First teased over two years ago, Bungie finally dished on Destiny 2 Lightfall during its big annual 2022 showcase, revealing new powers, threats, and mysteries all dressed up in a spiky, neon-infused cyberpunk art style. The Witch Queen turned the Destiny universe on its head, and the next expansion looks poised to deliver on that chaos in some big ways when it arrives next February.
The penultimate expansion in a nine-part epic, Lightfall looks on the surface like a radical departure from the long-running sci-fi shooter’s past. It will introduce the previously rumored poison subclass, Strand, that taps into the unseen fabric of space and includes a new grappling hook ability (oh hey there Halo Infinite). Players will explore the new hidden city of Neomuna on Neptune that exists in an alternate timeline, and contend with its own version of Guardians called Cloud Striders.
Today’s showcase also show’s Destiny players grappling with the consequences of the Witness’ plans for destroying the Traveler and its Light hinted at in the final moments of The Witch Queen campaign and raid. Mainly, that includes a new army under the command of Calus that has the ability to neutralize your powers, and mini-Witness disciples called Tormentors that appear to act like a completely new class of mob enemy. Guardians will have to team up with Cloud Striders to repel an invasion of Neomuna, and scale a ton of futuristic skyscrapers using their new Strand abilities.
Here’s the trailer:
Bungie outlined some major features coming next year as well, including more detailed player histories, a commendation system, in-game looking-for-group tools, and best of all: dedicated loadouts. That’s right! At long last players will be able to fine-tune their gear and and fashion and then save it to slot they can swap to on demand. Tired of constantly changing mods between Nightfalls and raids, PVE and PVP? Well this system should fix that. Bungie has been calling Destiny 2 and MMORPG for a while now, but with Lightfall it sounds like its finally investing in some of the systems needed to make good on that promise.
Destiny 2's annual expansions are where the game gets jolted back into life with new story-based campaigns, gameplay overhauls, and additional Exotic gear. For a long time they used to drop every September, but beginning with Beyond Light during the pandemic the expansions started getting pushed back, first into late fall and eventually into late winter. During these intervals, Bungie has been keeping the game fresh with rotating seasonal updates every three months or so.
The latest, Season 18, goes live today and is all about hunting down pirates and their buried space treasure. It was previously leaked that it would be called Season of the Plunder, include two different sets of activities and story missions, and bring back the beloved legacy raid King’s Fall from 2015's expansion, The Taken King. Bungie also confirmed a Fortnite collaboration that will see both games exchange character skins, as well as bring Destiny-themed cosmetics to Fall Guys.
If new seasons are like television mini-series, new expansions like Lightfall are the annual blockbuster movie. Back in 2020, Destiny 2 was set to have three more of them to cap off its Light and Darkness Saga. However, last year Bungie announced it needed more time and space to tell the story it’s been building since Destiny 1 launched. The result is a fourth expansion called The Final Shape that will drop sometime in the future. It’s anybody’s guess where the series heads after that, and whether it will include a Destiny 3.