For Context, I have been playing Destiny since the "Beta" (realistically it was a demo) July 17, 2014 and pre-ordered the White PlayStation 4 edition September 9 2014 and I have played all of the DLC and have about 480 hours time played with all the classes at rank 400 with all of the Raid gear and all of the trials gear / Emblems. Currently with Destiny 2, I have multiple raid completions and 59 hours played with all three classes currently at 305 with 188 items in my vault at level 300+
Basic Core
Destiny 2 is fundamentally and mechanically the same as it's previous title after the Taken King DLC. This is not a bad thing since this would be a great opportunity for Bungie to focus on the story and lore of the Destiny Universe we've all been asking for, for 3 years now. That said there are some minor things that are different. What has changed? Well not a heck of alot they made some changes to the sub classes opting for a more simple system with only 4 branches (Class ability, Super Ability, Grenades and Jumps). The gear perk customization is also made alot more simple opting for a different modding system allowing you to change what element type power weapons and Energy weapons are on the fly with a 1 time use mod or squeeze 5 more light (if you get a legendary mod). They also added two new enemy types to the Cabal, and two new weapon types (Grenade launchers and sub machine guns).
The Story/Lore
The story starts off strong with the Cabal invading the Tower and blowing it up and taking your light making you mortal again. However after Tutorial stuff that is the opening bits, the first real quest you go on, you get your light back which immediately ruins the story, you don't feel the helplessness for very long, nor do you really feel or see the struggle of everyone else within the universe. They didn't do much to really implement you into the story to the point where your guardian no longer speaks, leaving you feeling even less invested into the story itself. Sure there are alot of Cut scenes (in fact 2 hours worth) but they are just kind of... there. I can say that Destiny does have a story this time around that I can basically recite back, but it's just not a very good one full of silly tropes with poor writing. The voice acting this time around is excellent and you do see just a tiny bit more of each Vanguard, but not enough to really learn anything. They had a great opportunity to show us more about who the character's are but instead backed away very quickly only opting to show us a few quick cut scenes that don't really bring out the characters. It feels as though this was a huge opportunity wasted. The strong beginning with nothing immediately after that. There is no middle and the ending basically confirms this as a soft reboot as everything is reset to how the previous title ended (without the gear).
When Bungie announced that grimoire would be no more I thought "Excellent, now I get to find out more about the races and factions and overall learn more about the Destiny Universe I've been craving." However the lore within Destiny 2 is far and very few between limited to some scan able objects spread out through out the individual areas you can visit and some faction gear (excluding the Iron Banner). I still can't tell you who the vendors are. Bungie only told me one thing about them in two sentences or less. I know the cabal weigh 400 pounds and are highly militarized and blow up planets for being in the way? I honestly barely know anything about the Destiny Universe and no I will not and have not read or watched videos about the Grimoire. If it is not in the game, it is not apart of the game.
END GAME
Okay, so if the story and lore are a bust the end game stuff is good right? That's when the game really begins right?! Sadly no. Regardless of what level you finish the main campaign at be it level 17 or 19 you will get boosted to level cap of 20 which is nice, but the struggle begins after that. In fact it feels as though they took a huge step backwards taking away the daily's and keeping everything to a weekly basis in the form of "Milestones". The amount of grinding you have to do to level your self up after you've completed the weekly's and exotic quests, is pretty real. You have to basically farm public events (I would recommend the moon Titan) and the Nightfall which (thankfully) can be farmed this time around. They also took away the difficulty setting on quests and strikes so you are stuck with brain dead A.I. There is no streak system for running multiple strikes either, making them pointless to run. There is no record book or any kind of record keeping or objectives in-game for you to look at to see what you have achieved like the previous game. They do very little in keeping player's motivated to play the game on a daily basis. They did alot better to incorporate clans which is very nice, allow the clan leader to create a custom banner and give us rewards for leveling up, but after 6 weeks my Clan (as well as many other's) have reached the level cap making the point of contributing clan xp pointless giving us one less of a reason to sigh on. (Especially if you hit the light level cap of 305).
The Nightfall is as hard as ever and you can wipe multiple times but each time your team dies you spend 15 seconds waiting to re-spawn. The night fall has a set timer (which you can sometime increase via objectives) tillyou have to complete it with enemies doing alot more damage and taking alot more damage. The multipliers vary but from what I have seen have not been as diverse as the previous title. Upon completing this, you will unlock higher level gear to help you level up and complete one of the weekly Milestones. There is a "Prestige" variation of the same Night Fall Strike with a shorter timer and enemies that have even more health and do even more damage, but it does not offer any more rewards that you wouldn't get from the regular nightfall strike apart from a blue Aura around your head. No increased xp.
The Raid
As for the Vanilla raid itself. It's not difficult at all, but more of a test of patience with other player's abilities to follow and understand simple instruction, making it an LFG nightmare. When you do find that one team, you can beat the raid with in half of an hour. It's more about recognizing simple patterns with a simple rinse and repeat giving off the illusion of difficulty. More people have beaten the raid than the prestige Night Fall. This isn't necessarily a bad thing since it can be seen as a nice introductory to raiding in Destiny for new players, but for the long time players, it's nothing much more than another stepping stone. Of course people are going to ask, "Well why don't you do the prestige difficulty then?"
