Geek Review – Destiny 2: Curse of Osiris

Destiny 2 is a great game.

I had a grand old time powering up my three classes, raiding the Leviathan and putting Calus to the sword, and generally messing about with my clan mates. But there was only so much you can do with the base game content, and when Curse of Osiris finally arrived, I was pumped to immerse myself in the world of Destiny 2 again.

I wished I wasn’t that excited now.

The expansion (if you could call it that) adds very little, and what’s there is dull and disappointing to say the least. With a brief two to three hour long campaign addition that is as hollow as they come in terms of story, a miniscule public space with less to do than an empty room, and three new multiplayer maps (two if you are not on PlayStation 4), Curse of Osiris is a slap to the hardcore fans’ faces.

Besides increasing the level cap and power level cap, the only good to come out of it is the new Raid Lair activity, which offers enough challenge for endgame players, with unique puzzle elements and great loot to boot.

The unsatisfactory campaign additions brings Guardians to the new Infinite Forest on Mercury, an inorganic forest of time warps and time remnants that also holds two new Strikes, A Garden World and Tree of Probabilities. The Strikes are definitely better than the rest of the missions, and Bungie certainly played up the aspect of time-travel for these experiences. Mercury sure looked better when it’s all green and lush.

That said, the end bosses of the Strikes could use some buffing up. They were interesting, mechanics-wise, but so pathetically weak that any Fireteam could easily take down without breaking a sweat. Of course, they are more menacing on Heroic Strikes, but that only highlights how awfully unbalanced the game is for this new expansion. This goes for the normal mobs as well.

The most egregious offender has to be the final boss at the culmination of the campaign. This supposedly godlike being? Yeah, he went down like a wooden house on fire.

The encounter is uninteresting, and it is certainly not even worth the two-hour journey to end the new campaign. Add to that a lame introduction to the “legendary” rebel guardian Osiris, and Curse of Osiris is a cocktail of disaster. (Spoilers ahead)

Where is the Guardian who stood up against a whole city and left everyone else feeling uneasy? All that build up and mystery go up in smoke as the Osiris you meet is as friendly as can be, who bids you a fond farewell, and disappears as anticlimactically as he came. The potential of weaving an intriguing tale was sadly, wasted.

At least the new Adventures in the Infinite Forest and new loot can help soothe the pain a little. The use of the Infinite Forest left me wanting more in terms of randomized ending scenarios, but it is still not enough. The addition of new collectables in the form of Lost Prophecy verses/Radiolarian Cultures maintain Destiny’s insistence on more currency to track.

Thankfully, the Raid Lair is a great addition. A shortened, more concise version of the regular raid with new puzzles to figure out, even the boss was a more challenging and enjoyable fight than the rest of Curse of Osiris. You definitely have to give it a try even if you abhor the rest of the expansion.

The new Crucible maps – Pacifica, Radiant Cliffs, and the PlayStation-exclusive Wormhaven – are pretty well-designed, offering many opportunities for players to fight it out. The added verticality makes battles fresh and more interesting than the maps we have from vanilla Destiny 2.

However, nothing else has changed, the Crucible is still about team shooting and the fastest trigger finger, so if you are not a fan of that, the extra maps mean little.

Granted, the issue of locking content behind the paywall of Curse of Osiris and disabling trophies/achievements have now been resolved, but to think that Bungie thought it was the right move to make speaks volume about how they view their player base, and that is worrying.

The Curse of Osiris is a genuine dud for the Destiny franchise, offering little challenge and even fewer solutions for players looking for a true endgame experience. Even its redeeming additions like the Raid Lair can do little to distract from the fact that it is a mediocre expansion and not worth getting unless you are extremely into Destiny 2.