The current season of Destiny 2 wraps up this week, and the focus throughout this season has been preparing for a very specific attack. The Almighty, a ship used by the Cabal in the game’s base campaign, has been hurtling toward the Traveler and the Last City throughout the last many weeks, and players have been working with the AI Warmind named Rasputin to power a counter-attack.
In the final hours before the Almighty’s impending crash, Rasputin finally hit full power today, and for 90 painfully slow minutes, players were able to gather at the Tower and watch the fireworks. The Almighty loomed in the sky, blocking out the sun, and many of the Tower residents had changed positions to watch its approach.
I watched the entire event unfold, which at times left players, both in my gaming instance, and in online forums for the game, scratching their heads in confusion. Had the event started? Was something more going to happen? As it turns out, the event was always intended to be a very slow burn. As we watched, red flashing laser blasts from Rasputin began to appear in the sky from multiple directions. And only after watching for nearly an hour could players see any sense of the weapons hitting their target.
After the initial barrage, the debris in the distant sky became more obvious, until at long last, the Almighty’s core began to appear to distintegrate.
An hour and half after it all started, a huge flash of light showed the Almighty’s entry into our atmosphere, and its near miss as its shattered hulk flew past the Last City, the Tower, and the Traveler, and finally, came to rest in the distant mountains, sending out an enormous shockwave that temporarily deafened the Guardians watching.
The entire event was indeed a strange one. In any given instance of the Tower, you could see numerous fellow players simply sitting, unmoving, watching the very slow and distant events unfold. Hardly the norm in an action-packed FPS. Players emoted, having their Guardians eat popcorn, or sit in imaginary lawn chairs. But the final explosion and near-destruction of the Tower certainly made for some drama.
In addition, players were able to move to an area near Commander Zavala after the event, where a piece of debris hit a portion of the Tower, and retrieve a new emblem to commemorate their attendance.
Check out some pictures of the event, in sequence, from the gallery below.
Destiny 2’s new season, which remains something of a mystery, begins this Tuesday, June 9.
Click image thumbnails to view larger version
Source: Game Informer
