Destiny 2: The Edge of Fate (REVIEW)

Destiny 2: The Edge of Fate (REVIEW) - Our Fate is Sealed.

8/2/2025

Game/Content: Destiny 2: The Edge of Fate
Developer: Bungie
Release Date: July 15th, 2025.
Platforms: PlayStation 4 / 5, Xbox Series S/X, Xbox One, PC

Price: 39.99 USD (Standard), Year of Prophecy: 99.99 USD.
Review Code Provided by Bungie.

I never honestly expected to continue playing after Destiny 2’s previous expansion (at the time for this review): The Final Shape.

I did feel Destiny 2: The Final Shape provided a complete conclusion to Destiny’s Story as a whole.
Although it is nice that Bungie is trying to begin a new saga, do we know if it will live up to expectations?

Guess we'll find out.

Thoughts and Story/Planet, Gameplay, etc.

“Well then.. This is an edge to adventure about”

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!

The story feels well something new for the first time since Destiny 2’s launch was simply input “Ghaul wants the Light and wants to be noticed by the traveler. We need to stop him and his legion from taking our home, etc.”

Also, with the first mission having us feeling invited by someone unknown (most obvious is the Nine) to a planet we explore outside of our solar system, known as Kepler.

We also tend to meet a new faction or a faction known as the House of Exile, etc.
Then we find a distress call of a recording from a person specifically. At the end of the first mission, we meet a character named Lodi, and so far, a great character.

The focus they have done with how Lodi feels to be a normal person and suddenly being plucked out of the 70s to magically come pulled here in this timeline, etc, did enjoy Lodi’s theatrical moment during his 1 on 1 with the archon in the story too.
Very grateful that we didn’t get a new character issue like we have gotten with Nimbus from Lightfall here this time around.

I did believe the story was okay in a gameplay sense, same with Matterspark as a new mechanic to explore around with puzzles, etc, since it was nice for them to try something new. Except, it wasn’t executed perfectly, they did try at least to create something different. Matterspark itself did feel like it was very jarring or tedious, same with the activities you do, since you use that too much. (but I do enjoy the metroidvania feel to it though).

Matterweave and other mechanics were fun to use but not really Matterspark as much to be fair.
Also, not to mention the story was pretty lengthy/beefy compared to Rise of Iron, except the Destiny 2 Team did try to make a Rise of Iron type of Expansion focus here, but not much exactly in gameplay, planet exploration terms, but I respect them trying here either way so it’s nice to have another planet, etc.

Kepler is a pretty cool planet for sure, but it does feel a bit bland or a copy and paste to another planet, like IO, or is it just me?
Sorry if that seems silly here, but that’s how I am seeing this in honesty.
I do hope they improve upon the planet exploration more like The Pale Heart or Plaguelands, as we need more of this type of exploration of locations in this sense.

But if we push that aside, and the issues.

The Narrative in the Story was fantastic, and even like the Final Mission (even with how Matterspark was fun there too (shocker), and that finale cutscene (chefs kiss).

Personally, it was so well done, showing why we are kind of here and why our Guardian finally now has a purpose as a “Guardian” specifically, and simply put, Bravo, Narrative Team, Bravo.

Same to the Raid and Dungeon team once again on the Desert Perpetual Raid.
Loved the way you can also choose any encounter was fun, and the story, plus narrative to extend the main story to add more of a conclusion and an experience in a raid in a non-linear were great, felt like entering The Leviathan raid again in some sense.

Now with that out of the way, let’s talk about the Quality of Life Changes, etc.

Quality of Life Changes - The Portal, etc

“We have to talk about this one…”

TLDR (if not wanting to read all that): With how the grind in the game is, there is a need for improvement in the reward structure to gain power level, etc.
Same with a dire need for a better choice of content to choose from.

But with that TLDR now out of the way and willing to read the rest, let's begin.

The Portal needs a lot more room for improvement to be done or changed.
I do feel the destinations side of the game has a nicer look/feel to it, and what stinks is that even when going to the destinations, it feels like in remembrance in a way, looking grayed out sorta.

Sure it’s great that it’s more simplified to do stuff easily, though knowing they are planning to put support to Destination and Portal, makes me hope that people can do pinnacles, etc, without the portal and with it so players who are more used to the Destinations side can play mostly on there or if wanting to have a quicker/easier option is the portal too.

Power Level changes specifically, I want to speak about, I am tired, boss….

It’s cool of them to do a soft reset, but does it feel that grinding power level again to 450 and likely 550 for Ash and Iron in September, feels like too much, and having that being reset most likely when Renegades dropping in December, feels like you might have to farm the same exotic mission (or another one), again and again for a pinnacle is a chore and not fun.

I want the game to feel more rewarding in beating harder difficulties to do a power grind easier, then it being a bonus power boost reward of just 3 or 2, I’d love a chance to get Tier 4 or 5 armor out of the batch instead, because Armor 3.0 feels so complex to play with in the sandbox as well not to mention since it may becoming annoying to mess with a lot in old builds or new, plus Raid and Dungeons should give a 5 or 9+ gear drop to be honest.

Since I do feel that once you hit Power 200/250, you should be able to farm Tier 4 armor/gear, and once at 300/350, you should be able to gain Tier 5 armor/gear right out of the batch.

The Portal and the way power grind plays out just needs to be re-worked on providing players a benefit to gaining power level and activities to choose from, and the fix is most likely optimising the reward structure and pinnacle ops in dire need of content instead of just exotic missions, with an easier and quicker way to gain power, same with gaining unstable core materials for infusion, but it does have ton of potential to be great as a new system for sure.

Shooting Range is pretty cool and don't have much to say since it's a really great feature to test builds, etc.
Even damage testing in the Shooting Range is super fun, even with champions too, and I hope they add more cool stuff like this in the future.

Conquests in the seasonal end also need to not be once per week or one per season which is a massive gripe for me since that just ruins the purpose to even play end game content specifically to grind power, locking players from gaining guardian ranks with having to play them twice when that’s almost impossible, unless they join a guardian that hasn’t done a conquest in an entire season or week.

Also, to add that I enjoyed the Soundtrack for this Expansion as well, same with the lovely remixes and nods to some of the older content was catchy, same with the destination music too, my favorite one has to be “Dreamin’ About The Past” and “An Invitation” from it, bravo to the music team always cooking up something everytime for me to hear their work in ways they have done before again and again.

Final Judgement/Result

The Edge of Fate has some interesting foundational changes despite it not being a new subclass, new gameplay things much or in the sandbox, sure, I do hope they tend to do stuff like that in the future.
Despite the problems, I am still looking forward to what this saga has to offer going forward, despite these problems.
The negativity in the expansion does suck because it happens and can be very demeaning, but either way, I still thought The Edge of Fate was a solid and fun experience.

The narrative in the story, the raid and everything in the expansion, besides the gameplay and matterspark was the key main factor that carried this expansion big time.

Still enjoyed them trying new things, despite the issues entirely, but either way..
This was a Very solid experience here from the Destiny 2 Team and wish them luck in improving the game onward, since there’s a lot of potential here in the new saga.

Review Result:
Quote:
“Destiny 2: The Edge of Fate enters a brand new saga as a solid experience, despite problems and issues in the aftermath.”
Rating: 7/10.

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