
Melbourne
March 29-30, 2025
Melbourne Showgrounds
Destiny 2: The Final Shape is not just Destiny’s latest expansion, but the culmination of a 10-year saga in gaming. While Destiny has had moments, and even years that have been incredible, both the game and its development studio, Bungie, have been through many tumultuous times, seemingly struggling to show a coherent vision at different moments over the years, both narratively and with gameplay. The Final Shape was the chance to prove that there was a coherent vision and passion behind this franchise, and it feels like Bungie may have found the light at the end of a dark tunnel.
It’s no understatement to say that The Final Shape’s campaign was Destiny’s ‘Endgame’ moment. Like the culmination of the MCU’s Infinity Saga, The Final Shape brings together all of the major narrative beats from the past 10 years, and all of humanity’s Guardians and their allies to prevent The Witness, the architect of humanity’s original downfall, from achieving the titular ‘Final Shape’. This is an event where the Witness reshapes and freezes the entire universe into what it believes is a perfect image — and the Witness is on the cusp of achieving this using the Traveller, the floating white sphere that’s the source of humanity’s space magic and the only reason we’ve survived in the Destiny universe.
Like Endgame, The Final Shape’s story is unlikely to hit quite as hard, or be quite as comprehensible, to newcomers compared to franchise veterans. But if you’ve been here since the start, this expansion somehow manages to stick the landing and deliver a story that resonates with players whose journeys started many years ago. Looking at the quality of The Final Shape, it’s incredible to think that Bungie has managed to introduce a distinct main villain with the Witness, compared to the final boss of the original Destiny, that being a floating ball of Darkness goop.
‘The Pale Heart’ of the Traveller is the new destination for the expansion. Taking place within the Traveller itself, it’s an environment that melds elements of previous destinations from the franchise’s history, overgrown by lush natural environments from the Traveller’s power or corrupted by the Witness’ nightmarish visions of ‘perfection’.
The Pale Heart is designed much more linearly compared to most previous destinations, essentially acting as one massive campaign map, as throughout the story you progress further and further into The Pale Heart, towards the glowing peak in the distance, where the Witness is spreading its horrific corruption from. It’s an incredible world to explore, and the most artistically dynamic destination yet.
It also sets the stage for a lot of post-campaign content, with some of Destiny’s best missions (and wildest exotic rewards), along with the new ‘Overthrow’ public events. Overthrow tasks players with luring out a world boss in a patrol zone by killing enemies and completing small public events. The mode feels like what the now defunct ‘Flashpoint’ events should have been during Destiny 2’s original launch period, as Overthrow is a much more engaging and rewarding method for players to grind for gear, should they want to.
The new ‘Prismatic’ subclass is another major addition with The Final Shape. While it doesn’t provide a new element or flashy new abilities, it opens up a slew of build crafting options, allowing players to combine select abilities and perks from their existing Light and Dark subclasses.
While not every ability is available for use in Prismatic (otherwise there would absolutely be some game-breaking options), the options Bungie has selected allow for unique and particularly powerful combinations. During part of my playthrough as a Hunter, I designed my Prismatic subclass around a dodge and melee combo that allowed me to build up melee damage while freezing enemies as I dodged around. This was combined with the grapple grenade, allowing me to close the distance between groups of enemies (as well as being the most fun traversal option in the game). It will be interesting to see if Bungie expands on this subclass in the future, as there’s definitely potential for some absolutely bonkers combinations in the Destiny sandbox.
Throughout the campaign players can test their Prismatic abilities against both familiar enemies like the Hive and Scorn, and the new Dread faction — darkness beings created or modified by the Witness. Lightfall already introduced the first of this enemy type, the Tormenters, and now we have a slew of others, such as the Grim, a flying gunbat with a suppressing screech, and the Harbingers and Omens, tall and elite enemies that wield Darkness abilities. The Harbingers and their smaller compatriots, Weavers, are particularly enjoyable to fight, as their Strand abilities will either suspend you in place, or suddenly pull you across the battlefield towards them.
Of course, what really draws a saga together is the story. Admittedly, the campaign narrative starts off a little slow, explaining what the Final Shape means a few too many times amongst major story beats — but once the story gets rolling it doesn’t stop. It’s very easy for a ‘universe ending’ plot to become untethered from relatable stakes, but The Final Shape manages to remain grounded through the relationships between its main cast: Zavala, Ikora, Crow and Cayde-6.
