Unfortunately, there’s almost no way to earn these items through gameplay. Random tiers on the Battle Pass (we’ll get to that) drop Engrams that contain some of this gear. Other than that, players need to rely on two currencies:

Unlike Forsaken, Destiny 2: Shadowkeep is a direct sequel to Destiny 2 . Eris Morn has uncovered something deadly on the Moon and accidentally unleashes the Nightmares, ghostly versions of past enemies. With a new threat emerging, the Vanguard quickly dispatches its army of Guardians to put down the Nightmares and discover their dark source.

This weapon also has the rare trait of coming in both Kinetic or Strand depending on whether its catalyst is equipped, meaning it can be used in Prismatic to gain Transcendence energy for both light and dark elements simultaneously, or on Strand to create more Tang

Destiny campaigns have always been mind-numbing thanks to heavy-handed writing and mission design that overly relies on mundane busywork. The stories nearly always end up being vague, open-ended and unsatisfying. Forsaken changed that by making the story more personal and finding new and engaging ways to push that narrative forward. Shadowkeep, on the other hand, is content with regressing all that hard work. Aside from strong opening and closing missions, Shadowkeep barely delivers any meaningful revelations or character development. You, Eris Morn and the remainder of the Vanguard remain blank slates with surface-level characterizations. With the most emotive member of the cast, Cayde-6, dead, Destiny desperately needs NPCs with some personality. Unfortunately, that isn't found anywhere in Shadowkeep.

The cycle of Destiny whiplash continues with Destiny 2: Shadowkeep. Like during the Destiny 1 era, kepler expansion leak we started with a lackluster opening, then got two awful expansions, got our significant overhaul, and now we're at the stopgap. Much like Rise of Iron , it's hard to shake the feeling that Bungie is just buying time until the inevitable next entry in the franchise. In this case, Destiny 2: Shadowkeep feels like Bungie is slow-walking to Destiny 3. The campaign ends up going nowhere, ending in an unsatisfying cliffhanger we likely won't see resolved for a while. Meanwhile, as great as the Moon is compared to its incarnation in the first game, there's no getting around the fact that we've already seen and paid for this before. The core gameplay is still the star of the show, the Moon is a fun place to play around in, the Strikes are imaginative and the new Seasonal Activity is a standout. But you can access all that without owning Shadowkeep (though the Seasonal Activity does require you to own the Season Pass). Destiny 2: Shadowkeep isn't bad, but it also feels wholly unnecessary when most of its selling points (Strikes, the Moon, Armor 2.0) can be played without owning it. This is one nightmare we didn't need to have.

If any gun in this list is going to compete with The Summoner with regard to perks, it's Rufus's Fury. This weapon has some of the best elemental synergy with Strand, and one look at its perk pool is enough to see why. Its first column alone can run Rewind Rounds for more shots before reloading, Demolitionist for more grenade energy, and Reconstruction for auto-loading up to twice the magazine s

That mentality extends to the way Bungie is handling post-launch content. Season of the Undying sees waves of Vex arriving via a storm to take over the Moon. Watching them arrive is breathtaking, and the firefights that ensue are hectic and enjoyable. Then there's the new Vex Offensive activity, which allows players to travel back to the Black Garden to take on the Vex. It's a surprisingly robust seasonal activity and it'll be interesting to see what lasting impact the Vex have on the Moon once the Season is over.

There’s no justification for this other than Bungie thinking they can get away with it and they most certainly will. When Forsaken launches in September, Destiny fans will have been waiting for about a year for the game to finally become what it should have been in the first place. If Forsaken turns out to be as good as it looks, then Bungie deserves to be rewarded for it. There’s no excuse for all the scumminess surrounding it, though, especially when there are similar games like Monster Hunter World, Warframe and Rainbow Six: Siege that are all enjoying massive success without dipping into any exploitative business practices.

The following months also weren’t kind to Destiny 2 and its fans. First, fans starved for meaningful content wound up being sorely disappointed with Curse of Osiris thanks to lackluster rewards and the reality of what the "Infinite Forest" actually was: a technologically-impressive loading zone. It sounded cool on paper and was a technological achievement on the part of Bungie, but it unfortunately didn’t amount to much in terms of gameplay.

Bungie is now quadruple-dipping with Season Passes, loot boxes (via Engrams), direct cosmetic purchases and a Battle Pass. The Battle Pass in particular is annoying by adding an additional layer of time-consuming grind to a game that already requires a lot of grind. The scummiest part of the whole system, though, is that Bungie has built the Eververse store straight into the Director menu. Previously, monetization could be ignored entirely because it was secluded to the Eververse Store at the Tower. Now, Bungie has made sure that it follows players everywhere they go. It's sad to see such regression after Forsaken made Destiny 2's monetization feel fairer to players.