There’s something about returning to lots of Future’s earlier places, together with the very first areas of the unique recreation, that makes The Ultimate Form reek of highschool. Rather a lot has modified in regards to the collection within the ten years since our ghost first discovered us simply outdoors of Outdated Russia. Furthermore, working down the identical halls I as soon as traipsed with the outdated gang seems like a highschool reunion of types. Once I was first right here, I felt so small, however coming again to my outdated haunts all these years later as a much bigger and higher model of myself has revealed simply how a lot I’ve grown within the years since.
Future 2, like absolutely anything that’s been working for ten years, is hard to interrupt into. There’s a lot of characters, motivations, plot twists, and correct nouns to maintain monitor of. For the longest time, Future 2 has reveled in these items, spinning a hell of a yarn for the followers who’ve caught round for all of it over time. The Ultimate Form is unconcerned with most of these nitty-gritty lore tidbits because it brings a few of these arcs to an in depth, putting emphasis as an alternative on large emotions and a surreal surroundings that lends these emotions actual energy. This makes it a bit messy, however there’s one thing deeply transferring about how a lot The Ultimate Form wears its coronary heart on its sleeve, too.
The Ultimate Form has the unenviable process of getting to shut out this guide of Future’s historical past. I frightened about the way it may start to deal with such an immense process, which appears not possible to perform to the satisfaction of everybody taking part in. The reply Bungie discovered, nevertheless, is fairly easy: maintain the story lean, funnel the participant to the climactic battle, and tug on some heartstrings when you’re at it.
Emotions given form
Future 2’s climactic conclusion to the Mild and Darkness saga does middle the collection’ villain, the Witness, greater than it ever has earlier than, but it surely’s tough to name them and their motivations the center of this enlargement. That honor’s reserved for probably the most extremely esteemed and messy fireteam in Future’s historical past, the Vanguard. Commander Zavala, Ikorra Rey, and the returning Cayde-6 make The Ultimate Form thrum with an electrical and uneasy vitality as their painful reunion will get swept up into the bigger disaster of the tip of the world.
Upon coming into the Pale Coronary heart of the Traveler, a vacation spot that reuses and distorts a number of environments from Future’s previous, issues really feel instantly off. The Pale Coronary heart is usually beauteous, particularly the place nature appears to have reclaimed long-forgotten locales, however pockets of it tout these huge veiled statues of ghastly figures that Future 2 gamers have turn into accustomed to, and calcified palms appear to jut from the bottom and caves. As you push deeper into the festering wound the Witness has minimize right here, the environments develop extra tortured and agonized faces protrude from partitions. The Ultimate Form leans into ache, worry, and anger, and it particularly comes by within the Pale Coronary heart. If I could, it appears good on Future.
This enlargement’s central forged goes by it simply as a lot because the world seems to be. Ikorra and Zavala’s reunion with their finest buddy Cayde-6 is…lower than joyous. His look, in addition to the present, pressing state of issues, prompts crises of faiths that see some characters pushed past their breaking factors, and right here is the place I’d like to present a nod to Future’s secure of voice actors. Everybody from Keith David (taking up as Zavala from the late Lance Reddick) to Kirsten Potter as Mara Sov clearly understood the task, and their line readings on this enlargement are a number of the most emotive and expressive stuff I’ve ever heard within the collection. Mara Sov’s anguished cries for her brother haunted me the whole lot of the marketing campaign, and Zavala, Ikorra, and Cayde particularly have some emotionally resonant and hard conversations. They verbally spurn one another like jilted pals that by no means bought over the bitter finish of a cherished relationship, however in addition they have probably the most tender moments of the entire expertise too. Their performances assist floor the finality of the occasions occuring all through The Ultimate Form.
Rising pains
The power of those numerous performances helps masks the truth that little else appears to be happening for all of Future 2’s numerous ongoing threads outdoors of the Pale Coronary heart. Whereas I’m grateful for the emotional weight of the beats The Ultimate Form does ship for some beloved characters, I can’t assist however be let down that this doesn’t really feel like Future 2’s “Avengers, assemble” second. I’ll doubtless be confirmed mistaken by the point the raid rolls round—and there’s a seasonal story appended to The Ultimate Form that’ll doubtless tease out a few of these secondary plots—but it surely’s a bummer that extra of the allies and pals we’ve made alongside the way in which haven’t figured in additional prominently.
The Ultimate Form’s missions are a bit uneven, too. Although they’re definitely a step above Lightfall’s marketing campaign, which felt tonally confused from the get-go, they don’t fairly attain the highs of The Witch Queen, both. The Ultimate Form will get the stakes, not less than, however fails to make immense moments or mechanical setpieces of them. Which isn’t to say I didn’t have a blast, as a result of I did, particularly as Future campaigns proceed to borrow mechanics from its endgame raids that deepen the story expertise. Whereas many of the marketing campaign missions got here and went, an exciting strike and the ultimate mission have been the most important standouts, boasting a combination of environmental design and mechanics that recalled the highs of Future’s easiest encounters. However whereas I felt I may level to quite a few landmark moments in The Witch Queen marketing campaign, like a sure boss encounter in a sprawling maze-like surroundings, I principally discovered approximations of a few of Future’s best hits, together with that exact same encounter, in The Ultimate Form.
It additionally struggles to make the brand new Prismatic subclass stand out, although this isn’t precisely new to Future expansions. Prismatic blends the entire earlier parts (Void, Arc, Photo voltaic, Stasis, and Strand) and turns gamers right into a super-powered warrior able to utilizing all of them concurrently. It’s the definition of an influence journey, and but, the marketing campaign deploys the brand new subclass as extra of a gimmick than a brand new a part of the participant’s arsenal, although I’m positive that may give solution to radical builds as soon as gamers clear the story and get into The Ultimate Form’s postgame.
I nonetheless actually loved The Ultimate Form (regardless of server points) and I’ll admit that a number of the low-cost nostalgia performs it pulled efficiently made me teary-eyed. Even when it doesn’t totally land, it’s bought a lot coronary heart, and wrings a lot from a forged and world I like, that I can’t fault it too closely for its missteps. It’s not less than as targeted as Future 2 has ever been, and because the twists and turns stored piling up, I couldn’t wait to see the place of us wound up. It’s a bit of laborious to consider, however an period of Future 2 is ending, and true to itself, The Ultimate Form is an appropriately uneven however endearing shut to 1 chapter and the start of a brand new one.
