Big things are happening in Destiny 2 this week, including a questline that sets in motion the removal of 4 major destinations.
During the Beyond Light livestream last month, Bungie revealed that 4 planetary destinations will be removed from the game this September. In order for Destiny to continue growing and evolving, Titan, Mars, IO, and Mercury will need to be removed from the game. This week, the puzzle pieces have started moving into place.
IO has already been a major focus of this season. As the home planet of the new Contact public event as well as the weekly Interference story mission (not to mention the first landing zone of the Darkness) the writing has been on the wall for IO this whole time. We’ve known all along, thanks to the season roadmap and the triumphs page, that Titan would be the next destination to host the Contact event. That move happened this week, but that was far from the only major change in the solar system.
The Darkness has made its way to Mars and Mercury as well as Titan. Zavala has a new questline called Exodus: Preparation that takes us to all 4 destinations, introduces a new weekly bounty and focused engram, and rewards a Masterworked The Militia’s Birthright grenade launcher. It’s sort of a last hurrah for the nearly dearly departed, as well as the official beginning of “The Exodus.”
Clearly, things are getting dire all across the solar system. In each destination, the planetary vendors are dealing with both Savuthun and the typical enemy factions of that zone, now energized by the new threat against the guardians of light. Each week, we’ll be visiting these 4 destinations and doing our best to suppress the enemies there. Unfortunately, we already know that their fates are sealed.
An interesting tidbit came out of the conversation with Anna on Mars: before getting shut down by the Darkness, Rasputin began an upload process to preserve himself…potentially in a physical form. Is it possible they’re hinting at an Exo guardian inhabited by Rasputin vis-a-vis Felwinter? If so, that would be an exceptionally cool “new” character.
I’m grateful Bungie is giving these destinations their due during their final season in the game. It’s nice to have a strong story-based reason to visit them each week. As much as I have anxiety about watching them blink out of existence (especially Titan) I’m looking forward to seeing where the story goes from here.
