Bungie Speaks Out on Destiny’s Lack of Raids Matchmaking

Destiny, while essentially an MMO in all but name, asking players to be always connected to get the most out of it, will have some shocking omissions when it comes to its online suite. Specifically, the game will be lacking in any form of matchmaking for raids, an incredibly baffling decision, especially when you considered Bungie were the pioneers of matchmaking to begin with, with Halo 2 back in 2004.

Speaking to Eurogamer about this, though, Bungie said this was a deliberate design choice.

“We intentionally did that,” they said. “We’re going to see people self-organise. We’re seeing people in the Tower already gathering saying, who’s going to commit for a raid?

“It is about that commitment part. If you just casually matchmake… you can see people jump out of competitive multiplayer games in matchmaking. In Strikes you can continue with two if somebody jumps out. You can still have that experience and not feel robbed. A raid requires six. If you’ve got five players in the raid, you’re not going to win. You’re not going to get through. I can tell you now, it’s really tough, and it’s intentionally meant to be that way. We’ve all got roles to play. So it requires a commitment of six people. That was very intentional.

“It’s about the group dynamic. It’s not just about a casual dynamic. It’s about an understanding of people committed to playing the roles in raids. And preparing. With raids, you don’t just jump into them. You’ve got to prepare before you go in, and decide, what are you doing? What am I doing? Let’s all talk about it in orbit. Okay, what role are you going to play? Well, I’m an x Titan, whatever type of Titan I am, and I’m going to be defensive and hold positions. And, have you played this before? Yeah, I found success when I did it this way.

“We don’t explain what to do. You’ve got to work it out. It’s very unlike any other activity we’ve ever done before. It’s exciting. People will play it more and get more organized about it. We’ve seen that in other games where people have created sites of raid finders for MMOs. We may see that.”

Yeah, guys, I’m not sure I like that explanation. It’s a bit like if Nintendo were to explain its omission of an invite system for friends in Mario Kart 8 as ‘we wanted friends to communicate beyond just the game.’ Or something like that.

Although I haven’t yet played the final game, so who knows, maybe Bungie may be on to something here. We’ll see.

SOURCE

Personally? I'm not sure I get it. Like, why would you not want your players to be able to coordinate games and stuff from within the game itself? Anything else represents a failure of online infrastructure (the Nintendo example is a pretty pertinent one in this case).

I'm trying to figure out what must have happened here, or do they really believe that a lack of matchmaking will somehow be good?

Then again, who knows, it might actually work out for the best. I guess I'll give Bungie the benefit of the doubt here.

Wow. The game is starting to sound like its way too overhyped for what it's containing.

Not even in The Crucible? smh

A few years ago Blizzard added a "matchmaking" system to World of Warcraft where you could just click a dungeon/raid finder button, and it'd put you with a random group of strangers that didn't communicate with each other, and were often toxic players. This as opposed to the, what was then, standard in MMOs of recruiting players for a guild, communicating, and team-building.

They've lost millions of subs since implementing terrible ideas like that one, and many others.

Happy to see Bungie wants the players to organize, and actually communicate with each other before starting raid content. It'll be a better game because of it.

This game would be so much better on the PC.

@charizard1605: You should clarify in the topic title that its specifically for raids only. Everything else has matchmaking.

I personally dont like their decision and reasoning.

But this is only for Raids. You should clarify that in the thread title.

People don't read OPs.

I wouldn't call Destiny "essentially an MMO" due to a huge number of factors, but they are definitely making an experience more like what PC gamers are used too with MMOs.

You need to understand these kind of games before you can truly understand why matchmaking doesn't work. MMO-like content isn't something you can just do with random players as it's not built for randoms being paired together. The vast majority of the content in this game is built for people who have a good line of communication with each other, matchmaking groups rarely (basically never) have that. You get matched into your game, you play with your team or solo, you do your best to play your role but you rarely hear detailed communications between people.

The way they are setting up Destiny puts players in situations where instead of forcing players to play together, they simply allow players to interact with each other in any way they want. In the open world players ultimately have the choice who they want to help and how. This builds much more natural relationships than just forcing it on people, and from what I can tell they are building their content where you're going to need some strong relationships with people in order to beat the content.

