Destiny 2 Lightfall maintenance downtime will last 24 hours, according to a recent post on the Bungie blog as part of its This Week at Bungie series. The maintenance will precede the Destiny 2 Lightfall release date, which includes the launch of Destiny 2 season 20 and the Destiny 2 Strand subclass in the FPS game. However, Destiny 2 players can pre-install Lightfall during this time, according to the TWAB.
“Be advised that the download file will be large, but this new installation will improve load times, and overall disk space usage will be smaller afterwards,” the post says.
Ultimately, the downtime means Guardians should plan to complete all outstanding Destiny 2 season 19 objectives before the scheduled maintenance downtime, beginning on February 27 at 9 am PST / 12 pm EST / 5 pm UTC. While Bungie has not expressly shared why the game requires this downtime, taking the game entirely offline ensures the team can test for bugs as it migrates its test build to live Destiny 2 servers.
While such an outage is not unusual for Bungie in advance of a new DLC, this scheduled downtime comes amidst complaints that the game’s architecture may need an upgrade. Destiny 2 DLC launches are often rocky, with some players struggling to access the servers even hours after the scheduled DLC launch. In the TWAB, Bungie acknowledged that it expects this to be the case with Lightfall. Further, recent reports of various error codes and players reporting lost progress toward Triumphs have led some to question whether the entirety of the Destiny 2 infrastructure needs an overhaul to best support the popular live-service space game.
An unconfirmed Destiny 2 leak suggested that Bungie plans to take a year off from Destiny 2 after the release of the finale year of the current Destiny storyline, which will be part of a DLC called The Final Shape. The Final Shape is set to launch in 2024. The leak suggests Bungie will use this time to rebuild the game’s overall infrastructure.
Light bearers have only a few more weeks to complete outstanding tasks in the Season of the Seraph. If you’ve yet to explore everything this season offers, you have only a few more weeks left to complete the Destiny 2 Revision Zero exotic quest and earn its catalysts before the new season. You’ll also want to check out our recent interview with Bungie narrative team members, who gave terrific insights into The Witness’s role in the game.