The Halloween season is upon us, and so too is Destiny 2's annual Festival of the Lost celebration. Most of the spooky elements in the annual event, including the Haunted Forest game mode, have stayed consistent with last year, though one change made to the special mission for this year has proven to be an unintentional nuisance. Players have reported unacceptably low drop rates for the event's Cipher Decoder items, which can be used to unlock up to five item chests at the end of a Haunted Forest run.
After assuring players it was investigating the issue, Destiny 2 developer Bungie announced that further changes were made to the Cipher Decoder drop rates. The studio says it will continue to gauge fan feedback over the weekend, and told players that the items were not intended to drop from strikes outside of Vanguard playlists, enemy kills, Gambit matches, or Forge completions.
Guardians still have three weeks to snag all of the Festival of the Lost rewards they can, including the impressively stylish Halloween armor ornament sets and an expanded selection of Destiny character-themed masks to wear during the event. If the adjustments fix the drop rate for Cipher Decoders, players should have more opportunities to get some more rewards from the Haunted Forest, like the perfect roll on the Braytech Werewolf.
Fan reception to Destiny 2's events has been mixed for a while. Detractors of Bungie's in-game celebrations have argued that they're designed to sell cosmetic items in the Eververse store above all else, and the latest issue hasn't helped matters. Farming methods for Cipher Decoders have already popped up in the four days since the start of the Festival, though, and fans eager to get their hands on new masks and items from the Haunted Forest are already grinding hard to add to their collections.
The Festival of the Lost comes at something of an awkward time for Destiny 2 this year. The event will serve as the last major part of the game to arrive before the Beyond Light expansion launches next month, and caps off a season that will last two whole months longer than usual. Most of the studio's focus is probably on launching Beyond Light and looking to the future of the game, but annual events like Festival of the Lost keep loyal Destiny fans invested.
Players have speculated that Destiny 2's Content Vault may mean that Festival of the Lost would have to return in a much different form next year. The Infinite Forest map that the Haunted Forest mode is built on is set to disappear from the game next month. Bungie has not announced any specific plans for future events, but it is possible that this will be the last time players may see the Haunted Forest for a while.
Destiny 2 is available for PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One, and versions for the PS5 and Xbox Series X are in development.
Source: @BungieHelp on Twitter
