Destiny 2 – The Witch Queen review (PC)

Almost six years after its initial release, Destiny 2 is still going strong, and the release of The Witch Queen proves it. It’s available for all systems that support the game, and we tested the PC version.

When it comes to Destiny 2, there is a whole range of players who stick with it and embrace its ‘games as a service’ model, populating its multiplayers servers for matches almost on a daily basis. For us, however, Destiny 2 is all about the major campaign beats and story-related releases, and it feels like The Witch Queen really caters to players like us.

There aren’t a whole lot of gameplay elements here, but for Destiny veterans there is a story campaign that goes all the way back to The Taken King, which was released for the original Destiny. It reintroduces Savathûn, sister to the Taken King Oryx and the Queen of Lies. Forsaken was memorable for its quality storytelling, so it’s nice to see Bungie return to that story tangent in a big way. We can’t dive too much into the story here for obvious reasons, but it’s full of both big story twists and subtle nods for those more invested in the Destiny lore.

Gameplay-wise, the Glaive weapon type is a nice new addition, and The Witch Queen also introduces weapon crafting. The latter feels more like a stepping stone on the way to future expansions and more longevity for the game, although there were a few instances where the pacing of the story led to grinding as well. In those cases it’s nice to have a bit of weapon crafting to keep you busy, but these pacing issues were more of a result of difficulty spikes on account of playing solo than by narrative design. For a campaign that’s narrative-driven, it is a shame that it’s less welcoming to solo players who play Destiny 2 for its gameplay and lore rather than its multiplayer aspects.

Luckily, the story is more than good enough to make you want to deal with these slight pacing issues when playing solo, and those who engage with the multiplayer will find it a non-issue. For anyone interested in the Destiny’s story aspects, this is a must-have expansion, and when looking at the quality shown here we’re glad that Bungie’s planning further story expansions as well. Bring it on.

Score: 8.5/10