Bungie has released new information about Destiny 2: Frontiers. The developers want to take a new direction that won’t bore you, offer more content for free players, and make significant adjustments to the loot shooter.
What has been announced? Bungie has released five big blog posts about Destiny 2 (via bungie.net). These revolve around upcoming changes in 2025. The topics include the following changes you can expect:
- Seasonal content is supposed to become free
- Future stories are not supposed to be linear, and more experiments should take place
- Loot and its locations are supposed to be improved
- The portal and the change in activities
Even beforehand, Bungie had announced the future project “Frontiers” in a short video. Many fans speculated about what new content Bungie had planned and whether it might still be worth taking a look after the end of the Light and Darkness saga.
We now go into detail and provide you with the most important information from the TWiDs so you can decide for yourself whether Bungie is on the right track.
Seasonal content will be free in 2025
What does Bungie have planned? Destiny 2 is overhauling its entire system on how seasons and expansions are supposed to work. Instead of one massive expansion, there will now be two medium-sized expansions per year. In 2025, two DLCs with the codenames “Apollo” and “Behemoth” are already planned, which will likely be paid.
As for seasons, they are supposed to be free for all players. Two season updates are set to be released per expansion, at the beginning and around the middle of the expansion. You can purchase a reward pass per season, which mostly contains cosmetic content – like the season pass that players currently know.
You can find out what the expansions, seasons, and reward passes have in store for you in the table:
| Expansions | Season | Reward Pass |
|---|---|---|
| New Story | New and old activities | Exotic weapon & ornament |
| New destination | New gear and artifact mods | Legendary weapon and armor ornaments |
| New missions | New modifiers and challenges | Resources to upgrade gear |
| New weapons | New sandbox meta | Cosmetic items and more |
| New gear | New events | |
| New raids and dungeons |
New expansions are not supposed to be linear and should experiment
What does “not linear” mean? The Light and Darkness saga followed a linear storytelling path. You went from NPC A to B to C to D in a specific order that Bungie wanted you to follow. This is supposed to change with the first expansion “Apollo” in 2025.
Bungie wants to give you the freedom to experience the story as you wish. So if you want to complete the story of NPC C first and then tackle that of A later? Soon you can do that.
Tyson Green, the Game Director of Destiny 2, also addresses the topic of experimentation. With each expansion, the team wants to try something new: “We are actively working on prototypes for non-linear campaigns, exploration experiences similar to those in the Dreaming City or Metroidvanias, and even more unusual formats like roguelikes or survival shooters. […] Each expansion will present a new opportunity to try something different.”
The expansions are also expected to offer new characters, factions, twists, and more. Whether new peoples are also meant by factions is not known.
Loot and its locations are supposed to be improved
What is supposed to change? Currently, there are few activities where players can grab their loot. The grind results in a tedious repetition of the same modes just to get their God Roll, find a blueprint, or complete the collection.
With Destiny 2: Frontiers, this is supposed to change. In the upcoming expansion “Apollo”, your loot is set to become more profound. There will be several improved weapon variants that you can hunt for in a much wider range of activities.
The legendary weapons will then be divided into different tiers. The lowest represents the base level of all known legendary weapons, while the highest tier is comparable to adept weapons.
To make it easier to obtain these items, there will be a so-called pool for each activity, which can also partially overlap with other pools. A pool will receive an armor and weapon set with different examples for each weapon slot. Thus, Bungie wants to divide its pools:
- Core PVE: Rewards shared from more accessible PVE activities like strikes.
- Core PVP: Rewards distributed across more easily accessible PVP activities like crucible playlists.
- Pinnacle PVE: Rewards allocated to more challenging PVE activities like dungeons.
- Pinnacle PVP: Rewards distributed under more challenging PVP activities like Trials of Osiris.
New items for a season or expansion will also be highlighted, making them easier to identify. Weapon crafting is also supposed to remain available, but more as a means to catch up on missed weapons.
The portal and the change in activities
What is the portal? Bungie will adjust its activity interface with “Apollo”. Anyone returning to Destiny after a long break will notice how quickly the star map and possible activities can overwhelm you. With the “portal,” this is supposed to change.
The portal is designed to provide an overview at a glance, showing you which activities are relevant for your grind. Depending on the season, the focus may change, and to help you know immediately which activity you can tackle to get the best loot, the portal is supposed to assist you.
The portal will show you the most important activities for PvE, PvP, and even events. Through the overview, you can also select the new destination and the tower to travel there.
This is how activities are changing: Players only know a few difficulty modes and modifiers in PvE dictated by Bungie. There is no more variety. However, with “Apollo”, Bungie wants to give you the chance to decide how challenging the activity you want to approach should be. Keyword: Challenge Customization.
Bungie allows you free rein for challenges with the new menu in PvE. You can adjust the following things in strikes, for instance:
- Rules
- Gameplay
- Enemy power
- Scoring (multiplier)
The more challenges you select, the higher the reward you will receive at the end of your activity. This is supposed to add some spice and can even change how enemies fight.
As for PvP, the team is still pondering how to implement some changes here. However, it is understandable that there are not as many freedoms possible in the Crucible, as players face off against each other and it would otherwise be unfair.
That was all the important information about Destiny 2: Frontiers at a glance. Which new features are you most looking forward to, and did any of these contents persuade you to take another look at Destiny 2? For more on Destiny 2, check here: Destiny has turned 10 years old – Do you remember the 10 best moments of the franchise?
