Destiny PS4 Impressions

If there’s one area where Destiny’s definitely not lacking, it’s in the budget department. You can literally feel the dollar bills bristling against your exposed skin when you sit through the first-person shooter’s opening cinematic; you can sense the dabbed brows and nervous boardroom exchanges as executives wrangle over the rumoured $500 million required to haul the Traveler and its band of intergalactic disciples onto store shelves. As those that loathe Britney Spears and Michael Bay will attest, though, money does not always make a quality product. So, is Bungie’s ambitious adventure any good?

Starting out in rustic Old Russia, the game’s opening moments infuriatingly mirror those of the release’s recent beta, meaning that it’s not until you reach the idyllic greenery of Venus and the dusty expanses of the Moon that you’ll truly feel like you’re seeing something new. As a cross-platform production, the visuals never quite rival the sheer technical grunt of a Killzone: Shadow Fall or an inFAMOUS: Second Son, but outstanding art direction helps to alleviate any graphical shortcomings, with some of the medium’s most impressive skyboxes on display. As a result, there’s a real sense of scale across all aspects of the presentation, even if it’s something of an optical illusion a lot of the time.

Destiny PlayStation 4 Review

Our worry after experiencing the title’s opening hours is that said pretence will ultimately expand to other aspects of the adventure, too. Take the fiction: it’s messy, convoluted, and completely inconsistent. It’s not easy to establish a gigantic sci-fi universe in a few hours, so we remain hopeful that this will come together in time, but Peter Dinklage’s utterly uninterested commentary on a futuristic cliché is not what we had in mind when the former Halo developer spent the entirety of the game’s inaugural unveiling enthusing over the release’s “rich, cinematic” plot. The frustrating thing is that there’s fascinating lore here, we’re just yet to see it presented in an interesting manner.

Exploring the Cosmodrome may be entertaining and all, but the game lacks raw white knuckle spectacle so far

Perhaps the problem is that the game wants you to write your own stories. As a concept, the seamless segues between public spaces and instanced arenas appear innovative, but it’s not a million miles away from the format introduced by Phantasy Star Online almost 15 years ago. To discredit its online achievements so coldly would be unfair, though, and the developer definitely deserves kudos for making its social experience effortless. Connecting with friends requires next to no work at all, while the notifications that alert you of the unexpected presence of a nearby stranger still haven’t lost their lustre after the beta earlier in the year.

But yet we can’t help but feel that this emphasis on online play detracts from the impact of the core campaign; exploring the Cosmodrome may be entertaining and all, but the game lacks the white knuckle spectacle of a mission like ‘The Maw’ – the breakneck final stage in Halo: Combat Evolved which ultimately gave Bungie its name. The studio may argue that Strikes – challenging co-operative objectives that pit you against the title’s toughest enemy waves – fill this void, but we’re yet to get an enormous thrill from the heavily shielded foes that you encounter here; it all seems a teensy bit tedious if we’re being blunt.

Destiny Sony Thoughts

Fortunately, that’s not necessarily the fault of the combat itself, which is one of the shining beacons of the first few hours. Plasma rifles snap, crackle, and pop like a popular brand of breakfast cereal, while shotguns scream like an angst-ridden teenager listening to a Marilyn Manson CD. There’s satisfaction to be gleaned from the way that foes expire, too; colourful spray spews from the heads of fallen Dregs, while there’s a real sense of occasion when you finally finish off a Captain – well, until you walk away and everything respawns. This niggling issue is clearly a consequence of the persistent world, but it’s hard to shake the sense that your actions don’t really matter at all.

And whether they do actually mean something is far too early to call. Bungie’s latest has barely been available for 24 hours at this point, and we still have lots of the game to explore. We’re particularly hopeful that its plot and mission design will pick up over the next few hours, but even if it doesn’t, at least we know that there’ll always be plenty of Fallen to off in the expanses of our Solar System. And failing that, we still reckon that dancing in the Tower is some of the most fun that you can currently have on the PS4. We’re not sure whether that’s the kind of accolade that’ll get us a spot on back of the game’s box, but, well, we suppose that it’ll do for now.

Remember, this only represents our early impressions on Destiny, and does not represent our final verdict by any stretch. In saying that, how are you enjoying the first-person shooter? Has it lived up to your initial expectations, or do you feel that it’s been a little overhyped? Point and stare in the comments section below.