Destiny 2 may be ending, but it’s final update is god tier level, plus backlash against Sony increases, and fans wonder, can it be saved? As we covered previously developers Bungie, now wholly owned by Sony announced that June 9th would see a final live update to the game, it was over. Not only that, but it seems plainly clear a Destiny 3 is not in development.
Since then we’ve heard a few more stories and it seems this final update was not actually planned as a final update. at least not to many of the developers. Only a few at Bungie were aware this was the end and other devs were only made aware just before the public was.
We’ve heard also that Bungie did pitch a D3 to Sony. However the corpo giant thinks it will cost too much money to develop and maintain. Which, as I said in my last piece, begs the question why the hell they paid $3.6 Billion for the studio when Destiny was their only active IP?
Now let’s get into the update on June 9th. There is far too much for me to cover here and I will link three different and rather large Developer Insights, though one is disguised as a This Week in Destiny. I’ll highlight a few big details on each
Developer Insight 1
Link to the full article over at Bungie’s website.
This one if it had landed on its own would still have been considered a major boon for the ongoing life of the game.
Bungie have essentially re-upped all the previous, no updated gear from various destinations and activities to fit into their most recent Tiered Gear system. Just looking at weapons alone this allows veterans (like me) to upgrade all that gear to current standards. For those jumping back or in for the first time it provides an absolutely crazy amount of good options to go chasing.
They’ve also made Patrol Zones more fun by bringing in a new special difficulty (Distortions) of public events and associated loot across many locations. Plus these locations all get their own unique origin traits for the weapons. This and the gear upgrades is something players have been asking for for a long, long time. Not only that but some weapons no longer even in the ‘old system’ are coming back, alongside new modern perk pools.
Also a reduction in Portal prominence and a return of the Director. Portal still available as a useful tool which it always should have been. Again, a big ask in the past year since the Portal was introduced. Add in some more simple gear to score mechanics, a return of some Crucible modes which are there to say and even the return of the Sparrow Racing League. Not my jam when it was there in D1, but who knows and it was asked for for years. Oh and Gambit is back with new loot as well.
Developer Insight 2
I’m not sure anyone was expecting this next insight to hit as hard given how the last one went. But if anything it’s even more impressive.
Link to the full article over at Bungie’s website.
I won’t get into all the weapon tuning other than to point out that they have buffed Primary weapons across the board by 30%. Primaries had become almost unusable in high end content, well now they are viable again.
Every single Exotic in the game that didn’t have a Catalyst now has one. And some of the ones that were underperforming have been buffed or outright changed. Many exotic weapons which themselves had been underperforming have also been buffed into balance.
They’ve also given a reason for people to chase Crafting Patterns again by allowing them to be upgraded into the tier system, which opens up all previous Raids and loads of old destinations. On top of that, all Dungeons will get tiered loot as well. That includes new tiered armour sets for both Raids and Dungeons with their own unique set bonuses.
Finally, though there’s detail on how all this works and specific changes in the article above, plus much more I haven’t mentioned, we get to Artefacts. I won’t explain too much detail, but fans expected either the most recent Artefact (used for build crafting) to remain, or it to be permanently removed.
Instead Bungie have dropped 7 previous Artefacts including the current one. You can switch between them for an almost endless amount of buildcrafting options. Additionally, they have finally added them into Loadouts so you can set up these builds to be one click away after saving. Oh and there’s also 6 new Loadout slots and the Vault space has gone up to 1300.
Dev Insight (TWID)
This final (for this week) update was the smallest of the three but had some important information about how Crucible tuning will work going forward and how the Pantheon (Raid) event will work and that is also here to stay permanently.
Updates on how cosmetic items will start dropping on a knockout system, so you can essentially collect them all just by playing the game and earning the relevant currencies.
Also how they’ve rejigged Feats (a previous bad idea) to not be such a chore and made Raids more accessible. To help with that Bungie has developed a beginner mode for Raids which will drop lower tiered loot, but is more forgiving for groups looking to learn mechanics and strategies, Before of course joining the veterans for better loot later.
Conclusion
If you are a Destiny fan, check the links and read the details. This is an amazing update and would have been welcomed by fans in place of any new story content even if the game was not ending. It’s clear that poor management has held back these developers and when allowed to, they can cook.
The point is, even for a veteran like me there is months and months of content. For some fans who dropped a year or more ago, there is probably a year at least worth of content to play. For someone knew, the onboarding is still clunky, but once you get going there’s years worth of content to play and loot to collect. The buildcrafting options are almost limitless and it may take a long time for content creators and players to find some of the new overpowered options.
Can Destiny 3 Be Saved?
The Destiny 2 numbers have increased probably three fold over this past weekend. That number is just on Steam charts and could be higher when consoles are factored in. Destiny has always been bigger on console.
Just to be clear that’s 4 times what Bungie’s new game Marathon has on Steam and that game is not popular on consoles. Plus, the update doesn’t even hit for another 8 days. I think it’s more fans coming together to prove to Sony more than Bungie, that if you get it right, there are millions of Destiny fans that will come back. Sony didn’t make this situation happen to be clear, that’s on Bungie management. However, they have absolutley backed the wrong horse with Marathon over Destiny 2 or even a Destiny 3.
There was almost a civil war between Destiny and Marathon fans as Destiny fans swore to boycott Marathon until a D3 is announced. I say almost because it became clear very quickly that there was about four thousand Marathon only fans and the rest were Destiny players killing time waiting for an update and trying to support Bungie. A very one sided civil war perhaps?
RELATED: Destiny 2 Meets Its End – How Bungie Tanked A Company Worth Billions
The question is now, is there any hope for Destiny 3? I think most fans understand there can’t be much life left in D2 after this update, especially with some of the ‘forever’ systems put in place.
However, if player counts are pushing into millions come June 9th, maybe Sony will take notice and back the right horse? It’s a slim hope and some fans are huffing pure copium that it could. A petition is doing the rounds, but realistically that would need to get 2 million signatures for Sony to greenlight a game that will cost north of $150M to make and perhaps another $50m to give ongoing support to.
Yet, they have to be taking notice and who knows? I don’t see it, but I will live in eternal hope it happens anyway.
Perhaps these latest social media post by the Destiny community manager dmg04 are giving people a little too much hope?
Guardians make their own fate
— dmg04 (@A_dmg04) May 31, 2026
Do not go gentle into that good night
— dmg04 (@A_dmg04) May 31, 2026
But then again, maybe Guardians do really make their own fate? Sony have a choice, spend $200M to save a $3.6 billion overspend. Or, write it off as a bad idea and kill the popular franchise which made them buy Bungie in the first place.
Thoughts below if you got em.
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