This is very MMO like and I don't expect non-mmo gamers to understand. This approach works wonders and is the reason why there are still gaming communities who have been playing with each other since the Everquest days on the PC. When you join an MMO gaming community, odds are you didn't just say "I want to join you", you were probably invited due to their interactions with you in the open world or were invited through mutual friends. There are plenty of cases to just randomly join groups, but the nature of MMOs allows players to get a feel for the group before taking on any real challenges. It's hard to explain to a person who's never really spent any time in an MMO.

Basically I know this setup will work in the long run. We will see more dedicated Destiny communities built due to the fact that players are given the choice if they want to help each other and how. This should help Destiny have a real strong community in the long run. The content isn't being built for randoms who've never worked with each other to complete. You'll need to know your teammates personality, playstyle, and probably loadouts so you can best compliment each other's abilities.

This actually makes me confident that Bungie is making the right decisions with how they are building the content. This is awesome to hear and I hope with other games like Destiny coming (The Divison, The Crew) we start seeing this as a trend in mainstream gaming. Matchmaking is great for competitive PvP games no doubt and I'm not denying that communities don't form there, but the kind of content we see in Destiny requires a different kind of community than that of the CoD, Halo, and Battlefield variety.

Yeah, added it in the title.

Cool beans, chaz.

As a former wow player I can tell you they are right. Matchmaking raids suck. Trust me they are doing Yall a favor.

lol are hermies gonna beg in every destiny thread?

Maybe? Given the very low number of people I come across that have headsets on the PS3, the prospect of having to communicate on that platform isn't all that appealing.

Bungie did the raids right, not allowing matchmaking where people can just leave when they feel like it. I like that, that a raid is about commitment of the players.

I see what they are trying to achieve and it rests primarily on the backs of lazy ass gamers quitting mid-game. It happens all the time and this way those jumping in know they are there till completion. Sure, it would be nice to have matchmaking but like the dev stated, people are far more willing to quit with match making then they would be after telling someone they are committed to the cause.

Besides, you can still have your friends join you.

People keep calling this an MMO but what makes this game an MMO? Wasn't the beta just matchmaking 4 players to go through a level with the occasional travel to the hub.

You make a good point. However the difference is console gaming vs pc gaming. Console gamers, from my experience, want more of a "twitch".. jump in jump out sort of environment. Yea in the long run it makes for chaotic sometimes unenjoyable matches, but it does satisfy those who simply want to enjoy a quick 15-30 minute session. I guess we'll see next month.

That's the whole point of the "commitment" Bungie spoke of. Destiny features no commitment areas like the Crucible (5-10 minutes) where you just go for one game then go again for another to aspects like raids (hours upon hours) that are something completely different.

And gameplay. If this is a MMO, so are Borderlands 1/2, POE, GW1, Diablo 2/3, and Hellgate.....and probably countless other games with 4-6 player COOP in enclosed environments.

Raids ....with 6 players in maps smaller than F2P MMO low level dungeons/instances......lol? How the hell are these remotely "raids"?

I have no clue honestly.......unless I'm missing something.

I've played with plenty of console gamers who want a much deeper and usually longer experience. Demon's Souls and Dark Souls are proof that the community exists plenty on consoles.

Depends if you guys keep begging for star citizen like you did for planetside2, diablo3, crysis, ethan carter, witcher3, and cyberpunk for your LessGamesStation 3 and 4.

6 players is not a raid.

So in other words a large portion of the games population missing out on raid content? Before LFR you had to be in a raiding guild or be allowed to tag along with one but not everyone could do that. LFR has made it so everyone can now see the raids which is great. It is also great for alts since mains stick to raiding with their guild. My main only raids with my guild but I still want the LFR gear for my alts but without LFR I would only be able to gear one of my toons. Also standing around in a city forever screaming looking for whatever raid is current sucks.

The more I hear about this game the less it sounds like something I want. A lot of people will miss out on content.

