Destiny 2 roadmap shows major changes to the game’s usual schedule
Lot 2 Fans are waiting with bated breath to learn more about the game’s future. The final shape expansion marked the conclusion of the long-running Light and Darkness saga, and was well-received by veterans who had faithfully followed the franchise throughout its lore. This was followed by a major shakeup at Bungie, which saw 225 employees laid off and over 200 employees redeployed to various studios within Sony.
Monday, for the 10th anniversary of the Destiny franchise, Bungie has released a roadmap titled Codename: Frontiers, which explores the future of Lot 2. There will be two medium-sized expansions each year. In 2025, Bungie will release the Codename: Apollo expansion in the summer of 2025, and then the Codename: Behemoth expansion in the winter. There will also be four major free content updates each year, running alongside the expansions.
Expansions offer new stories, locations, missions, raids, and dungeons for players. Seasonal updates are more focused on gameplay, offering new events and adding new twists to in-game activities. “Expansions have become too formulaic and go by too quickly with little replay value,” writes Tyson Green, game director for Lot 2. Green is a longtime Destiny developer who took on the role after Joe Blackburn left the studio before The final shape‘s launch.
“Seasons and episodes are getting bigger and bigger, but it can still feel like you’re just going through the motions. (…) We’re actively prototyping non-linear campaigns, exploration experiences akin to Dreaming City or Metroidvanias, and even more unusual formats like roguelikes or survival shooters. Each expansion offers a new opportunity to try something different.”
Bungie also plans to make changes to the core gameplay as it stands, to avoid having too much to do with too little guidance. Bungie will be revamping the game’s activity UI, the Director, to help players find the activities they enjoy or provide the rewards they’re looking for. There will also be changes to the Challenge Customization system, with rewards increasing with challenge.
The end of the Light and Darkness Saga doesn’t mean the end of multi-year campaigns. Alison Lührs, narrative director on Lot 2shares some of the upcoming story content. “We are proud of The final shape and the ending we created for the Light and Darkness Saga. And we knew that the episodes that followed would act as an epilogue, tying up the hanging threads of Light and Dark… but also setting us up for what comes next,” she writes.
Codename: Apollo will be the next great saga at the heart of Lot 2; while Lührs is deliberately sparing with details to avoid spoilers, she writes that Codename: Apollo is “a nonlinear character-driven adventure” that will “introduce many new characters, factions, twists, and more.” The name Frontiers suggests new areas, and fans have speculated that in the conclusion of The final shapeThe Guardians may finally leave the solar system to go to other galaxies.
Much of the upcoming content for Lot 2 will be experimental. As Lührs writes, “Fate is at its best when it’s mysterious, strange, and unafraid to try new things.” It seems that Bungie is shedding some elements of its online shooter that fans have found boring, and experimenting with new formats and styles. It remains to be seen how these trials will pan out, but a commitment to more narrative content is a relief in light of the conclusion of The final shape and the successive dismissals.