Thoughts on Destiny: Rise of Iron
It's been a few days since Destiny's latest expansion pack, Rise of Iron, was released, and I thought now would be a good time to briefly write up my thoughts on the story that I experienced. I haven't been able to play it all that much, thanks to my busy schedule, but I did manage to complete the main storyline in about three hours worth of play, if not less than that.
I'll divide this into three sections: Story, Characters, and Lore. Each will discuss the topics they're named for, and'll keep things nice and organized. Be warned, however, I have not collected all of the SIVA fragments and the other collectibles scattered across the Plaguelands, so my opinions and thoughts are going to be limited to what I know as of tonight.
I. Story: This is the important one, and oh boy does Rise of Iron shine. The plot is a fairly simple one, and it doesn't take very long to get to the end of the single-player campaign, so you'll get the breadth of it pretty quickly. As far as a spoiler-freeish synopsis goes, your Guardian is tasked by Lord Saladin to defend the Iron Temple, an ancient fortress of the Iron Lords, from a Fallen assault. Before you do this, you get to see a beautiful cutscene detailing the last seconds of the Iron Lords, and without ruining it to the 0.03% of the people who go on my blog and haven't seen/played it already, it is properly epic.
Back to the point, your Guardian takes the fight to the House of Devils, and from there forms the front line against the Devil Splicers, a subcaste that exists in all Fallen Houses that focuses on bioengineering and technological research. The Splicers have uncovered a Golden Age nanotechnology known as SIVA, and are using it to augment themselves and their weapons as they aim to conquer the City and retake the Traveler.
The conclusion of the story is probably one of the best missions in Destiny to date. Without spoiling anything (again, for the curtesy of the 0.03%), the mission takes an already personal and dark story with epic overtones to its climax. I will not lie: the last boss encounter of the fifth and final story mission is one of the most unnerving, if not horrifying, experiences Destiny has ever had. The ominous lighting, voices whispering just outside of comprehension, and then the tortured noises that are in the final fight itself makes the "Iron Tomb" one of the best. There's even an epic sequence right after the death of the bosses that cannot be spoiled because it would rob the player of just how epic it is.
In sum, the story of Rise of Iron, apart from its short nature, is an excellent one. The Live Team, working with only nine months to complete a full-scale expansion, delivered one of the best campaign experiences in Destiny to date, and for that I must congratulate them.
II. Characters: Rise of Iron introduces several new characters, but the crux of the story focuses explicitly on your Guardian (who sadly remains a silent protagonist-maybe in Destiny 2 we'll hear our voices again), your Ghost, and Lord Saladin.
Newcomers first. Shiro-4, the Vanguard Scout, is one of the primary talkers in the campaign, particularly during the Strikes and post-campaign play. Shiro is a breath of fresh air away from the stereotypical "space cowboy" Hunters that are exemplified by characters such as Cayde-6, Shin Malphur, and Dredgen Yor. Shiro instead acts a lot like how Lisset does, and is closer to an Army Ranger than he is some swaggering Lawbringer of the Frontier. I'm not going to lie: I like the guy a lot, and I hope that he'll get to stretch his legs more as the year continues.
Tyra Karn is an interesting new Cryptarch character that makes her voice known, but isn't as much of a chatterbox as Saladin, Shiro, or your Ghost. However, she's a far more likable side character than any of our previous Cryptarchs (although you're hard pressed to be a more interesting person that Master Rahool or Ives...). Despite her role, Tyra is an interesting character, having as much of a connection to the Iron Lords as Saladin himself. I'm looking forward to interacting with her further, should the game make that a possibility.
Back to the familiar. Your Guardian definitely is one of the major focuses of Rise of Iron, eventually taking on the moniker of "the Young Wolf" and becoming an Iron Lord themselves. While the attention placed upon the player isn't overwhelming, it is nice to see that your actions in previous adventures are getting more and more notice. It was a bit of a surprise to read a Grimoire card specifically about me. Again, your character's interaction with the world is hampered by the lack of voice acting they have, but I'm hoping that they'll get over their sore throat by the time of the next Destiny installment.
Lord Saladin is one of the best parts of the expansion pack. He's brooding, dramatic, and driven unlike any character we've seen before. Where Eris was dark and looming in the shadows, Saladin stands out in the bright of day, his voice confident and powerful. It is hard not to like Saladin, and he does his lines with a level of expertise that we've come to expect of Destiny that adds emotional punch to the campaign, especially at the conclusion. However, due to the campaign's length, his character's development from lonely sigil to reinvigorated Iron Lord is a bit rushed. It's something that I understand, but I do wish that we could have seen him grow more and more like what he must have been back when he fought alongside the likes of Jolder and Felwinter.
