In Destiny , developers contradict several circulating myths such as the famous ten-year plan.
I drive a Honda Civic, I know shit about 500 million dollars
“Destiny – the huge project, with the 10 year plan and a 500 million dollar budget,” that became the story, the history of Destiny in the first year. Community and Marketing Manager Eric Osborne vehemently contradicted this in an interview with the print magazine Edge. It was allowed that exactly this 10 year plan and the huge budget dictated the discussion about Destiny.
“I drive a Honda Civic. I know shit about 500 million dollars,” Osborne explained. “And a 10 year PLAN? It’s a contract for 10 years. That has nothing to do with development. It is ridiculous that people believe we planned everything in detail 10 years in advance.”
It was allowed that the budget and the 10 year plan dictated the discussion about Destiny, which made Bungie a faceless company instead of a group of people who passionately created a great game.
The first year was necessary to reach the current state
These statements from Osborne also match others from Luke Smith, the Game Director of The Taken King. In an interview with Polygon, he also touched upon the feeling of players that Destiny only really begins now with “The Taken King”. Everything before was just a beta.
According to Smith, we are only at this point now because we overcame the first year with all its difficulties. From the outside, everything always seems so simple and straightforward. As if everything should have been anticipated. For Smith, one of the crucial factors in development is experiencing Destiny as a player.
Identified problems in the light system shortly after the release
We are at this point now because we made mistakes in the first year, recognized them, and improved them. In the endgame of Destiny 1, there was only the raid “The Vault of Glass”, nothing else, otherwise players would have only had to do things they had already done. Even with progression, they tried different approaches. From all of this, from all the data, we learned. But we needed time to implement it.
They wanted to get rid of the complicated light system from the release days early, recognizing shortly after the release the problems with it. However, the light system was so deeply embedded in the whole game that they knew they would only be able to address it in the transition to year 2.
“We take it damn seriously that we want to make Destiny better,” Smith continued. “And as much as we hope to have improved Destiny with The Taken King, we know: Our work is not finished, we will continue to work on improving it”
