Destiny: The Taken King Reviews
Much of the late game still feels like a needlessly punishing grind as it embraces artificial difficulty before fun
Perhaps the best that can be said about this expansion is that it's ultimately a step in the right direction for one of last year's most disappointing games and offers a glimmer of hope that Destiny might, within a few years time and a handful of updates, actually be a consistently great game rather than a pile up of both great and poor design decisions that frustrates just as often as it delights.
Slowly but surely, Bungie is morphing this chimera of a game into something more presentable.
All the changes and additions are for the best, and a great step forward for Destiny in general, but they come at a price – both literally and figuratively.
Destiny takes the best parts of Halo and combines them with the worst parts of Borderlands.
The Taken King shows Destiny is willing to reach for everything it might be, and it's hard not to look forward to what comes next.
Destiny: The Taken King makes the Destiny universe worth exploring and finally makes it a fun experience. The endless grinding and vague, confusing storylines are gone. Now we have a clear, understandable and enjoyable storyline with a streamlined levelling-up system.
Bungie has finally delivered something akin to promises it has made in the past. Destiny is still not the open-world exploration adventure everyone thought it was going to be, but it is carving its own path in the videogame world, and it's getting better and more fun with every step.
It doesn't fix everything that was wrong with Destiny, but The Taken King does enough in all the right places to make it a highly enjoyable FPS experience overall. A renewed focus on narrative and a streamlined progression system helps to push Destiny in the direction it should have been heading all along.
For newcomers to the series, 'Destiny: The Taken King' presents a much larger and more user-friendly 'Destiny' experience, and that's after a year of crazy highs, and RNG lows. For veterans, it feels as though we have to take two steps back before we can go forward, but the way is paved with fun things to do. If you've been putting off playing 'Destiny' until it got better, now's the time.
Bungie set out with a goal for Destiny: The Taken King and they have mostly succeeded. While some of the nagging problems from the original game persist – boring patrol areas, recycling of areas and enemies, and bullet-sponge enemies – Destiny: The Taken King does more than enough to make up for the sins of its predecessor.
Destiny: The Taken King may not have made this Bungie's best series yet but it's certainly changed it for the better while offering tons of new, fun things to shoot.
An essential update and a sensible improvement
Refined and balanced, a better offering than before
Destiny shows improvement with The Taken King, but there is still work to be done before it occupies a place in the canon of key games of this generation.
True, I still don't know my Hunter's name. But suddenly I'm a lot more excited about spending another year with her.
There are still plenty of thorns, but it manages to address and improve nearly every aspect of the original 1.0 release.
Destiny: The Taken King takes what was a good foundational game, and enhances nearly everything about it, taking the great gunplay and environments, and adding more of the good, while negating the bad with system overhauls, new modes, and new ways to enjoy Destiny.
Bungie could have thrown in a bit more content given the price tag, but what's offered in The Taken King is definitely solid and certainly adds to the Destiny experience, making this a must-buy for fans of the game.
The Taken King is an important step forward as a franchise and more often than not feels like the Destiny we should have gotten last year. Bungie is finally adding meat to a game that was mostly bones. Year 2 is off to good start with a story that matters, improved loot drops and leveling system. At the end of the day, Destiny: The Taken King has become an easier adventure to revisit and an even easier recommendation for new players. Now, who wants to raid?