Destiny as an Episodic Narrative

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Thursday, April 04, 2013, 15:00 (4062 days ago) @ Flynn J Taggart

I'm getting an Elder Scrolls-ish narrative vibe from how Bungie's describing Destiny, also. I think when they're referring to the episodic nature of Destiny, they're probably talking about it in the sense of City of Heroes having semi-regular comic "issues" (episodes) that introduce new content into the game and progress some overarching story forward, but the world itself is still sandbox-y enough to support your own story doing your own thing. The episodes basically serve as backdrop for the world itself.

Ah, the whole episodes thing. Aren't we at the point where this has generally been proven to be ineffective? Spartan Ops tells the story much less effectively than a real campaign, and other genres that have tried episodic gaming either have episodes which don't reach critical mass for sufficient complexity, or the episodes take as long to develop as a full game proper. I can't really recall any episodic games that are significantly better than if they had been a single release or a series of larger releases.