Now that Destiny 2's Season of Opulence is well underway, excited Guardians are already looking forward to the Shadowkeep expansion. Bungie's already spoken quite a bit about Shadowkeep, noting it as the first step in a new direction for the franchise since the company' split from Activision. Today, Bungie saw fit to provide more perspective, confirming that Destiny 2: Shadowkeep will be of a size to Destiny expansion Rise of Iron.

Speaking to PC Gamer, Destiny 2 game director Luke Smith characterized Shadowkeep as similar in scale to the original Destiny's final expansion. Rise of Iron was the fourth of Destiny's expansions, following up the major Taken King "comet" expansion and bringing the storyline of the original game to a conclusion. As such, Rise of Iron wasn't as big of an expansion as Taken King, but more akin to Destiny 2's first two expansions, Dark Below and House of Wolves. Arguably, it was even smaller than what had come prior.

For some perspective into Smith's saying that Shadowkeep will be of similar scale to Rise of Iron, the interview in which he said it had a focus on Bungie's new plans for Seasonal content. More than that, it had to do with Bungie's plans to avoid a "burst" of content as opposed to spreading the "peanut butter evenly over the bread." Also note that Bungie's reveal of Shadowkeep went hand in hand with its pronouncement that Destiny 2's nature as an MMO will be embraced going forward.

In other words, Bungie's modern approach to content is to provide it in pieces over a wide time period, to keep players invested in its ever-changing Destiny 2 world day-to-day, week-to-week, and month-to-month. To start, that means Shadowkeep will be of scale with Rise of Iron instead of Taken King, but for Destiny 2 Guardians who keep playing over a long period of time, Shadowkeep may feel more fulfilling overall. That's if Bungie can deliver on its goals, of course.

Much remains to be said and shown about Shadowkeep. Its success, as well as Bungie's internal view of whether it successfully delivered on its own promises, will define the future of Destiny 2 (or lack thereof). At face value, Shadowkeep and its annual pass look a lot like Forsaken and its annual pass. Bungie's job, from the perspective of players, is differentiating Shadowkeep from Forsaken in a meaningful way and proving that things are better now without Activision's involvement. Not an easy job, but clearly both Bungie and its fans are hopeful.

Destiny 2 is available now on PC, PS4, and Xbox One, with a Stadia version also in development.

Source: PC Gamer