It seems Bungie is excited about the idea of the Drifter in Destiny 2. In a video, they explain how fantastic and deep the character is and how much history is embedded in him.
Who is the Drifter? Most players know him only as “the guy who cracks jokes in Gambit before each round.” A video, in which he said “thing” an insane number of times and in many variations, went viral.
Since Forsaken, Drifter has been closely tied to the Gambit mode, cracking his jokes there. Now that he has his own season in the Annual Pass , he has become even more central in Destiny 2.
For Bungie, the “Drifter” seems to be the coolest and deepest character they have ever created. In a developer video and an interview with the US website Polygon , Bungie’s story specialists highlight the character’s background.
This is the role the Drifter plays in Destiny 2: Bungie says: “The Drifter is like an uncle who shows you how to fight dirty.”
The Drifter is meant to encourage Guardians to walk the path between darkness and light.
Thus, he is often in conflict with the “good guys” from the Vanguard, who feel committed to the light.
Where does the Drifter come from? The Drifter is one of the first humans to be revived by the Traveler. Therefore, he did not become a Hunter, Warlock, or Titan, but a “Lightbearer.”
He lived in the “dark age”, long before the Guardians entered the world of Destiny.
During the Dark Age, he died alone from hunger hundreds of times and was repeatedly revived by his Ghost. Thus, his jokes about having eaten aliens should be taken seriously. Often he had no choice if he did not want to die again.
Since then:
- He has owned a bar
- was trapped on an ice planet
- and fought in pretty much every conflict the Guardians have heard of
This is the story of the Drifter: The character has gone by many different names and lived many lives over the long years. He has been part of many crews but has always left them again.
Alongside him, he has been involved with the mysterious “The Nine.” The Drifter contacts them through their emissary, whom he knew as the Guardian “Orin” from a previous life during the Dark Age.
But both have lived many lives since then and have changed.
The ongoing story about the emissary and the Nine is told every week through “the Invitation of the Nine” in Destiny 2 .
The Nine want the solar system to survive and support the Drifter in preparing the Guardians to face the darkness. To do this, the Drifter runs the game modes Gambit and Gambit Prime to let the Guardians face fragments of the darkness.
The Nine have given the Drifter an appendage called the “Haul”: a massive ice ball. He drags it behind his spaceship. The “Haul” is the Drifter’s own little world, where he can create things. This place holds limitless potential.
Bungie says: What he creates there says more about the Drifter than about the Nine.
Because the Drifter uses the Haul apparently to channel and create his horrors. He creates the Taken and uses them as his personal guards or as training objects for Guardians to face in the “Reckoning” mode. Thus, this mode also partly plays in the mind of the Drifter.
As Bungie says, the “shadow of Oryx” is in the Reckoning because it is pretty much the worst thing the Drifter can imagine.
The Drifter also has a relationship with the “Weapons of Sorrow”: dark and grim weapons, such as the Thorn.
What does the Drifter want? The Drifter primarily wants to stay alive and has thus developed a healthy paranoia.
However, Bungie does not reveal what true intentions lie behind his grin and charm.
This is what Bungie wishes: The story team wants to create a mysterious character with the Drifter that evolves and tells an ongoing story. Ideally, Guardians should empathize here and hope for the resolution of the mysteries.
He is part of an idea to take Destiny more in a direction of “live games” that tell an ongoing story. Therefore, the Drifter is also expected to play a role in Destiny 2 in the upcoming months.
