless your team is highly precise, highly tuned, but even if you come out the other side having completed the raid on hard mode, there is no guaranteed reward.  There’s a shader for clearing the event on normal mode, but it’s no consolation for gear.  I know several players on my friends list who have gone upwards of ten attempts at the raid with no more than a single piece of armor through all of their rigors.

The Vex Mythoclast, the weapon that most will strive to obtain in clearing a hard mode raid, is a nice weapon.  It’s probably “neat” at best, but in my opinion and those of my friends that play as chronically as I do it is not worth the efforts of possibly ten Vault of Glass trips on hard mode.  It is possible to create a checkpoint at Atheon to make multiple attempts with multiple characters, but even those efforts aren’t worth the prize.  Much of this has to do with lackluster gear, whether it’s in weapons or armor or their perks.

Exotics, gold/orange items, like in other loot hunting games should feel very powerful and unique by comparison to average items, or even a Guardian’s legendary equipment.  This is not the case for Destiny however, as a player will find the majority of exotic weapons to feel bland or underpowered, even by comparison to their purple counterparts.  In their first attempt to make PvP more balanced, the patch made one of the most satisfying exotic weapons, the Pocket Infinity, feel like the rest of it’s bounty brothers, unimportant and underpowered.  Exotics in the game are not so much of a reward as they are a trophy that comes after a long struggle.  Most of said trophies aren’t worth utilizing, at least not yet.

This is a stark contrast to Diablo, Borderlands, World of Warcraft, and other loot hunting cousins of the title.  The majority of the time a player in any of the referred games could celebrate, even throw a party for themselves upon finding a rare and powerful piece of equipment.  Orange items are game changing in other games, and while it is not Destiny’s obligation to meet that standard, it is at the very least expected.

For some time, almost since the third or fourth week of Destiny’s life since launch, the guys at Bungie have said that they will be modifying exotics to feel more unique and powerful.  Of course that hotfix hasn’t arrived yet and possibly might not arrive before the new content drops on December 9th.

Bungie has been focused on balancing, making the game as challenging as they intended, and preventing work arounds, but here’s the catch, players are enjoying the game just as it is.  No one held a gun to my head and said that I had to use a work around to get the job done.  At no point did I neglect that if I wanted a challenge, whether that be in the raid or PvP that I could choose to have one.  Players could choose to beat the Vault of Glass as it’s intended, or a Guardian could choose to use a pulse rifle or hand cannon in the Crucible.

Oddly enough, for all it’s issues, Destiny works as it is. Sure, it’s not as difficult as Bungie wants it to be, but at this juncture it’s really too late to be focused on making the game harder for players.  Making a game harder, that already has issues with it’s rewards and rewards system does not make a game more enjoyable, but rather it makes the experience frustrating.  Instead Bungie should become more focused on what makes the game fun to play, whether that be better weapons, more effective exotics, cooler perks for said gear, more events like the Queen’s Bounty or Iron Banner, and let players challenge themselves if they so please.

There’s always time later to add challenging content, but it’s important to keep giving players a reason to continue playing so there is still an audience when that content and DLC drops.

Scott Deisner is an Associate Writer for MONG.  He enjoys story and character driven content above all else, things made from potatoes, and long walks on sandy beaches ;P  You can follow him on Twitter.