Destiny wasn't a failure, it was one of modern gaming's greatest triumphs

Destiny has been the butt of many jokes over the years, and for good reason. Bungie has made a lot of dumb decisions, from awkwardly rolling out changes to character customization to screwing up the launches of entire expansions. But despite these missteps, hardcore fans have always persevered, knowing that the highest peaks are well worth it.

While I don't consider myself a hardcore gamer these days, I've played through all the campaigns and expansions over the years and have probably spent several hundred hours in Destiny since it was first released in 2014. I've made the rounds and consider myself a pretty seasoned player of one of the greatest first-person shooters in history. That statement may sound like hyperbole, but I say it with sincerity and hope that its unfortunate conclusion doesn't shroud Destiny's legacy in unfair assumptions.

After Destiny was revealed to the world over a decade ago, many believed it was destined to be the greatest game in the world, and several times throughout its history, I believe it has delivered on that promise and then some. But nothing can last forever, especially when the studio that brought it to life is acquired by a company that seems forced to make bad decision after bad decision. So with the development team laid off and divided, I want to briefly remember Destiny's long history and why it will always hold a special place in my heart.

Destiny is still the best feeling on the market

I knew when Destiny was first announced that it would feel incredible to play. Bungie had spent the past decade redefining console shooters with the Halo series, leaving the titan behind after pushing the formula as far as it could go. It was hoping to do something more ambitious with its next game that involved more weapons, more abilities, or a world rich with stories to tell and characters to meet.

I remember pouring hours into both the alpha and beta tests before starting university and seeing the potential early on, grinning like an idiot when I got the perfect headshot of an approaching fall. The gunplay in Destiny was always top notch, and no competitor outside of Titanfall has ever come close to matching how wonderful it feels to play.

And its gameplay has only been further refined with each new expansion, whether Bungie introduced new weapon types, streamlined the way it felt to switch between loadouts, or just made the act of equipping armor and building your collection feel really meaningful. This is a central part of Destiny that has kept players coming back even as countless competitors have tried and failed to replicate its innovative gear system.

Nothing will ever beat increasing light levels slowly but surely as we prepare for a raid case, knowing we'll be ready yet for the fight of our lives. From a gameplay perspective, Destiny is an unparalleled shooter experience that I doubt will ever be beaten.

Even when the first Destiny released and was rightly praised for its nonsensical story and characters, the game was still hailed as one of the best out there. You are free to jump through impeccably designed spaces to do battle with enemies big and small who give their best, and over time the level design has only become more and more sophisticated to meet the demands of the players.

What I love most about Destiny is that the relatively straight forward nature of story missions, strikes and dungeons is followed up by raids that tell the player absolutely nothing. You have to find out for yourself. Spending hours on a recently aborted raid and reaching the end with a group of friends feels amazing, and much more so than traditional MMORPGs.

Bungie was never afraid to learn from Destiny's failures

Now that Destiny has had its last live service update and most of the talent that brought it to life over the years has been laid off, I fear that people will soon be referring to the game as a failure. It didn't have what it took to last in a landscape now dominated by Fortnite, Roblox and Call of Duty, despite the immense talent behind it.

While I would have loved for Bungie to have been more reactive and survivable, it's also not the kind of game that can survive on licensed crossovers and instead needed to build out its own world. It tried that with Star Wars, and it just didn't work, while Sony isn't willing to spend the time or money necessary to make a full-fledged sequel a reality.

But to claim that Destiny never learned from its failures or listened to its fans to stay afloat is an outright lie. For a long time – especially after the release of Taken King and well into Destiny's lifetime – this was one of the biggest online games in the world.

Destiny 2 The Final Shape Cover Art featuring all the main characters superimposed on a space themed background

People logged in to see what Xur was selling each week, while the updates leading up to each new expansion kept people like me hanging on, waiting to see how the Light and Dark saga would finally conclude. Each new expansion was a huge deal, breaking player records as Destiny was put back on the map. When The Witch Queen arrived, it was arguably a bigger deal than ever. Now, just a few years later, it's gone.

As both a fan and a critic, it was fun to follow the decision logic used by Bungie and how it tried to both listen to the fans and please its corporate overlords. The first game was forced to push out lackluster expansions that didn't deliver until Taken King, although the potential was always there. Then it had a brief period of independence, all before Sony came along and slowly but surely drove Destiny into the ground.

Once The Final Shape launched and ended the decades-long saga, I think both Bungie and Sony struggled to figure out what shape Destiny could take going forward. Small updates for a light but still passionate audience were no longer enough, while the overall value of the original acquisition was greatly overstated, and everyone suffered for it.

Unfortunately, things couldn't continue as they were without a major investment that Sony wasn't prepared to provide, and here we are. With Marathon already becoming public enemy number one for being a live-service shooter released by Sony, I fear that Destiny will be lumped into the same camp when the long outdated stigma associated with the genre.

Now, as Destiny fades from the modern gaming consciousness and is remembered as yet another casualty of the current landscape, I want us to remember how many times it has sat on top of the world and helped innovate both the shooter and live service genres with creative mechanical ideas, unparalleled combat, and a visual identity that to this day has never been matched. It wasn't a failure, it's simply over and Bungie has no choice but to move on.