On “Destiny 2”, the secrets, expectations and reading of the play

I’ll admit some level of frustration with the final days of Destiny 2. While the Telesto bugs turned out to be “”a thing”, they weren’t the kickoff of some kind of big mystery. puzzles in the game. And yesterday, an interview with a Bungie engineer made it seem like the reason Destiny 2 didn’t do big secret Whisper quests anymore was because it was too hard to keep them secret. later said that was a misinterpretation of what was said, but I still haven’t really heard a good explanation of why the game has dropped almost all the big puzzles and gameplay secrets for ages years now.

Community manager DMG posted a thread about the situation, which I put in paragraph form here:

Context is key. Regarding a recent Reddit AMA with our engineering lead, a question was asked about data encryption. The reply was mistakenly translated as “Bungie is never doing Secret Quests again” by some fan twitters. We have issued clarifications to be more specific.

To talk more about the comments about “we want more secret quests”, the comments are heard. That said, I don’t want that statement to become “Bungie just promised more secrets!”

As we saw with the Telesto micro-event (and recent patch notes), anything can become a potential secret in players’ minds. If we don’t say anything, it’s considered the beginning of a secret. Even if we specifically say there is no secret, people immediately start looking for one.

Each stage is a time to learn and absorb feedback, so we’ll keep trying new things like Telesto Week (or whatever) even if they have similar vibes at the start of a secret. We’ve received a ton of great feedback this week, and we’re excited to build on it.

In the end, surprise and fun is the name of the game, but not all surprises can be a 60-hour community puzzle. I would strongly recommend resetting expectations accordingly, but we’ll continue to pass on feedback on desires for more secrets in the channel.

While I’m sure it’s frustrating to deal with a community that is seemingly never satisfied, on the other hand, I find this explanation a little frustrating itself. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask why Bungie hasn’t done another all-secret Whisper or Zero Hour-like quest, or a mass community puzzle like Corridors of Time for literally years now. They can say “no, it’s not just because we can’t hide things from dataminers”, and yet I don’t really see any other explanation given.

A common complaint is that the community continues to feel “baited” about things that look and sound like big secrets (Telesto!) but end up being much less than that (an emblem and a social media gaffe). If you say, “Well, you’re jumping on anything or nothing as a potential secret,” what does that tell you? that the community is hungry for secrets, and it’s weird to hear ‘feedback’ being given when it’s incredibly well known that things like the Secret Whisper have been one of the best things the game has done in its lifetime life. It’s not new. And now we’re being told to “reset expectations accordingly”, which would imply that no, this stuff really isn’t going to happen anytime soon, most likely, despite years and years of “feedback”.

I think there are other explanations for the lack of secrets that are more obvious:

• Although Bungie has strengthened its teams, they are focusing on projects that are more aimed at the public. For example, a seasonal team focuses on creating great seasonal activities that can serve as a selling point for a season. Something that might have been a secret is now a pre-announced exotic quest to show value when purchasing a season.
• Then there’s the new monetization, where Bungie now wants to sell a dungeon pass every year. I can’t keep them secret, although they are at least similar in scope to previous Secret Missions, if not much larger. Dungeons that you can sell for $20 are inherently more valuable than Whisper-type items.
• In terms of community puzzles, I think Bungie has been spooked by the pushback of things like Niobe Labs or Corridors of Time by players who complained that they were just “streamer” events where a few people base were working on a solution for the wider community. I hate this story because it’s some of the most interesting content in Destiny, my main issue was that the rewards weren’t worth the elaborate nature of the puzzle (in the case of Corridors, an Exotic launch that was already announced a few weeks later sooner than the roadmap).

Since Bungie really doesn’t say it clearly Why they don’t make secrets, those are my best guesses. Guess I have to stop looking for signs in the clouds at this point and accept that nothing like this can happen for very long, if it ever becomes a priority again.

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