I will point out I (nor my clan of 97 members) have any motivation to even attempt the prestige raid since (******SPOILER ALERT******) everything is purely aesthetic, nothing more than minor cosmetic variants of the same gear with glowing purple bits and no change to the stats or any benefit to getting the gear in any way shape or form, as well as some shaders, hardly worth the time. The only thing you get are bragging rights and some rare emblems that show you have completed the prestige raid along with a gold aura around your head and nothing more. I was hoping for an upgrade to the Legend of Acrius at least, but you only get a new exotic weapon Ornament turning the Shotgun into a white and gold cosmetic variation with no change to the stats. There are no missing weapons either like the Sidearm and Fusion rifle for those collectors. You do get tokens and keys, but those are turned in for the vanilla raid gear and not prestige gear. (******END OF SPOILER******)
The Crucible
So with the PVE basically being a bust, lacking less than the previous title the crucible should still the be the solid game since there need be no story and just shoot other player right? Well the answer is Yes and No. The game play is solid which means the pvp has not changed much from the previous title at a core opting for a more simple point system, however the big change is every match type (Trials included) is now 4 vs 4. It forces you to run with your team more and play around with one another's play style. I was hoping for there to be a selection of various game types and maybe even player vs player amounts (a 9 vs 9 would be really interesting to play), but you don't get that. The fact that all gear have static perks (we'll get to that later) there is little to be seen in weapon variations and thus the crucible is dominated by the Mida Multi-tool and Uriel's Gift. I won't complain about about whats over powered and what is not since you get the Mida for free. They also took a huge step in the wrong direction only allowing you to choose between two main types of Crucible playlists.
1: Quick play: Clash (Death match), Supremacy (Killing enemies will drop "crests" you need to collect) and Control (capture and hold 2 or all 3 positions and kill your enemies, the more positions held the more points you get per kill).
2: Competitive: Countdown (Counter strike's plant the bomb with limited Lives) and Survival (Team Death match with limited team lives).
The fact you have no control over which game type to play is confusing and really needs to be addressed. Sometimes I like to hop in the crucible and play a little Control or clash. The fact this playlist is also a 4 vs 4 makes it a bit more tactical and "sweaty" and less appealing to people looking to have a casual relaxed time.
As far as the competitive playlist goes there is no skill based match making and no punishment system in place for those who rage quit the moment you lose a single round. There are also no separate rewards for playing this playlist.
Every Friday to Monday Trials of Osiris makes it's return. This time light level does not matter (not that is made a real difference in the previous game). It (so far) consists of just the game type: Countdown on unique maps with very interesting rewards and a new location to get rewards from (we will get to all loot and rewards later) and is still the same sweaty game mode it once was only with 4 vs 4.
Lord Saladin returns bringing with him the Iron Banner and it was fun but the end result was disappointing and rage inducing. It consisted of just control and they brought back the map Distant Shore from the previous title but with a few differences. What was rage inducing was how they handled how you get the reward items.
The Loot System
The loot system in this game is the worst it has ever been, ever. I would argue to say it is the worst loot system in any game ever. It is as always purely RNG with absolutely no way to influence it. You will get duplicates and you will get a lot. Okay you so you maybe wondering how is this any different from the previous title? All Boss items, strikes, crucible, raid, public event and vendor rewards are all purely RNG. Vendors no longer sell items that you can buy with a random selection of perks. Instead, you get tokens to hand in to level up (if you could even call it that) with a vendor to get a random reward (generally it takes 20 tokens to level up once). This has to do with the fact that every item be it Armor or Weapons have a static perks, meaning that every piece of gear is going to have certain perks leaving everything to be what it is. You don't need to look for that "God Roll" anymore. What ever the gun you get has, that is what they will all have for you and everyone else. Which is part of the reason why you see certain weapons in dominate certain parts of the game. It leaves little to be desired in loot drops once you get the one weapon you want, leaving the rest of the gear you get to be nothing more than fodder to level up your gear. The Iron Banner was the absolute pushing point for the loot drops. The way the Banner handled the loot system was abysmal. In the previous title Lord Saladin would have weapons and armor for sale once you reach certain levels by playing the banner. In Destiny 2 they give out tokens whether or not you win or lose (a win will give you 5 tokens and a loss will give you 2 tokens) so you can trade into Saladin like every other vendor. However, Saladin is not selling any items for you this time around leaving everything up to RNG. After opening up 58 packages on my warlock I still was unable to collect the full armor set. That is 1160 Tokens handed in, or roughly 400 games in the Iron Banner played. In terms of the raid they took a huge step backwards with the loot system. The raid is still purely RNG based in another way. From the raid you have a few chances at getting armor or weapons but from my experience they drop rates are incredibly low. Fair enough since you get more tokens to hand into a raid vendor. This is where you will get the majority of your raid gear, but unlike the in raid item drops (which tend to drop around 300 light) the Vendor will not drop items at a higher level unless you get lucky with a mod. What is disappointing is that none of the raid armor benefits you in the raid in any way shape or form, it is 100% purely aesthetic.
Overall
I have read and watched reviews praising this game's release which is constantly being compared to the Original Destiny's Launch. Which is admittedly miles ahead of where it once was, however this is not how to judge this game. It would be the same as comparing Grand Theft Auto 3 to Grand Theft Auto 5 and not Grand Theft Auto 3 to Grand Theft Auto Vice City. Most reviewers either stopped playing after the initial release, or haven't played all of the DLC which is how this game should be compared. A lot of the "changes" people bring up are nothing new at all, and in fact are alot older and have been around since the Taken King DLC (which came out September 15 2015). The gear infusing system, weapon ornaments, scan-able lore items through out a rich environment, a difficult raid forcing team work throughout various puzzles strike bosses with mechanics to kill them not just bullet sponges and even exotic quests are not new. Bungie has taken several huge steps backwards and not a single step forward. This is not Destiny 2, this is not Destiny 1.5. This is Destiny 0.6 and the other 0.4% of the game might come out in updates and paid DLC. Bungie had all this time to work on this game, look at our feed back, give us what we wanted and failed to deliver with this soft reboot and failure of a game. There is no defending this absolute dumpster fire called Destiny 2.