Finally, your Ghost. Wow, does he really shine in this one. Dropping Peter Dinklage for Nolan North in the last expansion pack took some time for us "Old Guard" to get used to, but I had faith in the new voice actor's talent. I was not disappointed then, and I was blown away now. Ghost, aside from being a bit more sarcastic than usual (which has its positives and negatives, but when dealing with more serious characters this time around, I can see why he is), is also a lot more personal. There is a line during the Exotic Khvostov quest that might as well be a conversation between Bungie and the player, and God does it hit hard. Rise of Iron was, in many ways, giving back to those of us who have been here since 2014, and beyond. Hell, I remember Destiny being called "Project Tiger", and wondering what those strange symbols were on some of the Bungie employees' clothing back during Halo: Reach. This latest installment is meant to be a trip down memory lane for the player, bringing back so many fond experiences from when we were all just so new and fresh and young to this expansive world.
I'm not going to lie, Destiny means a lot to me. It's a game that will go down as my favorite of all time, and as far as I can tell, nothing is ever going to supplant that. There was something deeply cathartic to just stand, looking over that snowy graveyard of rusted vehicles where it all began, and just take a moment to reflect on everything we've done over the last year. It was a beautiful thing.
III. Lore: Rise of Iron has brought a fair amount of new information to the table about the Iron Lords and about SIVA, but there are also some interesting tidbits that are fleshing out the world of Destiny, especially as we approach the sequel. First and foremost, the Owl Sector ARG that occurred the week before launch was a fascinating look at not only how Bungie incorporates player behavior into the lore (it's officially canon-there are Guardians who stand on Cayde's map), but also at the civilian side of the Tower, the involvement of Clovis Bray in the Golden Age, and a bit more detail as to the private life of Ikora Rey, everyone's favorite Warlock mentor.
One of the things that the Grimoire seems to be reaching is that the Golden Age was a lot less shining than we've been lead to believe. It was no dystopia, not by a long-shot, but the Clovis Bray corporation was the shadow that marred the perfect image. Unethical experiments, human testing, blackmail and using leverage to get the company's way; all are things that the mega-corporation was guilty of. Back in The Taken King, those of us who got the Physical Edition encountered this first with the memoirs of Cayde-6, who remembered that Clovis Bray had a similar hold over him. It is more than likely that this leverage was what led Cayde to becoming an Exo, but Owl Sector has revealed that similar tactics put together less than moral tests on SIVA-like nano machines. The goal of Clovis Bray was to push humanity's boundaries, and they did intend to make the world a better place, but their ethics and their execution makes them to appear a lot more threatening that I had expected. Learning more about their involvement in the Golden Age, especially as the Collapse approaches, would be good to know.
Actually hitting some of the new Grimoire, the SIVA cards themselves seem to be an interesting mix of Golden Age records, C'thulu-esque psychological horror, and a curious self-examination over the mixing of flesh and machine. The Golden Age records are similar to what we saw with Owl Sector: Clovis Bray's attempts to accelerate human colonization of the solar system came with the price of overstepping some boundaries. Despite that, there is an attitude of hope; the people being recorded honestly believe that they are doing the right thing, and are trying very actively to get people to the stars. It's an interesting dichotomy. The Iron Lords records are somewhat horrifying, and seem to imply that SIVA has the capability to not only override technological systems (including armor and weaponry), but also minds. Again, this should be reminiscent of what we saw in Owl Sector, but it's still very unsettling. Finally, the Fallen cards seem to be a dialogue by an anonymous Devil Splicer post-augmentation as SIVA begins to consume his will. Whether or not this is just some random Vandal, or perhaps Aksis himself, I do not know.
To conclude, there are some little tidbits that I found interesting in the new Grimoire. For instance, it seems that Shin Malphur is still alive(!), as a Crucible Arena Grimoire reveals him having a heated discussion with Ikora about the reappearance of Thorn in the Crucible. Rezzyl Azzir's saga appears to have reached an end, with the Guardian apparently being killed by the Hive on the Moon. Whether or not Rezzyl is the Guardian that we find during the very first mission on Luna, I cannot say, though I find it somewhat improbable. Guardians are, effectively, immortal, incapable of dying via old age, but the previous cards have all been set during the late Dark Age/early City Age. Fast forwarding to our time would be a time jump on the order of several centuries, and I just find that unlikely. Hopefully future context will help us identify who Rezzyl truly is and what exactly happened to him during his "final" battle.
