originally posted in:Collective Of Knowledge
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I'm very much into the lore of Destiny, so much so that I've made [url=https://www.bungie.net/en/Forums/Post/183288968?page=0&sort=0&showBanned=0&path=0]a lot of posts[/url] dissecting and theorizing about the fiction. I have some thoughts on how the game handles it's fiction, and how it could be improved in a sequel.
[b]1) Integrate Grimoire into the game as a collectible audio series for players to listen to or read.[/b]
I understand that integrating vast and complex lore and backstory into a game's plot is difficult, and having the lore separated into Grimoire cards is a solution, I don't think it makes sense to require players to look outside the game to learn the lore of the game. [i]The Grimoire should be in the game as a library (preferably with both text and audio) for players to access in-game.[/i] The Mass Effect series does something similar with it's Codex, and I instantly loved it when I first jumped into Mass Effect 2 without knowing the lore. Making lore accessible in game makes players much more likely to access it, get enthralled by it, and thus become more invested into the game. A player who really cares about the story and universe is more likely to purchase future content, so I think it's worth it to do this.
* Bonus points if we can keep our grimoire from the original Destiny in this library. I'd be fine if they were text only.
[b]2) Integrate more lore into the story.[/b]
By this I don't mean the characters need to explain the backstory or give us detailed understanding of the lore, but as it stands right now, many interesting and seemingly important lore elements are essentially ignored in the plot, and it makes the Destiny fiction feel fractured and disparate instead of a cohesive universe. One example is the sword logic; it is the method through which Hive gain power from killing as a result of the symbiosis with their worm. With enough sword logic, they can become gods, and create their own universes called throne worlds to respawn into when they die (they don't stay dead unless killed in their own throne world). Crota's was in his raid location, and Oryx's was inside the Dreadnaught. We've had two different story arcs centered around killing Hive gods, and yet this important concept and it's extremely relevant effects (how to get powerful enough to fight a god, and how to keep it dead) has never come up? [i]Basically don't ignore the lore in the story when it would be appropriate to explore it.[/i]
* Strikes can be used to explore lore that isn't necessarily relevant to the main story since strikes are gnerally their own self-contained story. I actually did a thread on [url=https://www.bungie.net/en/Forums/Post/201122161]2 strike concepts designed to explore lore[/url]. Particularly with the Vex and the Vault of Glass, and the Hive and the oversouls. I think they are good examples of how to weave lore into the story, and explore that lore with dialogue.
[b]3) Reflecting enemy lore through gameplay (I have some examples of this).[/b]
[b]a-1)[/b] The Hive eat Light to grow, and they get stronger from killing. You can show this by having it so that [i]whenever a thrall kills a guardian, it eats the Light and becomes an acolyte, and when an acolyte kills a guardian, it eats the Light and becomes a wizard or a knight. [/i]
[b]a-2)[/b] Wizards perform spells and rituals, including the creation of ogres. [i]Have wizards perform spells on other enemy types like thralls to turn them into ogres and other new kinds of Hive abominations.[/i]
[b]b)[/b] The cabal are a massive military empire that incorporate those they conquer into their forces, like they did to the scions.[i] Show 1 or 2 more conquered species besides the psions incorporated in the Cabal military[/i] (preferably non-humanoid. Intelligent life does not have to be bipedal).
[b]c)[/b] The Fallen are fractured into various houses in story and lore, but we don't get to see indications of this in-game other than different colors. [i]Have house Judgement be visibly rebuilt with more Fallen forces so we can see more sides to the Fallen[/i]. According to the text of the Grayris bounty from Petra, Variks was actually trying to get the baroness to leave her house (presumably to join Judgement) before she got Taken, so the idea of Variks recruiting to rebuild House Judgement is not far-fetched.
[b]d)[/b] The Vex are supposed to be this massive unified mind distributed across countless units, but the way they fight doesn't actually reflect this. [i]Have the different units behave collectively as parts of one whole body to reflect this. For example: a swarm of harpies link up and generate a shield around a boss, and have players have to destroy individual harpies to create openings in the shield. Ha units that combine to form larger units.[/i]
I have other requests relating to story, but I will refrain from posting it here because it may detract from my main points. I would post further requests regarding how to not repeat the mistakes of Vanilla Destiny, but those mistakes were a merely result of development shakeups, and I'm sure Bungie has learned from it.
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Have the Fallen also scale vertical surfaces like spiders during actual gameplay, as seen in the first level of Destiny as simple animations.