Destiny 2's Version Of Mercury Is Underwhelming So Far

The first expansion for Destiny 2, Curse of Osiris, was revealed during Paris Games Week this year and is set to launch on PS4, Xbox One, and PC on December 5. We recently got a chance to play several hours of the game, including just over an hour of exploration in the new destination, Mercury, the new Public Event, and two new Strikes. While we didn't see everything Curse of Osiris has to offer, we left Mercury feeling skeptical about what's to come.

Mercury as a destination is actually a rather small, circular area on the planet called the Fields of Glass, which is connected to the Lighthouse that Bungie showed off last week. The most notable thing about the new map is the assortment of powerful, "high-value target" enemies you can fight--there seems to be more of them in the Fields of Glass than at other locations in Destiny 2. Other than that, it's an unremarkable donut map, and we couldn't even summon Sparrows there--seemingly to mask how small the area is.

While we were at Bungie's headquarters, the team behind Curse of Osiris stated that the theme of the expansion was "mystery." We spent an hour and a half roaming the Fields of Glass and the Lighthouse, and it's clear there are secrets we couldn't find. We looked for a good 15 minutes but didn't see any Lost Sectors, the hidden dungeon-like areas you can find everywhere else in Destiny 2, though we were explicitly told there was one and that would be marked on the map in a later build. We figured there's some sort of trick to all the powerful enemies, too, but we didn't have time to experiment properly.

Outside of the exploration on Mercury, the new Strikes added in Curse of Osiris are essentially retreads of two of the expansion's story missions. Repetition is to be expected in Destiny, and the Strikes themselves have interesting bosses, but there isn't much variety in the level design between their story and Strike versions.

The coolest aspect of the expansion that we saw was the Infinite Forest, a Vex creation designed to simulate an infinite number of realities. The concept is promising--it seems procedurally generated, at least in part, and you can encounter all sorts of enemies inside--but the connection to exploration on Mercury isn't clear, since our access to it was limited to the story.

In addition to the Infinite Forest (or what we hope it will be), the new Public Event, Vex Crossroads, is one thing we're still curious about and excited to explore further. It involves killing a series of Vex in stages and alternating between two towers that are only accessible during the event. We weren't able to trigger the Heroic version, but we did identify some potential leads, so we're eager to try it again and see what secrets it holds.

While we haven't seen everything from Curse of Osiris yet--Bungie has more reveals planned for November 29--what we have played doesn't feel substantial enough to bring any lapsed Destiny players back. The main Mercury map is just a circle that's not terribly interesting to explore, and the new Strikes are uninspired. The mysterious Infinite Forest could hold the key to making Mercury and Curse of Osiris in general a good addition to what's already in Destiny 2, but we'll have to wait to find out.