And, with that, I conclude my thoughts on Rise of Iron. I hope those of you who read this enjoyed it, and I look forward to reading your comments below.
I'll divide this into three sections: Story, Characters, and Lore. Each will discuss the topics they're named for, and'll keep things nice and organized. Be warned, however, I have not collected all of the SIVA fragments and the other collectibles scattered across the Plaguelands, so my opinions and thoughts are going to be limited to what I know as of tonight.
I. Story: This is the important one, and oh boy does Rise of Iron shine. The plot is a fairly simple one, and it doesn't take very long to get to the end of the single-player campaign, so you'll get the breadth of it pretty quickly. As far as a spoiler-freeish synopsis goes, your Guardian is tasked by Lord Saladin to defend the Iron Temple, an ancient fortress of the Iron Lords, from a Fallen assault. Before you do this, you get to see a beautiful cutscene detailing the last seconds of the Iron Lords, and without ruining it to the 0.03% of the people who go on my blog and haven't seen/played it already, it is properly epic.
Back to the point, your Guardian takes the fight to the House of Devils, and from there forms the front line against the Devil Splicers, a subcaste that exists in all Fallen Houses that focuses on bioengineering and technological research. The Splicers have uncovered a Golden Age nanotechnology known as SIVA, and are using it to augment themselves and their weapons as they aim to conquer the City and retake the Traveler.
The conclusion of the story is probably one of the best missions in Destiny to date. Without spoiling anything (again, for the curtesy of the 0.03%), the mission takes an already personal and dark story with epic overtones to its climax. I will not lie: the last boss encounter of the fifth and final story mission is one of the most unnerving, if not horrifying, experiences Destiny has ever had. The ominous lighting, voices whispering just outside of comprehension, and then the tortured noises that are in the final fight itself makes the "Iron Tomb" one of the best. There's even an epic sequence right after the death of the bosses that cannot be spoiled because it would rob the player of just how epic it is.
In sum, the story of Rise of Iron, apart from its short nature, is an excellent one. The Live Team, working with only nine months to complete a full-scale expansion, delivered one of the best campaign experiences in Destiny to date, and for that I must congratulate them.
II. Characters: Rise of Iron introduces several new characters, but the crux of the story focuses explicitly on your Guardian (who sadly remains a silent protagonist-maybe in Destiny 2 we'll hear our voices again), your Ghost, and Lord Saladin.
Newcomers first. Shiro-4, the Vanguard Scout, is one of the primary talkers in the campaign, particularly during the Strikes and post-campaign play. Shiro is a breath of fresh air away from the stereotypical "space cowboy" Hunters that are exemplified by characters such as Cayde-6, Shin Malphur, and Dredgen Yor. Shiro instead acts a lot like how Lisset does, and is closer to an Army Ranger than he is some swaggering Lawbringer of the Frontier. I'm not going to lie: I like the guy a lot, and I hope that he'll get to stretch his legs more as the year continues.
Tyra Karn is an interesting new Cryptarch character that makes her voice known, but isn't as much of a chatterbox as Saladin, Shiro, or your Ghost. However, she's a far more likable side character than any of our previous Cryptarchs (although you're hard pressed to be a more interesting person that Master Rahool or Ives...). Despite her role, Tyra is an interesting character, having as much of a connection to the Iron Lords as Saladin himself. I'm looking forward to interacting with her further, should the game make that a possibility.
Back to the familiar. Your Guardian definitely is one of the major focuses of Rise of Iron, eventually taking on the moniker of "the Young Wolf" and becoming an Iron Lord themselves. While the attention placed upon the player isn't overwhelming, it is nice to see that your actions in previous adventures are getting more and more notice. It was a bit of a surprise to read a Grimoire card specifically about me. Again, your character's interaction with the world is hampered by the lack of voice acting they have, but I'm hoping that they'll get over their sore throat by the time of the next Destiny installment.
Lord Saladin is one of the best parts of the expansion pack. He's brooding, dramatic, and driven unlike any character we've seen before. Where Eris was dark and looming in the shadows, Saladin stands out in the bright of day, his voice confident and powerful. It is hard not to like Saladin, and he does his lines with a level of expertise that we've come to expect of Destiny that adds emotional punch to the campaign, especially at the conclusion. However, due to the campaign's length, his character's development from lonely sigil to reinvigorated Iron Lord is a bit rushed. It's something that I understand, but I do wish that we could have seen him grow more and more like what he must have been back when he fought alongside the likes of Jolder and Felwinter.
