Skip to main content

Destiny 2’s hot new exotic is another pay-to-win headache

Few things get the Guardians of Destiny 2 excited like hunting for the latest and greatest exotic weapons. Osteo Striga is one such weapon. This unique SMG debuted with Destiny 2: The Witch Queen, but with a problematic caveat: Only players who are willing to pay extra are eligible to acquire the gun at launch.

It’s the latest in a troubling trend of Bungie turning the pay-to-win screws into one of the best fanbases in gaming, and is one of the few black marks in how the developer engages with its community.

Recommended Videos

Further reading

The problem with Osteo Striga

Crafting the Osteo Striga in Destiny 2.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Osteo Striga is a crafted weapon, part of a new system that has debuted with The Witch Queen. “Eligibleplayers can retrieve a Pattern (aka blueprint) for the gun at any time after completing the new campaign from their triumphs tab, and use it at the Artifact, a device at the center of the crafting mechanic.

So, what makes a player eligible? Spending money. At launch, only players who have purchased the $80 Deluxe Edition of Destiny 2: The Witch Queen can get their hands on Osteo Striga. All other players will need to wait until the weapon joins the general loot pool, at an indeterminate future date.

That means players need to make a choice whether or not to spend additional real-world money in order to unlock a powerful item that can directly impact their success in PVP and PVE activities. A weapon is being held hostage behind a paywall, and gamers can either pay the ransom or risk being on the receiving end of a weapon they themselves cannot wield.

A history of pay to win

The inventory card for Gjallahorn in Destiny 2.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

This isn’t an isolated example of dangling desirable weapons in front of players to coax more real money investment from them. No Time to Explain is an Exotic pulse rifle from Destiny 2: Beyond Light that began as an item reserved for higher-paying customers before being made available to everyone in a later season.

The most egregious example of this pay-walling was Gjallarhorn. This Exotic Rocket Launcher was the most iconic weapon in the first Destiny game. Its return was heavily requested by the community, and Bungie delivered during the studio’s recent 30th Anniversary Event. It should have been a celebration by Guardians franchise-wide.

It’s arguably the most powerful and desirable heavy weapon in the game. Having access to Gjallarhorn is a tangible advantage for players and it’s only available to players willing to pay for premium content. It’s the textbook definition of pay-to-win, even if there are plenty of other powerful, free weapons players can use.

This isn’t just an issue of free-to-play versus paid content. The Witch Queen isn’t free, players have spent the $40 in order to access the new content and experience the next story in the overarching Destiny narrative. Those players have paid, but not enough to earn Osteo Striga. It’s the kind of upsell you’d expect from a door-to-door salesman, not a video game.

No one can reasonably demand a game as vast and complex as Destiny 2 be perfectly balanced across all possible loadouts and weapon permutations. It is perfectly reasonable to offer value to your best-paying customers. But everyone who loads into Destiny, or any online-focused game, should be able to expect the basic courtesy of a level playing field, where spending money doesn’t directly translate into better and more effective equipment. It’s exploitative and erodes so many years of well-earned trust between a developer and the community that supports it.

Topics
Justin Koreis
Justin is a freelance writer with a lifelong love of video games and technology. He loves writing about games, especially…
Bungie plots Destiny 2: The Final Shape overhaul in wake of mass layoffs
Guardians stand together in Destiny 2: The Final Shape key art.

Destiny 2 developer Bungie has broken its silence after laying off around 100 staff members earlier this week. The studio posted a blog update that acknowledged the move and teased a major change in plans for Destiny 2's next big DLC, The Final Shape.

On Monday, October 30, Bungie laid off a sizable chunk of its staff in departments including community, QA, audio, and more. According to a report from IGN, Bungie CEO Pete Parsons cited Destiny 2's declining performance in 2023 as a cause. A report from Bloomberg noted that Bungie's upcoming projects were internally delayed as part of the move, with The Final Shape quietly moving to June 2024.

Read more
Destiny 2 studio Bungie hit by layoffs, internal game delays
A runner runs in Marathon.

Amid a wave of layoffs at Destiny developer and Sony subsidiary Bungie this week, Destiny 2: The Final Shape and Marathon have both reportedly been delayed.
On Monday morning, tweets from developers revealed that Bungie, which was acquired by Sony in January 2022, was suffering layoffs. This was followed up by a report from Bloomberg that went into more detail about the layoffs and their impact on Bungie's future games. Sony and Bungie have not officially commented on the delays yet, although the Bloomberg article mentions that Bungie CEO Pete Parsons will hold a team meeting later today to discuss the layoffs further. This all follows contractor layoffs at Sony studio Naughty Dog earlier this month, which happened as that studio struggles to develop and release a The Last of Us multiplayer game. 

Bloomberg suggests that these layoffs, like others at Sony this year, are tied to internal game delays. While Destiny 2: The Final Shape is publicly slated to come out in February 2024, Bungie reportedly told staff that it's now going to come out in June 2024. Meanwhile, we learned that Bungie's revival of Marathon was apparently targeting a 2024 launch -- although no release window was given officially -- but will now come out sometime in 2025. These delays make the PlayStation 5's 2024 game lineup look pretty sparse right now outside of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, and it suggests that Destiny 2's next season will be one of its longest.
As of now, Sony and Bungie have not publicly commented on the layoffs or delays, but we will update this post when they do say more about it.

Read more
The little details in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2’s new trailer make a big splash
Peter and Miles leaping in the air in the city.

A new look at Marvel's Spider-Man 2 wrapped up Sony's September State of Play presentation narrated by Bryan Intihar and showcased all the details our wall-crawling heroes can expect in the nearly twice as large open world.

Marvel's Spider-Man 2 - Expanded Marvel's New York | PS5 Games

Read more