It seems a long time since the reveal of the latest Destiny 2 expansion but players finally get to experience the FPS game‘s epic The Witch Queen story today – and it seems like Bungie is taking a different approach to the DLC’s quests, with the goal of making them feel like Star Trek or The Mandalorian.
At long last, Destiny 2: The Witch Queen expansion is finally out, massively expanding the online multiplayer game with a huge new story campaign. To celebrate the DLC’s release, developer Bungie has gone into detail about the creation of the campaign and its missions on the PlayStation Blog (via The Loadout), as well as its influences.
According to designer Andrew Hopps, one of the team’s main goals with the new campaign was to make “every mission feel uniquely memorable”, which they describe as “one of our tenets”. Regarding the science fiction influences, the design team aimed for “each mission to feel like individual TV episodes from a season of Star Trek or The Mandalorian rather than a sliced-up movie”.
More specifically, Hopps adds that the team wanted to ensure that “each mission should be immediately memorable for its distinct themes, player journey, and unforgettable moments while still delivering the major campaign narrative arc”. Just like how many Star Trek shows, The Mandalorian, Book of Boba Fett, et cetera have individual episodes that work on their own but still contain elements that build the season’s overall story.
Fellow designer Alex Pfeiffer compares Witch Queen’s campaign missions to more like dungeons or “Exotic missions like Presage”. “Not everybody gets to experience them,” Pfeiffer says. “They’re very difficult, they require you to put a team together, and so we wanted to extract what makes those things special and bring it to a wider audience.” Designer Matt McConnell explains that, like dungeons, each mission features “something that sets them apart mechanically, and that makes them stand out from one another.”
Don’t expect things to get quite that difficult in Witch Queen’s campaign missions, however. “There are more moments where it gets a little sweaty, but it’s accessible,” says test lead Nathan Thorell. “The campaign is designed so that, whether you’re solo or in a fireteam, there is an appropriate challenge level for you.”
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If you do want a challenge, however, the expansion’s first raid Vow of the Disciple is out next month.