Finally, your Ghost. Wow, does he really shine in this one. Dropping Peter Dinklage for Nolan North in the last expansion pack took some time for us "Old Guard" to get used to, but I had faith in the new voice actor's talent. I was not disappointed then, and I was blown away now. Ghost, aside from being a bit more sarcastic than usual (which has its positives and negatives, but when dealing with more serious characters this time around, I can see why he is), is also a lot more personal. There is a line during the Exotic Khvostov quest that might as well be a conversation between Bungie and the player, and God does it hit hard. Rise of Iron was, in many ways, giving back to those of us who have been here since 2014, and beyond. Hell, I remember Destiny being called "Project Tiger", and wondering what those strange symbols were on some of the Bungie employees' clothing back during Halo: Reach. This latest installment is meant to be a trip down memory lane for the player, bringing back so many fond experiences from when we were all just so new and fresh and young to this expansive world.
I'm not going to lie, Destiny means a lot to me. It's a game that will go down as my favorite of all time, and as far as I can tell, nothing is ever going to supplant that. There was something deeply cathartic to just stand, looking over that snowy graveyard of rusted vehicles where it all began, and just take a moment to reflect on everything we've done over the last year. It was a beautiful thing.
III. Lore: Rise of Iron has brought a fair amount of new information to the table about the Iron Lords and about SIVA, but there are also some interesting tidbits that are fleshing out the world of Destiny, especially as we approach the sequel. First and foremost, the Owl Sector ARG that occurred the week before launch was a fascinating look at not only how Bungie incorporates player behavior into the lore (it's officially canon-there are Guardians who stand on Cayde's map), but also at the civilian side of the Tower, the involvement of Clovis Bray in the Golden Age, and a bit more detail as to the private life of Ikora Rey, everyone's favorite Warlock mentor.
One of the things that the Grimoire seems to be reaching is that the Golden Age was a lot less shining than we've been lead to believe. It was no dystopia, not by a long-shot, but the Clovis Bray corporation was the shadow that marred the perfect image. Unethical experiments, human testing, blackmail and using leverage to get the company's way; all are things that the mega-corporation was guilty of. Back in The Taken King, those of us who got the Physical Edition encountered this first with the memoirs of Cayde-6, who remembered that Clovis Bray had a similar hold over him. It is more than likely that this leverage was what led Cayde to becoming an Exo, but Owl Sector has revealed that similar tactics put together less than moral tests on SIVA-like nano machines. The goal of Clovis Bray was to push humanity's boundaries, and they did intend to make the world a better place, but their ethics and their execution makes them to appear a lot more threatening that I had expected. Learning more about their involvement in the Golden Age, especially as the Collapse approaches, would be good to know.
Actually hitting some of the new Grimoire, the SIVA cards themselves seem to be an interesting mix of Golden Age records, C'thulu-esque psychological horror, and a curious self-examination over the mixing of flesh and machine. The Golden Age records are similar to what we saw with Owl Sector: Clovis Bray's attempts to accelerate human colonization of the solar system came with the price of overstepping some boundaries. Despite that, there is an attitude of hope; the people being recorded honestly believe that they are doing the right thing, and are trying very actively to get people to the stars. It's an interesting dichotomy. The Iron Lords records are somewhat horrifying, and seem to imply that SIVA has the capability to not only override technological systems (including armor and weaponry), but also minds. Again, this should be reminiscent of what we saw in Owl Sector, but it's still very unsettling. Finally, the Fallen cards seem to be a dialogue by an anonymous Devil Splicer post-augmentation as SIVA begins to consume his will. Whether or not this is just some random Vandal, or perhaps Aksis himself, I do not know.
To conclude, there are some little tidbits that I found interesting in the new Grimoire. For instance, it seems that Shin Malphur is still alive(!), as a Crucible Arena Grimoire reveals him having a heated discussion with Ikora about the reappearance of Thorn in the Crucible. Rezzyl Azzir's saga appears to have reached an end, with the Guardian apparently being killed by the Hive on the Moon. Whether or not Rezzyl is the Guardian that we find during the very first mission on Luna, I cannot say, though I find it somewhat improbable. Guardians are, effectively, immortal, incapable of dying via old age, but the previous cards have all been set during the late Dark Age/early City Age. Fast forwarding to our time would be a time jump on the order of several centuries, and I just find that unlikely. Hopefully future context will help us identify who Rezzyl truly is and what exactly happened to him during his "final" battle.
And, with that, I conclude my thoughts on Rise of Iron. I hope those of you who read this enjoyed it, and I look forward to reading your comments below.
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