Translation: "We tried to do matchmaking but holy shit does Sony's online network suck dick."

@charizard1605:

Listen!!! You're just a hater, OK!!! Bungie is saving gaming as we speak, and most people agree because its the most pre ordered game in history!!! Everything they do is perfect. Even their farts are roses.

No matchmaking = no buy. Not even ashamed to admit that I'm too lazy to organize raid groups the old-fashioned way.

It's 2014, give me extreme accessibility or don't even bother. I have a backlog the size of Jupiter, if you don't make everything super convenient for me, I'll just skip your game and never look back.

It would have been nice to have the option of matchmaking regardless, but it's not a big deal for me and I get what they are trying to do. This will alter some people's behavior as to how they get together for those raids. You need to start making friends online for this game, and that is where it will be more gratifying.

I'm nearly certain they did the same thing with Halo:ODST, there was no matchmaking and people complained, but then people started going more to the forums and such to meet & party up. I like the fact that they are doing it for that reason, it may be a small annoyance at first to many, but it is not such a big hurdle if you take the right steps around it.

I always thought Blizzard adding that feature would ruin Warcraft and it has for the most part. I remember when my guild would joke about Blizzard saying they should do LFG for raids and it happened at the end of Cataclysm, I've tried it and good god it's horrible, so many assholes in one group it's too much to stomach, so good on Bungie for doing this as I want to enjoy Destiny not loathe playing it.

I love the LFG in wow. It gives people without the time to still experience raids. The difficultly of LFG raids is lower than regular raids and the loot has less iLvl. I have never wiped in a LFG raid and I still get to experience the content even if it's on a easier level.

This is a reason why I'm skipping destiny. The whole raids thing with no matchmaking is a huge turn off. I want to play destiny as I love Sci Fi stories but I will have to pass. I just don't have the time to do the raids with working a full time job. Oh well hopefully others enjoy the game. Love bungie's work in the halo series so I hope destiny becomes a success for them.

Sounds like WoW pre-raid finder shit. Good to hear.

I don't see why people have problem with raid finder in wow. You don't have to use it. If you don't use it you can do harder raids with better gear. It sounds win win to me.

The only really bad thing about the Raid Finder in WoW was that Blizzard gave into all the whining and nerfed content to the ground for raid finder.

Bungie could include Raid matchmaking, all they have to do is not nerf the content because of it, because lets be honest, if 6 people want to try and do it without the necessary communication that's "needed" then why the **** would anyone care as long as it's not affecting the way they want to play the game.

Bungie are so far up their own ass at this point. They seriously think there own audience are idiots and can't play a 6 player first person shooter well together.

Not really sure how you came to this conclusion from that statement. They said they want players to make a commitment and not look at raids as something you can start for 5 mins and back out.

Is this coming out on PC?

nope..not yet anyway.

Still? That's so weeaboo.

“We intentionally did that,” they said. “We’re going to see people self-organise. We’re seeing people in the Tower already gathering saying, who’s going to commit for a raid?"

Bullshit Bungie. Nobody in the Tower was gathering or talking because you dumb shits didn't include any way to communicate besides dancing with each other.

Lack of matchmaking is perfectly fine. I don't care. But give me a way of communicating with people so I can ask them to join me. Oh wait, they said they wouldn't do this during the beta so I cancelled my pre order. Forcing me on to a website I don't want to sign up for or visit so I can fin proper people to play with is garbage. Include a proper system in game that allows players to create parties without getting on their laptops. It works on PC MMO because they are already on their computer Bungie.

I get it, up to a point. Still, there are going to be gamers who can't organize a Raid, so why isn't there an option for matchmaking? Yes, it may not work sometimes, but if it works 10% of the time, why not have it?

@mems_1224: But... Destiny is also on Xbox One. So that must also mean that Microsofts almighty 300,000 server cloud must suck dick.

Way to make fun of your own console. You lemmings are ridiculous.

It's hilarious when you guys take Mems seriously.

Is there a text lobby in destiny? I didn't get to spend much time with beta.

brb I gotta go raid in L4D2.

Man console gamers are so behind the curve.