With the Destiny franchise now a decade old, Bungie has revealed a sweep of changes to hit Destiny 2 as part of its new saga, currently codenamed “Frontiers.”
Game director Tyson Green noted yearly expansions “dominated” nearly all of Bungie’s development efforts. By switching to medium-sized expansions, the Destiny 2 team is free to “explore and innovate” within the game.
These changes will begin in 2025, starting with “Codename: Apollo.” Instead of another large-scale expansions, “Apollo” will be split into two paid updates (summer’s “Arsenal” and fall’s “Surge”), and four free seasons over the course of its run.
“Codename: Behemoth” will continue this trend in winter 2025 and spring 2026, and so on and so forth.
After the layoffs in late July, it was reported that Bungie was considering axing yearly expansions to do smaller, free content drops. This new approach reflects that, and was further made to address the shared world shooter’s longstanding issues.
In Green’s words, part of that innovation will mean “challenging your idea of what a Destiny experience can be. […] Each expansion will present a new opportunity to try something different.”
He specifically said non-linear campaigns, exploration experiences (a la Metroidvanias), and roguelike or survival shooter formats were being prototyped. Of those, the non-linear structure was explicitly confirmed for “Apollo.”
Bungie also plans on employing changes to Destiny 2’s UI and activities and rewards, which were detailed in full, individual blogs. Green acknowledged that Destiny has become “too complex” and “rigid,” and hopes the new changes will liven up the now 10-year old game.
“We believe it’s time for Destiny to change and evolve, and that our community wants this game to grow and innovate too,” he said. “And to do that, we need to start breaking some of the molds.”
The full, broad outline for Bungie’s new gameplan for Destiny 2 can be read here.