There’s particular focus on Zavala’s journey, and it’s a smart choice. He’s the de facto leader of all humanity, essentially having the entire universe on his shoulders, along with his past traumas that the Witness is bringing into reality through manipulation of the Traveller’s energy. Throughout the campaign, the strain these pressures put on Zavala tests not only his emotional resolve, but his friendships with Ikora and the mysteriously resurrected Cayde.
Sadly, Zavala’s original voice actor, the iconic Lance Reddick, passed away last year. Reddick was well known in the Destiny community for his passion for the game (often playing his Warlock despite being the Titan Vanguard). The Final Shape’s themes around loss and memory certainly ring stronger with the loss of Reddick in mind.
Taking the reins from Reddick is Keith David, another iconic voice of many roles, such as Sergeant Foley from Call of Duty, and the Arbiter, with David having worked with Bungie all the way back in Halo 2. David does an incredible job as Zavala, despite coming in at an emotional crossroads for the character and so late into the game (pardon the pun). His only shortcoming is that he’s not Reddick, but David isn’t attempting to imitate him. It’s David’s own take on the character, but he delivers a performance with a gravitas that is faithful to Reddick’s work over the years, and still feels like Zavala.
A notable return is Nathan Fillion as Cayde. It certainly feels like Bungie heard the criticism that Cayde, while charming, felt too much like the comic relief when Destiny 2 first launched in 2017. Now he has a slightly more cynical view of the universe, trying to find a purpose in his resurrection. Fillion’s performance together with the well-crafted script, manages to find balance between the light-hearted and darker tones of Cayde, and adds a level of intrigue and emotion to the campaign that could have only been delivered with him.
The new raid, Salvation’s Edge, also acts as a magnificent climax for the saga (although it’s not the expansion’s narrative end). Bungie has created an experience that manages to combine lore and gameplay within the most expansive raid environment yet, showcasing the Witness’s twisted grasp on the Traveller as teams battle their way to the summit of the dark monolith in the Pale Heart. It’s an incredible journey and a triumph of game design.
Both Destiny and Bungie itself have been through their ups and downs over the past decade. The franchise has taken plenty of missteps, even from its original launch in 2014, and Bungie has gone through working with Activision, going independent and then being acquired by Sony; not to mention the staff layoffs last year as part of a wider industry trend. Bungie and all of its staff have managed to craft an impressive franchise and an incredible ending to a saga despite all of these challenges, and every one of its current and former workers deserves credit for sustaining Destiny for so long, and achieving an ending like The Final Shape. Both the craft in its gameplay and emotional development in its campaign results in the best Destiny release yet.
The Final Shape also sees the game’s yearly content transition to a three-episode structure, compared to the previous four-season structure we’ve had since 2019. Each episode will be released across three acts for a steady stream of narrative beats. The first act of the new ‘Echoes’ episode has wrapped, seeming to set the stage for the rest of the episodes and what’s to come for the Destiny universe, following the Vex and how the fallout of The Final Shape seems to have allowed an unknown entity to control a group of the robotic aliens. We’ll have to wait and see whether Bungie will deliver more consistently impactful narrative beats with this new content strategy – so far it’s felt pretty similar to past seasons.
Like Lightfall last year, I wouldn’t recommend that newcomers dive into The Final Shape, but for very different reasons. Unlike Lightfall, it’s simply because The Final Shape is the most rewarding if you’ve played what’s come before. Knowing how this saga ends, I’d highly recommend coming back to it after playing Destiny 2’s previous expansions (sadly, its 2017 campaign was removed years ago now), or potentially even picking up the original Destiny first. Then again, if you only want to experience Destiny at its greatest, The Final Shape is absolutely the time to join. And if you’re a veteran that’s taken a break from Destiny 2 either from burnout from a few years ago, or being disappointed by Lightfall, then The Final Shape is absolutely the time to return and experience the conclusion of one of modern gaming’s greatest arcs, right up until its final scene.
The Final Shape manages to be a fulfilling and satisfying conclusion, even with plenty of narrative threads that Bungie has left untied to continue Destiny. It will be an uphill battle to continue the franchise and build up another ‘big bad’; but if Bungie manages to continue with the quality of this expansion (something that they’ve struggled with in the past), Destiny may just be able to continue shaping its journey through the stars for a long time yet.