Upon booting up the first story mission of Destiny: The Taken King, I'm greeted by a rare sight, at least in the world of this online shooter: No one is shooting at me.
In fact, no one's around at all. The enemy base I've been sent to attack, a brutalist alien installation dug into the surface of one of Mars's1 moons, is abandoned. Evacuated.
Sirens blare overhead, and in shadowed corners, strange portals open up to distant stars. This is all looking suspiciously like a carefully-crafted set piece, but for a game as bare-bones and formulaic as the first year of Destiny has been, it's a remarkable and welcome change of pace.
Taken King is Destiny revitalized, with new energy and renewed purpose. It's not better, exactly, though a number of changes in structure have made parts of the game less frustrating. What it is is a more urgent Destiny, more assured of its goals and more willing to take risks in the interest of keeping your attention. And while that energy fizzles the deeper into the expansion you get, it's welcome while it lasts.
The Taken WarWhen I was a kid, I loved Power Rangers. The thing about Power Rangers, however, is that it was objectively terrible, with only one exception: Each season, the costumed characters got a new power set, which required their old power set to be rendered inadequate.
So, every once in a while, something crazy would happen: They'd lose to the bad guys.
For an episode or two, dramatic tension would skyrocket as the heroes rushed around, desperately pooling their resources and trying to cobble together a solution to beat their new, overwhelming foes. For these fleeting moments, the kid's show crackled with energy and, even though you knew they'd win in the end, it was riveting to watch the heroes struggle so close to the edge.
