Day 1 Alpha Tester Firstly for bungie as this is a beta. Bug issue: Mission+Strike teleporting enemies frequency 1 per play through. Playtime: 4 hours 30 Minutes Now onto the review: Mission - Mission for what it was as an introduction was great, first runthrough, i took my time and it took its time, was nice to see a mission where at the correct level (I assume) it still took a good 20-30 minutes just to do one mission with the cutscenes. (Obviously second plus playthroughs were quicker but its good to see story missions of this length and something to do throughout not just running through empty hallways constantly. Strike - The strike was as advertised, its a typical destiny strike, ive seen commentors saying it has a lack of mechanics and the boss was a bullet sponge but in reality other than the health bar determining boss stages, this was no difference to a rise of iron or taken king strike boss. It was nice to see the final area change as well as the mechanics though not just boss mechanics in the same room. Other than that no real complants, had its defend point section, run through shoot sections and scenery sections, as i said everything we've already got from strike playlists in Destiny 1. Characters - Characters were as everyone is commenting a little on the slow side which is different to the fast paced were used to (even with mobility at its highest), however i do like that it seems to be intentional as to make you fight through every section rather than run through as you will be gunned down trying at most parts. The new supers all have their enjoyment, Warlock and Hunter more than Titan but like Destiny 1 it'll all go down to preference rather than any overall gains from using the supers. Supers - Do recharge on the slow side unless you are killing alot or have a fireteam co-ordinating supers for orbs. Orb drops are less by the look of things too regardless of yellow bars or multi red bar kills your not going to be generating 6/7 orbs more like 3 max. The timing does feel less so it seems supers have moved to more of a clearing add and finishing boss mode rather than multi yellow bar destroyers in 1 hit. For PvE this can be a little frustrating due to weapon changes ill go into but PvP its nice to not have sections of time where every death is by super for 2 minutes. They seem to be building a supers have to be earned rather than gained over time feel. Weapons - 2 primary weapon slots and heavy being anything from snipers to grenade launchers. I was a fan of this change going into the beta for PvP reasons as i do prefer a gunfight to be snipered through a 1 inch gap in a wall on the other side of the map. For PvP i still hold the same feeling, its refreshing to get stuck into gunfights where you can re-gain your health round corners, and it takes effort and a consistant good shot to bring your enemy down more than the spray and pray or 1 hit shotgun/sniper/grenade that plague Destiny 1. PvP feels more like a best players will rise situation more than slide shotty or sniper for the win. Hopefully with the introduction of competitive mode it will also come with LEADERBOARDS BUNGIE! PvE is more on the frustrating side, bosses and yellow bars take alot longer to grind down and after it does feel like you were in a fight with heavy weapons even from 3 people at the same time rarely take chunks from the boss in the way we'd like to see. However the weapons in total are, dissapointing, taking out the second slot perks makes them feel irrelevant regardless what your using and exotics suffering from the same effect. However if the raids are changing to benefit the new weapon system and dont feel as grindy then im onboard if we only have to worry about strike bosses rather than end game content. The system itself however seems more refined, instead of using your favoured type of gun and it works well regardless of situation i tended to be switching constantly between short and long range weapons as and when needed throughout the playthroughs which for me was a nice purposeful touch to the weapons. Ammo Drops - The main issue ive seen over the hours on here. I tried a few different methods when playing, i played my normal style, saving heavy for bosses, everything else gets whatever. I played wasting 1 weapon then moving onto the next and i played switching every 2/3 enemies. For the mission i was fine with all drop rates. For the strike like many i struggled, whether this is the coding for strike drops being messed up or intentional to make the strike more of a struggle (which does make getting the right ammo and using the right ammo at the right time more interesting) i guess we'll find out on release. PvP - PvP as i stated above with the weapon changes was refreshing, yes you will still get rolled over by clans and fireteams however with the introduction of competitive, hopefully this will be lessened in regular games by the more casual players. As i stated it feels very much like the best players will rise to the top and gunfights with skill at using your perks and weapons will become key rather than 1 shot tactics (shotgun/grenades/snipers). The 1 person gets heavy randomly through the match as well was a nice change that should cut down on the total team wipes when 3 people have heavy that 1 shot again. The 4v4 gamemode i feel does benefit the game, it feels more purposeful than 6v6 and like you can get onto streaks easier because its less chaotic but also feels more like you can regain a match balance when 4v2 or 4v1 down due to the map size and player spread within a map. I didnt have any lag or server issues on my playtime (Roughly 2 hours). I find that the people getting server issues or complaining about people having lag are generally the people either; trying to play the game on 5MB or under connection or Wifi connection/are playing against with 5MB connection or Wifi and its easier to blame destiny servers than realise that you cant play online games with bad connection or wifi unless it is incredible good connection and that not everyone realises/can get better internet so they create lag by using slow/bad connections. Overall - Its a beta is all i can say, would i have liked 3 story missions and an extra 2 PvP maps, sure, but obviously bungie are keeping things close to their chests as they know due to Destiny 1 skeptics they have to keep everything wrapped up to keep the hype as high as they can for launch. Im still excited for Destiny 2 especially with the PvP changes, however i am still going to be skeptical at launch of there being a lack of PvE content (longer story missions go a way bungie but 20 of them like Destiny 1 wont cut it) and how the new gun changes will effect the PvE endgame content like raids. However as i said its a Beta and a very limited one at that which doesnt show us much apart from the new gun system and the way it changes PvP and PvE.