Destiny Concerns: The Potential Faults Of This Year’s Biggest Game

Now You See Me, Now You [Mostly] Don’t

When you first start playing Destiny, you get to pick a male or female character, get to choose from three separate races, and can select from a number of head shapes, skin colors, hairstyles, and facial markings. Then you start playing, the helmet goes on, and you might as well have the head of a crash test dummy for the majority of the game.

Yes, Destiny is a first person shooter, and you do get to see your character in all his or her full helmet-less glory in the social tower area, but during any given mission you’ll needlessly lose that personal connection to your character’s appearance. When riding on a vehicle, or using the D-pad to gesture, or activating your super move, or looking at your character in a mission results screen, each and every time is a missed opportunity to remind you of the man, or woman, (or robot) behind the mask.

Plenty of games deal with this issue by including a “hide helmet” option that gives you the stats of your current helmet, while still allowing you to see your character’s face. I can only hope that Bungie includes a similar option in the final game.