Somewhere above the clouds over Europe, powered by spacemagic, a number of ruined metropolis blocks and an entire load of rocks are hovering as a brand new playground for Earth’s greediest heroes. This is the European Aerial Zone, host to a brand new cooperative mode in Destiny 2‘s Solstice Of Heroes event, which started last night and runs for a month. I adore the EAZ as a playground, leaping from rooftop to rooftop or barrelling through maze-like interiors while hunting bosses and treasure. It is a good place. So it’s baffling that the broader Solstice Of Heroes occasion presents rewards which strongly incentivise not taking part in the mode.
The Solstice Of Heroes desires us Guardians to sit back and shrug off the woes of the previous yr. Okay, certain, our greatest pal was murdered, we unintentionally cursed a whole city, an enormous mech nearly stomped our house, and the alien emperor we befriended some time again is turning into only a contact too sexy for the tip of the universe, however aren’t we the best? We are. If you need an unstoppable evil stopped, conceal some shiny trinkets simply behind that evil and we’ll kick it to items to assert our prizes. We’re so nice.
To have fun ourselves (not a euphemism), our magic friends have created the European Aerial Zone, a wee hovering chunk of metropolis. It is full of hidden treasure chests, and to search out them we’ll first must kick aside a load of bosses. We oblige. Off we go into the depths of the town to hunt them down, doing spaceparkour between balconies, climbing damaged buildings, and getting misplaced deep into interiors, and usually having a homosexual previous time attempting to find baddies and goodies.
That’s uncommon for zippy first-person shooters like Destiny 2, the place cities are largely ornamental. Your standard FPS metropolis is a play areas constructed from a number of cuboids and flexible paths, wrapped in brick and concrete textures. It’s a uncommon deal with to find not solely can we undergo and over a lot, however we should. I don’t wish to recommend this can be a full recreation of a metropolis, with each ground and room open to discover; it isn’t. But it’s complicated sufficient that I’ve to really discover and probe paths to search out my means between aims. The vertical vary of some fights is a pleasure too. And, y’know, leaping throughout rooftops is simply enjoyable.
The EAZ mode itself is fairly neat too. We begin with 5 minutes to search out minibosses throughout the town, with every kill including one other chest to the treasure hunt on the finish. Next we batter huge bosses, some new baddies with some stunning new methods. Then, the treasure hunt. Chests spawn up excessive and down deep throughout the town, and we’re given solely a short glimpse at their areas earlier than we’re despatched out to navigate the maze and declare our booty whereas a timer ticks all the way down to the tip.
That’s good, that. I’m having fun with it. And not simply due to leaping throughout rooftops.
The bizarre half is, the rewards of taking part in within the EAZ are largely unhealthy, typically simply trash blue gadgets and a handful of faction tokens. The actual reward of the entire Solstice Of Heroes occasion is a gleaming new armour set, all white and gold and chains like Michael Jackson’s glam navy years. This set will even carry over to the brand new armour system coming in September, so it’s a possibility to get a head-start. But the way in which to earn this armour set is generally by not taking part in EAZ.
These units, which have separate quest progress for every of your characters, require an ungodly quantity of grind. The quest will ship you to play dozens of Crucible and Gambit matches, Strikes, Public Events, Heroic Public Events, Patrols, Bounties, and extra, racking up all types of elemental kills alongside the way in which. Some of the aims overlap and a few I’ll occur to finish whereas taking part in usually, and that’s dandy. But many steps, reminiscent of finishing 25 Patrols on Titan (busywork alongside the traces of ‘kill ten spacerats’, ‘collect ten spacerat noses’, and ‘go here to kill a big spacerat’), are a waste of my time. Few quest steps are within the EAZ.
If you wish to get the Solstice Of Heroes armour, you’ll spend a very long time not taking part in the Solstice Of Heroes mode. That’s daft.
We do have 4 weeks to finish the armour quests. I suppose I may make a schedule to unfold out the more severe components of the questline. But I don’t wish to do 25 Titan Patrols in 4 weeks, not to mention the 75 it’d take me to finish the armour on all three of my characters. As somebody who performs an excessive amount of Destiny for my very own good, I had thought I would get it for all my spacemen. Now I see how a lot grind is concerned, eh, I won’t full it for anybody.
The EAZ treasure packages can provide new rolls of Solstice armour when you full the search, however for me possibly they’ll keep sucky reminders that the questline sucks. Boo.
Oh, do notice: the Solstice additionally has an entire factor about powering up elemental buffs with elemental kills. They’re advantageous? Bit of enjoyable. Far much less disruptive than the Revelry occasion’s balance-breaking fizzypop. And, in contrast to that magical elixir, these elemental auras are disabled in Competitive Crucible and Gambit Prime modes. Good, good.
See Bungie’s Solstice Of Heroes’s page for extra.
To finish on a cheerier notice, there are some actual gems among the many Solstice’s staggering variety of beach-themed beauty gadgets bought for varied microtransaction currencies. The diddy toy mannequin for spacebikes is… so good.
“LiiiPy” and friends raced a bunch of ’em by means of a piece in a single raid the place a flaming spherical robotic chases you thru a drain:
