Bungie’s Destiny 2 will boast many new features, the most solo player-friendly being Guided Games. This will allow players to seek out like-minded allies for raids, Trials of Osiris and other activities, thus leading to clans they could potentially join.
Straightforward matchmaking for these activities was “incompatible” with the core Destiny experience according to project lead Mark Noseworthy. Speaking to GameRant, Noseworthy said that, “We’ve been pretty consistent that matchmaking is just incompatible for us. The type of community we want to have, the friendly, welcoming space we want Destiny to be. Because matchmaking takes anonymous people and puts them together and says, ‘Please behave.’ And then these really competitive activities we have say, ‘Please be good. Please communicate. Please coordinate. Please be fair to other players.’
“And you can do that when you have social groups that exist, but it doesn’t work when we put you with a random player or someone else. So matchmaking is fine for pickup-and-play PvP or strikes where you can’t really suck at this strike if you run forward and shoot everything. You don’t need to talk. And that’s great for certain modes, but when you are playing Trials of Osiris, you need to talk. When you are playing the raid – people have roles, there is coordination.”
As it stands, one of the biggest complaints in the original Destiny was the lack of in-game LFG to find groups to play with. Guided Games will achieve that but offer even more information the kinds of groups you want to play with.
“That’s why we think something like guided games, which is going to take solo players and allow them to look at the clans that have opened themselves up to single players for a session of Trials, a Nightfall, or a raid and pick, ‘Hey y’know this group seems a lot like me. They said they are really into playing with Hunters and they all like shotguns, and they are open to noobs. Well, I’m a noob, I’ll play with these guys.’
“Whereas someone else might say, ‘I’m an elite player but I don’t have any friends, but these guys are about kicking ass and taking names in the Crucible. That feels like a group I could play PvP with for 20 minutes and see what’s up.” And the fact that there is this agency on the seeker’s part, and the fact that they join a group that has an identity – has a motto and a banner, and social norms and customs in how they operate with people. Putting them together is fundamentally different, socially, than matching up with random players.”
Destiny 2 is out on September 8th for Xbox One and PS4. The PC version arrives later.