We should have been playing Destiny 2: Beyond Light by now, but while the expansion’s delayed to November we can at least gawp at some of its gear and imagine how cool it might be to use. The answer is: quite cool. Bungie today detailed the new Exotic-quality weapons and armour coming in Beyond Light, and some sound powerful, some sound like they’ll open up new tactics, and some just sound great fun. A sniper rifle summoning lightning? Warlock punches spreading contagious poison? My Hunter’s dodge becoming a blink>? I’m game.
This was to be the week Bungie launched Destiny 2: Beyond Light but, like everything else this year, the expansion ended up delayed. This week has at least brought news about installing Beyond Light come November, both good and bad. Good news: thanks to some revamped technoguts, the game should take up less drive space and Bungie should be able to patch any urgent problems faster. Bad news: you’ll need to download the whole game again when Beyond Light arrives. We’ll get a few hours’ head-start to preload, at least.
Destiny 2 is getting customisable ghosts, Bungie has announced.
Ghosts are the little floating balls that accompany guardians. Your ghost in the original Destiny was voiced by Peter Dinklage (he of "that wizard came from the moon!" fame), before he was replaced by Nolan North.
Ghosts have worked much the same in Destiny for years, popping into existence to res you whenever you bite the dust. Not to dig too deeply into the lore, but it is your ghost, supposedly a piece of the Traveler itself, who raises you from the dead at the beginning of Destiny 1 to become a Light-bearing guardian.
If you’re short on upgrade materials in Destiny 2, you fancy building a stockpile ahead of the new expansion, or you just enjoy a challenge, this week has a fun opportunity to farm for huge rewards. The Lake Of Shadows mission is giving double rewards in Nightfall: The Ordeal mode until Tuesday, and I recommend having a go on a high difficult level. Lake cranked up to Grandmaster turns Destiny into a tactical shooter, requiring careful, planning, coordination, and execution or even a small fight will get you murdered, which is a lot more fun than it sounds. Scoring loads of Ascendant Shards and Exotic items is just gravy.
UPDATE 4.50pm UK: Bungie has attempted to douse reports it has discussed acquisition with Microsoft.
Replying on Twitter to internet tipster Nibel, Bungie boss Pete Parsons said it was "false" that Microsoft had been in talks to acquire Bungie multiple times and that each time the talks had fallen through due to Bungie's price.
It's a broad-handed denial to a very specific tweet, which summed up information discussed on the GamesBeat podcast. But it also seems to be Bungie's response to this story - I received a link to this tweet via a Bungie spokesperson this afternoon in place of an official comment.